When embracing her father she colored like a guilty wife who is unable to dissimulate; but her face recovered its serenity as she looked at Emmanuel, from whom she seemed to gather strength to complete a work she had secretly undertaken.
Notwithstanding the gaiety which animated all present during the dinner, father and daughter watched each other with distrust and curiosity.
Balthazar asked his daughter no questions as to her stay in Paris, doubtless to preserve his parental dignity.

Emmanuel de Solis imitated his reserve; but Pierquin, accustomed to be told all family secrets, said to Marguerite, concealing his curiosity under a show of liveliness:-- "Well, my dear cousin, you have seen Paris and the theatres--" "I have seen little of Paris," she said; "I did not go there for amusement.

The days went by sadly, I was so impatient to see Douai once more." "Yes, if I had not been angry about it she would not have gone to the Opera; and even there she was uneasy," said Monsieur Conyncks.
It was a painful evening; every one was embarrassed and smiled vaguely with the artificial gaiety which hides such real anxieties.

Marguerite and Balthazar were a prey to cruel, latent fears which reacted on the rest.

As the hours passed, the bearing of the father and daughter grew more and more constrained.