"
"For what? What have I done?" asked she with an air of great innocence.
"You have made me happy, me who adore you," was the evasive reply.
Josephine came in from her walk with a high color and beaming eyes, and
screamed, "Run, Rose!"
On this concise, and to us not very clear instruction, Rose slipped up
the secret stair. She saw Camille come in and gravely unpack his little
portmanteau, and dispose his things in the drawers with soldier-like
neatness, and hum an agreeable march. She came and told Josephine.
"Ah!" said Josephine with a little sigh of pleasure, and a gentle
triumph in her eyes.
She had not only got her desire, but had arrived at it her way,--woman's
way, round about.
This adroit benevolence led to more than she bargained for. She and
Camille were now together every day: and their hearts, being under
restraint in public, melted together all the more in their stolen
interviews.
At the third delicious interview the modest Camille begged Josephine to
be his wife directly.
Have you noticed those half tame deer that come up to you in a park so
lovingly, with great tender eyes, and, being now almost within reach,
stop short, and with bodies fixed like statues on pedestals, crane
out their graceful necks for sugar, or bread, or a chestnut, or a
pocket-handkerchief? Do but offer to put your hand upon them, away they
bound that moment twenty yards, and then stand quite still, and look at
your hand and you, with great inquiring, suspicious, tender eyes.
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