"Hold your book right way up, miss," she muttered in a low voice,
tremulous with wrath. She snatched away the tell-tale prayer-book and
returned it with the letter-press right way up. "Do not allow your
eyes to look anywhere but at your prayers," she added, "or I shall
have something to say to you. Your father and I will talk to you after
church."
These words came like a thunderbolt on poor Augustine. She felt faint;
but, torn between the distress she felt and the dread of causing a
commotion in church she bravely concealed her anguish. It was,
however, easy to discern the stormy state of her soul from the
trembling of her prayer-book, and the tears which dropped on every
page she turned. From the furious glare shot at him by Madame
Guillaume the artist saw the peril into which his love affair had
fallen; he went out, with a raging soul, determined to venture all.
"Go to your room, miss!" said Madame Guillaume, on their return home;
"we will send for you, but take care not to quit it."
The conference between the husband and wife was conducted so secretly
that at first nothing was heard of it. Virginie, however, who had
tried to give her sister courage by a variety of gentle remonstrances,
carried her good nature so far as to listen at the door of her
mother's bedroom where the discussion was held, to catch a word or
two. The first time she went down to the lower floor she heard her
father exclaim, "Then, madame, do you wish to kill your daughter?"
"My poor dear!" said Virginie, in tears, "papa takes your part.
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