After dinner on the evening before the start was to be
made, the colonel had taken his daughter by the arm and made her feel
the necessity of deciding.
"Our position with the d'Herouville family will be quite intolerable
at Rosembray," he said to her. "Do you mean to be a duchess?"
"No, father," she answered.
"Then do you love Canalis?"
"No, papa, a thousand times no!" she exclaimed with the impatience of
a child.
The colonel looked at her with a sort of joy.
"Ah, I have not influenced you," cried the true father, "and I will
now confess that I chose my son-in-law in Paris when, having made him
believe that I had but little fortune, he grasped my hand and told me
I took a weight from his mind--"
"Who is it you mean?" asked Modeste, coloring.
"_The man of fixed principles and sound moralities_," said her father,
slyly, repeating the words which had dissolved poor Modeste's dream on
the day after his return.
"I was not even thinking of him, papa. Please leave me at liberty to
refuse the duke myself; I understand him, and I know how to soothe
him."
"Then your choice is not made?"
"Not yet; there is another syllable or two in the charade of my
destiny still to be guessed; but after I have had a glimpse of court
life at Rosembray I will tell you my secret.
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