"
Graham had heard nothing of this little altercation, but now
coming out of the bed-room to speak to Madame Lavaux, he found
a most determined little Madelon standing with her hands
clasped behind her, and her back set firmly against the wall,
absolutely refusing to retreat.
She sprang forward, however, as soon as she saw him.
"I may go to papa now, may I not?" she cried.
"Mademoiselle wants to go to her papa," says Madame, at the
same moment, "I beg of you, Monsieur, to tell her it is
impossible, and that she had better come with me. She asserts
that her father will want her."
"That is all nonsense," said Graham hastily; "of course she
cannot come in now," then noticing Madelon's poor little face,
alternately white, and flushed with misery and passion, he
said, "Listen to me, Madelon; you can do your father no good
now. He would not know you, my poor child, and you would only
be in the way. But I promise you that by-and-by you shall see
him."
"By-and-by," said Madelon; "how soon?"
"As soon as we can possibly manage it."
Nothing, perhaps, would have induced Madelon at that moment to
have given into Madame Lavaux' unsupported persuasions, but
she yielded at once to Horace; indeed her sudden passion had
already died away at the sight of his face, at the sound of
the kind voice which she had somehow begun to associate with a
sense of help and protection.
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