"
"Never!" he said, half raising himself on his elbow with a
mighty effort. "Well taught!--yes, I know the sort of teaching
she will get there; she will be taught to hate and despise me,
and then they will make her a nun--they will try to do it, but
that shall never be! I will make Madelon promise me that. My
little one a nun!--I will not have it! Ah! I risk too much; she
shall not go!"
He fell back on the pillow gasping, panting, almost sobbing,
all pretence and semblance of cynicism and indifference gone
in the miserable moment of weakness and despair. Was it for
this, then, that he had taught his child to love him--that he
had watched and guarded and cherished her--that he should place
her now in the hands of his enemy, and that she should learn
to hate his memory when he was dead? Ah! he was dying, and
from the grave there would be no return--no hand could be
stretched out from thence to claim her--no voice make itself
heard to appeal to her old love for him, to remind her of
happy bygone days when she had believed in him, and to bid her
to be faithful to him still.
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