Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 3).djvu/262

 me? Did you not expect me, then? ( staggers and falls into arms). Why, Noel! Noel! Don't you know me? It is I, Adrien.

(sobbing, and then recovering slowly).—Oh, my dear, dear boy! I am so happy. (Clasps in his arms.)

(after a pause)—But, Noel, I don't understand all this. Did you not receive my letter?

.—No; nothing has come.

.—It must have miscarried then. And my other letters from Germany? I wrote to you, last month, that I had recovered from my wounds.

.—There! What did I say? So you were not killed, after all?

.—Killed! Do I look as if I had been killed? But, Noel, my mother?

.—The poor lady believes you dead.

.—Dead?

.—Yes, killed by the enemy. Good gracious, how are we to tell her of your safety?

.—My poor dear mother. How I long to embrace her!

.—You frighten me at the bare idea. If she saw you now, she would fall dead on the spot.

.—It was to avoid all this difficulty that I wrote to you from Brussels, where I made my way after escaping from Germany.

.—Hush! I hear her footstep on the stairs.

.—My mother?

(listening).—Yes; she has stopped to rest a moment. What's to be done? Ah! let's fasten the door. No, that would excite her suspicions Here! help me to push the sofa against the door.

(outside, and trying to open the door).—Noel!

.—Her voice! My dear, dear mother!

(outside, calling).—Noel!

(aside).—I must answer. (Aloud) I thought you were gone for a walk, Madame, so I took advantage to dust the drawing-room a bit. Shall I move the sofa back and let you in? There's an awful cloud of dust here!

.—Never mind, then. I only came for my volume of "Lamartine," you will find it on the table. Give it me.

(aside—taking book from table L.C.). One of my own books. (Kisses it.)

.—Yes, Madame.

Is that it, Madame ?

(outside).—Yes, thanks.

.—Phew! I'm all in a cold perspiration (sits).

(at window).—How pale, how changed she is!

(pulling him away).—I'm changed, too. My hair has all turned grey—what there is of it.

.—And I cannot clasp her in my arms.