" Then she entered the inn, but stopped on the threshold,
and, casting on me a strangely wistful look, she added, "Great must be
the friendship between you and La Tournoire, that you can so confidently
assure his protection to those for whom you ask it."
"Oh, I have done much for him, and he cannot refuse me any request that
it is in his power to grant," I said, truly enough.
"Then," she went on, "the tie is one of obligation, rather than of great
friendship?"
"Yes. I have often been in a position to do him great services when no
one else was, and when he most needed them. As for my feeling of
friendship for him, I shall not even weep when he is dead."
"Suppose you should love a woman," she continued, with a strange
eagerness, "and there should come a time when you would have to choose
between your love for her, and your friendship for this man, which
would prevail?"
"I would sacrifice La Tournoire for the woman I loved," I answered,
with truth.
She looked at me steadily, and a hope seemed to dawn in her eyes, but in
a moment they darkened again; she sighed deeply, and she turned to ascend
to her chamber, while I stood there trying to deduce a meaning from her
strange speeches and conduct, which I finally put down to the
capaciousness of woman. I could understand the feeling that she ought to
part from a man who loved her and whom her religion forbade her to love
in return; but why she should seem pleased at the apparent lukewarmness
of my friendship for La Tournoire, whom she was willing to accept as her
guide, I could not guess.
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