"What is it?" she asked, dropping down on a log, fur-covered for a stool.
"Renée, I wonder if you would like to go away and visit wonderful, beautiful countries, where people have books and pictures and fine houses, and where there are elegant men and women----"
She took the rather rough hand in hers, soft as velvet, and gazed at him out of surprised eyes.
"Would you like to go?" studying her lovely face.
"But if some one younger and handsome, well-informed, accustomed to a more refined life, should care for you, should want to take you, should----"
"Oh, what is it you mean? And who is it? And I could not go unless"--her face was scarlet--"unless he married me, I know that. And there is no one I would marry. Do you think I would go away and leave you, when I love you so, when you wanted me and no one else did? Why, I would not marry a king!" and she clasped her arms about his neck.
Then a sudden knowledge flashed over her. She recalled last evening.
"I know!" she exclaimed. "It is Monsieur Laflamme. And he dared----"
"No, he did not speak. But you can make one understand. Perhaps he might have, but André came."
Renée rose suddenly and stretched up her full height.
"Then he did mean-- André said he was only pretending. I should hate him still more if he could do that! But if he thinks I care for him and would go away with him to the fairest spot in the world--oh, you do not want me to!" and she threw herself into his arms, sobbing vehemently.
"Renée, child, there is no harm done. He was very gentlemanly. He asked for your hand as an honest man should. And we cannot blame him altogether," a spice of humor in his tone. "He fancied you cared for him. Men occasionally make mistakes."
Had she made him believe that? She had tried somewhat without considering the consequences. The little triumph _had_ appealed to her girlish vanity. How could she explain it?
"I liked him a little," she confessed brokenly. "And I was proud and delighted to be chosen his queen. But I do not want him to love me. I do not want any one to love me but just you. I shall never love any one else."
It was a very sweet confession, but she did not know what it meant. So her mother had said, and he wanted to believe he had held _her_ truest faith, and this had descended to her child.