"Mariette," said she, "is Jerome in his master's confidence?" "I do not know, mademoiselle." "Do not play the innocent with me," said Mademoiselle de Watteville drily. "You let him kiss you last night under the kiosk; I no longer wonder that you so warmly approved of my mother's ideas for the improvements she planned." Rosalie could feel how Mariette was trembling by the shaking of her arm. "I wish you no ill," Rosalie went on. "Be quite easy; I shall not say a word to my mother, and you can meet Jerome as often as you please." "But, mademoiselle," said Mariette, "it is perfectly respectable; Jerome honestly means to marry me--" "But then," said Rosalie, "why meet at night?" Mariette was dumfounded, and could make no reply. "Listen, Mariette; I am in love too! In secret and without any return. I am, after all, my father's and mother's only child. You have more to hope for from me than from any one else in the world--" "Certainly, mademoiselle, and you may count on us for life or death," exclaimed Mariette, rejoiced at the unexpected turn of affairs. "In the first place, silence for silence," said Rosalie. "I will not marry Monsieur de Soulas; but one thing I will have, and must have; my help and favor are yours on one condition only." "What is that?" "I must see the letters which Monsieur Savaron sends to the post by Jerome." "But what for?" said Mariette in alarm. "Oh! merely to read them, and you yourself shall post them afterwards. It will cause a little delay; that is all." At this moment they went into church, and each of them, instead of reading the order of Mass, fell into her own train of thought. "Dear, dear, how many sins are there in all that?" thought Mariette. Rosalie, whose soul, brain, and heart were completely upset by reading the story, by this time regarded it as history, written for her rival.