We walked back to the Rue Fossette by moonlight--such moonlight as fell on Eden--shining through the shades of the Great Garden, and haply gilding a path glorious for a step divine--a Presence nameless. Once in their lives some men and women go back to these first fresh days of our great Sire and Mother--taste that grand morning's dew-- bathe in its sunrise.
In the course of the walk I was told how Justine Marie Sauveur had always been regarded with the affection proper to a daughter--how, with M. Paul's consent, she had been affianced for months to one Heinrich Mühler, a wealthy young German merchant, and was to be married in the course of a year. Some of M. Emanuel's relations and connections would, indeed, it seems, have liked him to marry her, with a view to securing her fortune in the family; but to himself the scheme was repugnant, and the idea totally inadmissible.
We reached Madame Beck's door. Jean Baptiste's clock tolled nine. At this hour, in this house, eighteen months since, had this man at my side bent before me, looked into my face and eyes, and arbitered my destiny. This very evening he had again stooped, gazed, and decreed. How different the look--how far otherwise the fate!
He deemed me born under his star: he seemed to have spread over me its beam like a banner. Once--unknown, and unloved, I held him harsh and strange; the low stature, the wiry make, the angles, the darkness, the manner, displeased me. Now, penetrated with his influence, and living by his affection, having his worth by intellect, and his goodness by heart--I preferred him before all humanity.
We parted: he gave me his pledge, and then his farewell. We parted: the next day--he sailed.