My God, man, I tell you that
in these past two years I have hoped that you were dead, and you
profoundly disappoint me that you are not!" He beat his hands
together, and raised his shrill voice to call - "Benoit!" He strode
away towards the fireplace, scarlet in the face, shaking with the
passion into which he had worked himself. "Dead, I might have
forgiven you, as one who had paid for his evil, and his folly.
Living, I never can forgive you. You have gone too far. God alone
knows where it will end.
"Benoit, the door. M. Andre-Louis Moreau to the door!" The tone
argued an irrevocable determination. Pale and self-contained, but
with a queer pain at his heart, Andre-Louis heard that dismissal,
saw Benoit's white, scared face and shaking hands half-raised as
if he were about to expostulate with his master. And then another
voice, a crisp, boyish voice, cut in.
"Uncle!" it cried, a world of indignation and surprise in its pitch,
and then: "Andre!" And this time a note almost of gladness,
certainly of welcome, was blended with the surprise that still
remained.
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