A summons to dinner prevented all further conversation. Madeline declared her utter inability of obeying it, and entreated her father to apologize for her absence.
Reluctantly he left her. Nothing could have prevailed upon him to do so, but a fear of distressing the Marquis if he absented himself from the table; and he promised to return as soon as he possibly could to her.
During his absence, Madeline determined to exert herself in order to regain some degree of composure. "But little shall I serve him (cried she), by the sacrifice of myself, if I let him know the anguish excited by that sacrifice."
He had been gone about half an hour when she heard a gentle knock at the dressing-room door. She started, but instantly recollecting herself, and supposing it to come from some one of the servants, she desired the door to be opened. She was obeyed
