“Oh, Arthur,” she replied, “you know not half the changes which have taken place since you were here, or you would not ask why I am pale and pensive! this is the grave of my kindest relative; till you came, I almost thought of my last friend!”

“Good heavens! of your aunt, Lucie; of Madame de la Tour?”

A burst of tears, which she could no longer restrain, was Lucie’s answer; her feelings had, of late, been severely tried, and it was many moments before her own exertions, or the soothings of affection succeeded in calming her emotions.  A long conversation ensued; each had much to say, and Lucie, in particular, many events to communicate.  But as the narrative was often interrupted by question and remark, and delayed by the expression of those hopes and sentiments which lovers are wont to intersperse in their discourse, we shall omit such superfluities, and sum up, as briefly as possible, all that is necessary to elucidate our story.

Madame de la Tour’s constitution was too delicate to bear the rigor of a northern climate, and from her first arrival in Acadia, her health began almost imperceptibly to decline.  She never entirely recovered from the severe indisposition which attacked her in the autumn, though the vigor and cheerfulness of her mind long resisted the depressing influence of disease.  But she was perfectly aware of her danger even before the bloom faded from her cheek sufficiently to excite the alarm of those around her.  It was a malady which had proved fatal to many of her family; and she had too often witnessed its insidious approaches in others, to be deceived when she was herself the victim.  Towards the close of winter, she was confined entirely to her apartment, and Lucie, and the faithful Annette, were her kind and unwearied attendants.  Her decline was from that time rapid, but it was endured with a fortitude which had distinguished her in every situation of life.  Still young, and with much to render existence pleasant and desirable, she met its close with cheerful resignation, surrounded by the weeping objects of her love.  On Lucie’s affectionate heart her untimely death left a deep and lasting impression.  She felt desolate indeed, thus deprived of the only relative, with whom she could claim connexion and sympathy.

The parental tie so lately discovered, and which had opened to Lucie a new spring of tenderness, became a source of painful anxiety.  Father Gilbert,—­so we shall still call him,—­had yielded for a brief season to the indulgence of those natural feelings, which were awakened by the recognition of his daughter.  But his ascetic habits, and the blind bigotry of his creed, soon regained their influence over his mind, and led him to distrust the most virtuous emotions of his heart.  The self-inflicted penance, which estranged him from her, in infancy, he deemed still binding; and the vow which he had taken to lead a life of devotion, he thought no circumstances could annul.  As the priest of God, he must conquer every earthly passion; the work to which he was dedicated yet remained unaccomplished, and the sins of his early life were still unatoned.