If you could only understand the point we have reached--"
"We? who are we?"
"I mean Mulquinier: he has understood me, he loves me. Poor fellow! he
is devoted to me."
Conyncks entered at the moment and interrupted the conversation.
Marguerite made a sign to her father to say no more, fearing lest he
should lower himself in her uncle's eyes. She was frightened at the
ravages thought had made in that noble mind, absorbed in searching for
the solution of a problem that was perhaps insoluble. Balthazar, who
saw and knew nothing outside of his furnaces, seemed not to realize
the liberation of his fortune.
On the morrow they started for Flanders. During the journey Marguerite
gained some confused light upon the position in which Lemulquinier and
her father stood to each other. The valet had acquired an ascendancy
over his master such as common men without education are able to
obtain over great minds to whom they feel themselves necessary; such
men, taking advantage of concession after concession, aim at complete
dominion with the persistency that comes of a fixed idea. In this case
the master had contracted for the man the sort of affection that grows
out of habit, like that of a workman for his creative tool, or an Arab
for the horse that gives him freedom. Marguerite studied the signs of
this tyranny, resolving to withdraw her father from its humiliating
yoke if it were real.
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