He faltered a little at the end, fully conscious of the hostile atmosphere in which he suddenly found himself. Hostility from M. de Kercadiou, the latter's earlier change of manner had already led him to expect; the hostility of mademoiselle came more in the nature of a surprise.
He began to understand what difficulties the course to which he was committed must raise up for him. A fresh obstacle was to be flung across the path which he had just cleared, as he imagined. Yet his pride and his sense of the justice due to be done admitted of no weakening.
In bitterness he realized now, as he looked from uncle to niece—his glance, usually so direct and bold, now oddly furtive—that though to-morrow he might kill Andre-Louis, yet even by his death Andre-Louis would take vengeance upon him. He h
