[Modeste Mignon by Honore de Balzac]@TWC D-Link book
Modeste Mignon

CHAPTER XI
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But what tumultuous heavings were within her breast! no wonder that a mother guessed them.
On the following day Modeste and Madame Dumay took Madame Mignon about mid-day to a seat in the sun among the flowers.

The blind woman turned her wan and blighted face toward the ocean; she inhaled the odors of the sea and took the hand of her daughter who remained beside her.

The mother hesitated between forgiveness and remonstrance ere she put the important question; for she comprehended the girl's love and recognized, as the pretended Canalis had done, that Modeste was exceptional in nature.
"God grant that your father return in time! If he delays much longer he will find none but you to love him.

Modeste, promise me once more never to leave him," she said in a fond maternal tone.
Modeste lifted her mother's hands to her lips and kissed them gently, replying: "Need I say it again ?" "Ah, my child! I did this thing myself.

I left my father to follow my husband; and yet my father was all alone; I was all the child he had.


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