"If God wishes, I also wish it."
Immediately Angelique opened her eyelids. She looked at the Bishop
without surprise as she awoke from her long trance, and, her lips still
warm from the kiss, smiled upon him. These things were not strange to
her, for they certainly must have been realised sooner or later, and
it might be that she was coming out of one dream only to have another
still; but it seemed to her perfectly natural that Monseigneur should
have come to betroth her to Felicien, since the hour for that ceremony
had arrived. In a few minutes, unaided, she sat up in the middle of her
great royal bed.
The Bishop, radiant, showing by his expression his clear appreciation of
the remarkable prodigy, repeated the formula:--
"_Accipe lampadem ardentem, custodi unctionem tuam, ut cum Dominus ad
judicandum venerit, possis occurrere ei cum omnibus sanctis et vivas in
saecula saeculorum_."
"Amen," replied the Abbe.
Angelique had taken the lighted taper, and held it up with a firm hand.
Life had come back to her, like the flame of the candle, which was
burning clear and bright, driving away the spirits of the night.
A great cry resounded through the room. Felicien was standing up, as if
raised by the power of the miracle, while the Huberts, overwhelmed by
the same feeling, remained upon their knees, with wonder-stricken eyes,
with delighted countenances, before that which they had seen.
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