had shown any signs of mental aberration, and had been locked up
in a lunatic asylum, and whether the life of constant fast pleasures, of
turning night into day and of frequent violent emotions, that I had led
for years, had not at last affected my brain. If I had believed in
anything, and in the science of the occult, which haunts so many
restless brains, I should have imagined that some enemy was bewitching
me and laying invisible snares for me, that he was suggesting those
actions which were quite unworthy of the frank, upright and well-bred
man that I was, and was trying to destroy the happiness of which she and
I had dreamt.

For a whole week I devoted myself to that hateful business of playing
the spy, and to those inquiries which were killing me. I had succeeded
in discovering the lady's maid who had been in Elaine's service before
we were married, and whom she loved as if she had been her foster
sister, who used to accompany her whenever she went out, when she went
to visit the poor and when she went for a walk, who used to wake her
every morning, do her hair and dress her. She was young and rather
pretty, and one saw that Paris had improved her and given her a polish,
and that she knew her difficult business from end to end.

I had found out, however, that her virtue was only apparent, especially
since she had changed employers; that she was fond of going to the
public balls, and that she divided her favors between a man who came
from her part of the country, and who was a sergeant in a dragoon
regiment, and a footman, and that she spent all her money on horse races
and on dress. I felt sure that I should be able to make her talk and get
the truth out of her, either by money or cunning, and so I asked her to
meet me early one morning in a quiet square.

She listened to me first of all in astonishment, without replying yes or
no, as if she did not understand what I was aiming at, or with what
object I was asking her all these questions about her former mistress;
but when I offered her a few hundred francs to loosen her tongue, as I
was impatient to get the matter over and pretended to know that she had
managed interviews for Elaine with her lovers, that they were known and
being followed, that she was in the habit of frequenting quiet
bachelors' quarters, from which she returned late, the sly little wench
frowned angrily, shrugged her shoulders and exclaimed:

"What pigs some men are to have such ideas, and