glanced on
clear pendants, on broad rings; neither the chasteness of moonlight,
nor the distance of the torches, could quite subdue the gorgeous dyes
of the drapery. Hail, Madame Walravens! I think you looked more
witch-like than ever. And presently the good lady proved that she was
indeed no corpse or ghost, but a harsh and hardy old woman; for, upon
some aggravation in the clamorous petition of Desiree Beck to her
mother, to go to the kiosk and take sweetmeats, the hunchback suddenly
fetched her a resounding rap with her gold-knobbed cane.

There, then, were Madame Walravens, Madame Beck, Pere Silas--the whole
conjuration, the secret junta. The sight of them thus assembled did me
good. I cannot say that I felt weak before them, or abashed, or
dismayed. They outnumbered me, and I was worsted and under their feet;
but, as yet, I was not dead.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

OLD AND NEW ACQUAINTANCE.

Fascinated as by a basilisk with three heads, I could not leave this
clique; the ground near them seemed to hold my feet. The canopy of
entwined trees held out shadow, the night whispered a pledge of
protection, and an officious lamp flashed just one beam to show me an
obscure, safe seat, and then vanished. Let me now briefly tell the
reader all that, during the past dark fortnight, I have been silently
gathering from Rumour, respecting the origin and the object of M.
Emanuel's departure. The tale is short, and not new: its alpha is
Mammon, and its omega Interest.

If Madame Walravens was hideous as a Hindoo idol, she seemed also to
possess, in the estimation of these her votaries, an idol's
consequence. The fact was, she had been rich--very rich; and though,
for the present, without the command of money, she was likely one day
to be rich again. At Basseterre, in Guadaloupe, she possessed a large
estate, received in dowry on her marriage sixty years ago, sequestered
since her husband's failure; but now, it was supposed, cleared of
claim, and, if duly looked after by a competent agent of integrity,
considered capable of being made, in a few years, largely productive.

Pere Silas took an interest in this prospective improvement for the
sake of religion and the church, whereof Magliore Walravens was a
devout daughter. Madame Beck, distantly related to the hunchback and
knowing her to be without family of her own, had long brooded over
contingencies with a mother's calculating forethought, and, harshly
treated as she was by Ma