eir journey from Paris
to Troyes, Bordin listened, his feet on the fender, without obtruding
himself into the recital. The young lawyer, however, could not help
being divided between his admiration for Mademoiselle de Cinq-Cygne, and
the attention he was bound to give to the facts of his case.

"Is that really all?" asked Bordin when Laurence had related the events
of the drama just as the present narrative has given them up to the
present time.

"Yes," she answered.

Profound silence reigned for several minutes in the salon of the
Chargeboeuf mansion where this scene took place,--one of the most
important which occur in life. All cases are judged by the counsellors
engaged in them, just as the death or life or a patient is foreseen by
a physician, before the final struggle which the one sustains
against nature, the other against law. Laurence, Monsieur and Madame
d'Hauteserre, and the marquis sat with their eyes fixed on the swarthy
and deeply pitted face of the old lawyer, who was now to pronounce the
words of life or death. Monsieur d'Hauteserre wiped the sweat from his
brow. Laurence looked at the younger man and noted his saddened face.

"Well, my dear Bordin?" said the marquis at last, holding out his
snuffbox, from which the old lawyer took a pinch in an absent-minded
way.

Bordin rubbed the calf of his leg, covered with thick stockings of
black raw silk, for he always wore black cloth breeches and a coat made
somewhat in the shape of those which are now termed _a la Francaise_.
He cast his shrewd eyes upon his clients with an anxious expression, the
effect of which was icy.

"Must I analyze all that?" he said; "am I to speak frankly?"

"Yes; go on, monsieur," said Laurence.

"All that you have innocently done can be converted into proof against
you," said the old lawyer. "We cannot save your friends; we can only
reduce the penalty. The sale which you induced Michu to make of his
property will be taken as evident proof of your criminal intentions
against the senator. You sent your servants to Troyes so that you might
be alone; that is all the more plausible because it is actually true.
The elder d'Hauteserre made an unfortunate speech to Beauvisage, which
will be your ruin. You yourself, mademoiselle, made another in your
own courtyard, which proves that you have long shown ill-will to
the possessor of Gondreville. Besides, you were at the gate of the
_rond-point_, apparently on the watch, about the tim