render it
necessary to confine her in a lunatic asylum.'"

"Yes," said Adrienne, with bitterness; "it related to a long interview,
which I had with the Princess de Saint-Dizier, my aunt, and which was
taken down without my knowledge."

"Behold me, then, poring over my shorthand report, and beginning to
transcribe it. At the end of the first ten lines, I was struck with
stupor. I knew not if I were awake or dreaming. 'What! mad?' They must
be themselves insane who dare assert so monstrous a proposition!--More
and more interested, I continued my reading--I finished it--Oh! then,
what shall I say? What I felt, my dear young lady, it is impossible to
express. It was sympathy, delight, enthusiasm!"

"Sir," said Adrienne.

"Yes, my dear young lady, enthusiasm! Let not the words shock your
modesty. Know that these ideas, so new, so independent, so courageous
which you expressed to your aunt with so much brilliancy, are, without
your being aware of it, common to you and another person, for whom you
will one day feel the most tender and religious respect."

"Of whom do you speak, sir?" cried Mdlle. de Cardoville, more and more
interested.

After a moment's apparent hesitation, Rodin resumed, "No, no--it is
useless now to inform you of it. All I can tell you, my dear young lady,
is that, when I had finished my reading, I ran to Abbe d'Aigrigny's, to
convince him of the error into which he had fallen with regard to you.
It was impossible then to find him; but yesterday morning I told him
plainly what I thought. He only appeared surprised to find that I could
think at all. He received my communications with contemptuous silence.
I thought him deceived; I continued my remonstrances, but quite in vain.
He ordered me to follow him to the house, where the testament of your
ancestor was to be opened. I was so blind with regard to the Abbe
d'Aigrigny, that it required the successive arrivals of the soldier,
of his son, and of Marshal Simon's father, to open my eyes thoroughly.
Their indignation unveiled to me the extent of a conspiracy, plotted
long ago, and carried on with terrible ability. Then, I understood why
you were confined here as a lunatic; why the daughters of Marshal Simon
were imprisoned in a convent. Then a thousand recollections returned to
my mind; fragments of letters and statements, which had been given me
to copy or decipher, and of which I had never been able to find the
explanation, put me on the track of this