rm,
under pain of not acting like a man of honor, and of disobeying my last
will. You must, without hesitation--"

But, by a deplorable fatality, the last words, which would have
completed the sense of the old workman's thought, were spoken in so
feeble a voice as to be quite unintelligible. He died, leaving Marshal
Simon in a worse state of anxiety, as one of the two courses open to him
had now been formally condemned by his father, in whose judgment he had
the most implicit and merited confidence. In a word, his mind was now
tortured by the doubt whether his father had intended, in the name of
honor and duty, to advise him not to abandon his children, to engage in
so hazardous an enterprise, or whether, on the contrary, he had wished
him to leave them for a time, to perform the vow made to the emperor,
and endeavor at least to rescue Napoleon II. from a captivity that might
soon be mortal.

This perplexity, rendered more cruel by certain circumstances, to be
related hereafter, the tragical death of his father, who had expired
in his arms; the incessant and painful remembrance of his wife, who
had perished in a land of exile; and finally, the grief he felt at
perceiving the overgrowing sadness of Rose and Blanche, occasioned
severe shocks to Marshal Simon. Let us add that, in spite of his natural
intrepidity, so nobly proved by twenty years of war, the ravages of the
cholera, the same terrible malady to which his wife had fallen a victim
in Siberia, filled the marshal with involuntary dread. Yes, this man of
iron nerves, who had coolly braved death in so many battles, felt the
habitual firmness of his character give way at sight of the scenes of
desolation and mourning which Paris offered at every step. Yet, when
Mdlle. de Cardoville gathered round her the members of her family, to
warn them against the plot of their enemies, the affectionate tenderness
of Adrienne for Rose and Blanche appeared to exercise so happy an
influence on their mysterious sorrow, that the marshal, forgetting for a
moment his fatal regrets, thought only of enjoying this blessed change,
which, alas! was but of short duration. Having now recalled these facts
to the mind of the reader, we shall continue our story.

CHAPTER XLV. THE BLOCKHEAD

We have stated that Marshal Simon occupied a small house in the Rue
des Trois-Freres. Two o'clock in the afternoon had just struck in the
marshal's sleeping-chamber, a room furnished with military s