ng of the heart, and make a man's nature
barren as a desert.

He never fully disclosed these sentiments until the evening before the
duel. It was then, in the midst of preparations for the morrow, that he
revealed to me all that he felt and thought. There was, throughout these
confessions, a tone of indifference that shocked me more, perhaps, than
actual levity; and I own I regarded him with a sense of terror, and as
one whose very contact was perilous.

"I have married since I saw you last," said he to me, after a long
interval of silence. "My wife was a former acquaintance of yours.
You must go and see her, if this event turn out ill, and 'break
the tidings,' as they call it,--not that the task will demand any
extraordinary display of skill at your hands," said he, laughing.
"Madame the Countess will bear her loss with becoming dignity; and as I
have nothing to bequeath, the disposition of my property cannot offend
her. If, however," added he, with more energy of manner, "if, however,
the Captain should fall, we must take measures to fly. I 'll not risk a
_cour militaire_ in such a cause, so that we must escape."

All his arrangements had been already made for this casualty; and I
found that relays of horses had been provided to within a short distance
of Mannheim, where we were to cross the Rhine, and trust to chances to
guide us through the Luxembourg territory down to Namur, at a little
village in the neighborhood of which town his wife was then living. My
part in the plan was to repair by daybreak to Erlauch, a small village
on the Rhine, three leagues from Kehl, and await his arrival, or such
tidings as might recall me to Kehl.

"If I be not with you by seven o'clock at the latest," said he, "it is
because Challendrouze has _vised_ my passports for another route."

These were his last words to me ere I started, with, it is not too much
to say, a far heavier heart than he had who uttered them.

It was drawing towards evening, and I was standing watching the lazy
drift of a timber-raft as it floated down the river, when I heard the
clattering of a horse's hoofs approaching at a full gallop. I turned,
and saw Ysaffich, who was coming at full speed, waving his handkerchief
by way of signal.

I hurried back to the inn to order out the horses at once, and ere many
minutes we were in the saddle, side by side, not a word having passed
between us till, as we passed out into the open country, Ysaffich
said,--

"W