roprietor."

"And the laboratory?" added her brother.

"Left standing," said Lomaque. "Here is a letter with all the
particulars. You may depend upon them, for the writer is the person
charged with the letting of the house."

Trudaine looked over the letter eagerly.

"The price is not beyond our means," he said. "After our three years'
economy here, we can afford to give something for a great pleasure."

"Oh, what a day of happiness it will be when we go home again!" cried
Rose. "Pray write to your friend at once," she added, addressing
Lomaque, "and say we take the house, before any one else is beforehand
with us!"

He nodded, and folding up the letter mechanically in the old official
form, made a note on it in the old official manner. Trudaine observed
the action, and felt its association with past times of trouble and
terror. His face grew grave again as he said to Lomaque, "And is this
good news really all the news of importance you have to tell us?"

Lomaque hesitated, and fidgeted in his chair. "What other news I have
will bear keeping," he replied. "There are many questions I should like
to ask first, about your sister and yourself. Do you mind allowing me to
refer for a moment to the time when we last met?"

He addressed this inquiry to Rose, who answered in the negative; but her
voice seemed to falter, even in saying the one word "No." She turned her
head away when she spoke; and Lomaque noticed that her hands trembled
as she took up some work lying on a table near, and hurriedly occupied
herself with it.

"We speak as little about that time as possible," said Trudaine, looking
significantly toward his sister; "but we have some questions to ask you
in our turn; so the allusion, for this once, is inevitable. Your sudden
disappearance at the very crisis of that time of danger has not yet
been fully explained to us. The one short note which you left behind you
helped us to guess at what had happened rather than to understand it."

"I can easily explain it now," answered Lomaque. "The sudden overthrow
of the Reign of Terror, which was salvation to you, was destruction to
me. The new republican reign was a reign of mercy, except for the tail
of Robespierre, as the phrase ran then. Every man who had been so wicked
or so unfortunate as to be involved, even in the meanest capacity, with
the machinery of the government of Terror, was threatened, and justly,
with the fate of Robespierre. I, among others, fell