ill carry this letter to its address," he said to the man, "and
bring back with you the person named. But will she be there?" he asked,
on reflection.

"It is more than probable," replied la Peyrade; "in any case, neither
you nor I will leave this room until she comes. This matter must be
cleared up."

"Then go!" said Thuillier to the porter, in a theatrical tone.

When they were alone, la Peyrade took up a newspaper and appeared to be
absorbed in its perusal.

Thuillier, beginning to get uneasy as to the upshot of the affair,
regretted that he had not done something the idea of which had come to
him just too late.

"Yes, I ought," he said to himself, "to have torn up that letter, and
not driven him to prove his words."

Wishing to do something that might look like retaining la Peyrade in
the position of which he had threatened to deprive him, he remarked
presently:--

"By the bye, I have just come from the printing-office; the new type has
arrived, and I think we might make our first appearance to-morrow."

La Peyrade did not answer; but he got up and took his paper nearer to
the window.

"He is sulky," thought Thuillier, "and if he is innocent, he may well
be. But, after all, why did he ever bring a man like that Cerizet here?"

Then to hide his embarrassment and the preoccupation of his mind, he sat
down before the editor's table, took a sheet of the head-lined paper and
made himself write a letter.

Presently la Peyrade returned to the table and sitting down, took
another sheet and with the feverish rapidity of a man stirred by some
emotion he drove his pen over the paper.

From the corner of his eye, Thuillier tried hard to see what la Peyrade
was writing, and noticing that his sentences were separated by numbers
placed between brackets, he said:--

"Tiens! are you drawing up a parliamentary law?"

"Yes," replied la Peyrade, "the law of the vanquished."

Soon after this, the porter opened the door and introduced Madame
Lambert, whom he had found at home, and who arrived looking rather
frightened.

"You are Madame Lambert?" asked Thuillier, magisterially.

"Yes, monsieur," said the woman, in an anxious voice.

After requesting her to be seated and noticing that the porter was still
there as if awaiting further orders he said to the man:--

"That will do; you may go; and don't let any one disturb us."

The gravity and the lordly tone assumed by Thuillier only increased
Madame Lambert's uneas