aw bankruptcy before him. On
making this discovery, he decided for a fraudulent bankruptcy rather
than an ordinary failure, and preferred a crime to a misdemeanor. He
determined, after the fashion of the celebrated cashier of the Royal
Treasury, to abuse the trust deservedly won, and to increase the number
of his creditors by making a final loan of the sum sufficient to keep
him in comfort in a foreign country for the rest of his days. All this,
as has been seen, he had prepared to do.

Aquilina knew nothing of the irksome cares of this life; she enjoyed
her existence, as many a woman does, making no inquiry as to where the
money came from, even as sundry other folk will eat their buttered
rolls untroubled by any restless spirit of curiosity as to the culture
and growth of wheat; but as the labor and miscalculations of
agriculture lie on the other side of the baker's oven, so, beneath the
unappreciated luxury of many a Parisian household lie intolerable
anxieties and exorbitant toil.

While Castanier was enduring the torture of the strain, and his
thoughts were full of the deed that should change his whole life,
Aquilina was lying luxuriously back in a great armchair by the
fireside, beguiling the time by chatting with her waiting-maid. As
frequently happens in such cases, the maid had become the mistress's
confidante, Jenny having first assured herself that her mistress's
ascendancy over Castanier was complete.

What are we to do this evening? Leon seems determined to come," Mme. de
la Garde was saying, as she read a passionate epistle indicted upon a
faint gray note paper.

"Here is the master!" said Jenny.

Castanier came in. Aquilina, nowise disconcerted, crumpled up the
letter, took it with the tongs, and held it in the flames.

"So that is what you do with your love letters, is it?" asked
Castanier.

"Oh, goodness, yes," said Aquilina; "is it not the best way of keeping
them safe? Besides, fire should go to the fire, as water makes for the
river."

"You are talking as if it were a real love letter, Naqui--"

"Well, am I not handsome enough to receive them?" she said, holding up
her forehead for a kiss. There was a carelessness in her manner that
would have told any man less blind than Castanier that it was only a
piece of conjugal duty, as it were, to give this joy to the cashier;
but use and wont had brought Castanier to the point where
clear-sightedness is no longer possible for love.

"I have take