couldn't get him to listen to reason. He seems to have made up his mind
to have no more to do with her, while she is fretting herself to a
skeleton over it, but daren't make the first move towards a
reconciliation. It probably wouldn't do any good if she did. He is as
hard as iron. And if his mind is once made up--" Max left the sentence
unfinished, and continued: "I think I shall go to Valpre and see what I
can do. This has gone on long enough, and we can't have Chris making
herself ill. I should think even he would see the force of that. This
trial business will be over in a few days, and if I don't catch him he
may go wandering, Heaven knows where. But it won't do. He must come back
to her. I shall tell him so."

But at that Bertrand laid a nervous hand upon his arm. "My friend," he
said, "you will not persuade him."

Max looked at him, and was confronted by eyes of gleaming resolution. "I
believe I shall," he said. "I can persuade most people."

"You will not persuade him," Bertrand repeated. "That _scelerat_ has
poisoned his mind. Moreover, you do not even know what passed between
us."

"I don't need to know," Max said curtly.

Bertrand began to smile. "And you think you can plead your sister's cause
without knowing, _hein_? No, no! the affair is too much advanced. There
is only one man who can help the little Christine now. He would not
listen to you, _mon cher_, if you went. But--to me, he will listen, even
though he believes me to be a thief; for he is very just. I know that I
can make him understand. And for that I shall go to him to-morrow. As you
say, we cannot let _la petite_ fret."

He spoke quite quietly, but his eyes were shining with a fire that had
not lit them for many a day.

"My dear chap, you can't go. You're not fit for it." Max spoke with quick
decision. "I won't let you go, so there's an end of it."

But Bertrand laughed. "So? But I am more fit than you think, _mon ami_.
Also it is my affair, this, and none but I can accomplish it. See, I
start in the morning, and by this hour to-morrow I shall be with him."

"Folly! Madness!" Max said.

But indomitable resolution still shone in the Frenchman's eyes. "Listen
to me, Max," he said. "If I spend my last breath thus, why not? I have
not the least desire to cling to life. And is that madness? I love _la
petite_ more than all. And is that folly? Why should I not give the
strength that is still in me to accomplish the desire of my heart? Is