e articles seized
in the Viscount de Commarin's apartments.

The magistrate carefully examined these things, and compared them
closely with the scraps of evidence gathered at La Jonchere. He soon
appeared, more than ever, satisfied with the course he had taken.

He then placed all these material proofs upon his table, and covered
them over with three or four large sheets of paper.

The day was far advanced; and M. Daburon had no more than sufficient
time to examine the prisoner before night. He now remembered that he had
tasted nothing since morning; and he sent hastily for a bottle of wine
and some biscuits. It was not strength, however, that the magistrate
needed; it was courage. All the while that he was eating and drinking,
his thoughts kept repeating this strange sentence, "I am about to appear
before the Viscount de Commarin." At any other time, he would have
laughed at the absurdity of the idea, but, at this moment, it seemed to
him like the will of Providence.

"So be it," said he to himself; "this is my punishment."

And immediately he gave the necessary orders for Viscount Albert to be
brought before him.

CHAPTER XII.

Albert scarcely noticed his removal from home to the seclusion of the
prison. Snatched away from his painful thoughts by the harsh voice of
the commissary, saying. "In the name of the law I arrest you," his
mind, completely upset, was a long time in recovering its equilibrium,
Everything that followed appeared to him to float indistinctly in a
thick mist, like those dream-scenes represented on the stage behind a
quadruple curtain of gauze.

To the questions put to him he replied, without knowing what he said.
Two police agents took hold of his arms, and helped him down the stairs.
He could not have walked down alone. His limbs, which bent beneath him,
refused their support. The only thing he understood of all that was said
around him was that the count had been struck with apoplexy; but even
that he soon forgot.

They lifted him into the cab, which was waiting in the court-yard at the
foot of the steps, rather ashamed at finding itself in such a place; and
they placed him on the back seat. Two police agents installed themselves
in front of him while a third mounted the box by the side of the driver.
During the drive, he did not at all realize his situation. He lay
perfectly motionless in the dirty, greasy vehicle. His body, which
followed every jolt, scarcely allayed by the worn-