"It is false," she cried, "and those who say it are liars! He cannot
be--no, he cannot be an assassin. If he were here, sir, and should
himself say, 'It is true,' I would refuse to believe it; I would still
cry out, 'It is false!'"

"He has not yet admitted it," continued the magistrate, "but he will
confess. Even if he should not, there are more proofs than are needed to
convict him. The charges against him are as impossible to deny as is the
sun which shines upon us."

"Ah! well," interrupted Mademoiselle d'Arlange, in a voice filled
with emotion, "I assert, I repeat, that justice is deceived. Yes," she
persisted, in answer to the magistrate's gesture of denial, "yes, he is
innocent. I am sure of it; and I would proclaim it, even were the whole
world to join with you in accusing him. Do you not see that I know him
better even than he can know himself, that my faith in him is absolute,
as is my faith in God, that I would doubt myself before doubting him?"

The investigating magistrate attempted timidly to make an objection;
Claire quickly interrupted him.

"Must I then, sir," said she, "in order to convince you, forget that I
am a young girl, and that I am not talking to my mother, but to a man!
For his sake I will do so. It is four years, sir, since we first loved
each other. Since that time, I have not kept a single one of my thoughts
from him, nor has he hid one of his from me. For four years, there has
never been a secret between us; he lived in me, as I lived in him.
I alone can say how worthy he is to be loved; I alone know all that
grandeur of soul, nobleness of thought, generosity of feelings, out of
which you have so easily made an assassin. And I have seen him, oh! so
unhappy, while all the world envied his lot. He is, like me, alone in
the world; his father never loved him. Sustained one by the other, we
have passed through many unhappy days; and it is at the very moment our
trials are ending that he has become a criminal? Why? tell me, why?"

"Neither the name nor the fortune of the Count de Commarin would descend
to him, mademoiselle; and the knowledge of it came upon him with a
sudden shock. One old woman alone was able to prove this. To maintain
his position, he killed her."

"What infamy," cried the young girl, "what a shameful, wicked, calumny!
I know, sir, that story of fallen greatness; he himself told me of it.
It is true, that for three days this misfortune unmanned him; but, if he
was dismay