advised, compelled perhaps. Who have been her accomplices? She could
never have managed this unaided; perhaps her husband himself."

"Her husband!" interrupted the advocate, with a laugh. "Ah! you too have
believed her a widow. Pshaw! She never had a husband, the defunct Gerdy
never existed. I was a bastard, dear M. Tabaret, very much a bastard;
Noel, son of the girl Gerdy and an unknown father!"

"Ah!" cried the old fellow; "that then was the reason why your marriage
with Mademoiselle Levernois was broken off four years ago?"

"Yes, my friend, that was the reason. And what misfortunes might have
been averted by this marriage with a young girl whom I loved! However
I did not complain to her whom I then called my mother. She wept, she
accused herself, she seemed ready to die of grief: and I, poor fool! I
consoled her as best I could, I dried her tears, and excused her in her
own eyes. No, there was no husband. Do such women as she have husbands?
She was my father's mistress; and, on the day when he had had enough of
her, he took up his hat and threw her three hundred thousand francs, the
price of the pleasures she had given him."

Noel would probably have continued much longer to pour forth his furious
denunciations; but M. Tabaret stopped him. The old fellow felt he was
on the point of learning a history in every way similar to that which he
had imagined; and his impatience to know whether he had guessed aright,
almost caused him to forget to express any sympathy for his friend's
misfortunes.

"My dear boy," said he, "do not let us digress. You ask me for advice;
and I am perhaps the best adviser you could have chosen. Come, then,
to the point. How have you learned this? Have you any proofs? where are
they?"

The decided tone in which the old fellow spoke, should no doubt, have
awakened Noel's attention; but he did not notice it. He had not leisure
to reflect. He therefore answered,--

"I have known the truth for three weeks past. I made the discovery by
chance. I have important moral proofs; but they are mere presumptive
evidence. A word from Widow Lerouge, one single word, would have
rendered them decisive. This word she cannot now pronounce, since they
have killed her; but she had said it to me. Now, Madame Gerdy will deny
all. I know her; with her head on the block, she will deny it. My father
doubtless will turn against me. I am certain, and I possess proofs; now
this crime makes my certitude but a vain boa