t the
transaction was simple enough. My estate is unmortgaged. I had given you
a power of attorney, but I knew that it had not been used; you told me
so yourself, scarcely an hour before I requested Mr. Emerson to make me
this loan."

"No--no,--I did not say _that_;--you misunderstood me,--I did not say
_that_,--I never said _that!_ You only _inferred_ it! I could not be
answerable for your _inferences_," returned the count, in the tone of a
man defending himself.

"Great heavens! What does this mean?" exclaimed Maurice "I cannot have
misunderstood you? You cannot have used the power of attorney?"

The count was silent, but the shame and confusion depicted upon his
countenance were a fearful answer.

It was some minutes before Maurice could rally sufficiently to take a
clear view of his own position. His first impulse caused him to turn to
his father in an excess of rage; but the broken, contrite, abject
demeanor of the latter silenced the angry reproaches that were bursting
from his son's lips.

The count was the first to break the silence.

He said, in a pleading, exculpatory tone,--

"There was no other way; matters had gone terribly wrong with me in
Brittany; we were reduced to worse than poverty; I was frightfully
entangled; nothing remained but a mortgage upon your property."

"What Mr. Emerson writes me in this letter is true, then?" was all
Maurice could utter; but his tone pierced his father as deeply as the
sharpest reproaches.

The count assented.

Maurice, unable longer to control himself, broke forth, "And I shall not
only be forced to endure the blighting suspicion of being guilty myself,
but I must bear the terrible certainty that my father is so!"

The count only murmured in broken accents, "Oh, if the committee should
select the left road!"

Maurice caught eagerly at the faint hope, and after a few moments'
reflection, replied in a voice which, in spite of its coldness, was not
without a touch of pity,--

"I must see Mr. Emerson, and make an effort to postpone his present
intentions until the decision is made."

"It will be against us!" cried the count, vehemently. "Mr. Rutledge has
made up his mind to vote for the road to the right; that one vote would
have saved us! But we are too unfortunate; there is no longer a chance
left!"

Maurice went forth without replying.

CHAPTER XXXI.

A SURPRISE.

The severe mental suffering that he endured during the half hour that
was o