ark passage, noticing none of the others who waited there, some pale
and afraid, some as though they were starting upon a journey of
pleasure.

"One, two, three tumbrils! The guillotine was hungry this morning.
Raymond Latour was in the last tumbril.

"I was promised life--I told all I knew--there is a mistake. Ask! Let me
wait until to-morrow--for God's sake let me wait until to-morrow!"

Latour looked at the frightened wretch who was literally thrown into the
tumbril after him, but the expression on his face did not change; he did
not speak.

The man continued to cry out until the tumbrils started, then with a
wail of despair he fell on his knees, shaking in every limb, chattering
to himself, whether oaths or prayers who shall say?

The tumbrils moved forward slowly.

The wretch upon his knees seemed to realize suddenly that he was not
alone. He looked up into the face of the man beside him. Then rose
slowly and touched him.

"Latour."

There was no answer, no turning of the head even.

"Latour. So this is how we meet at last."

There were crowds in the streets, yelling crowds. He spoke clearly so
that the man might hear him, but there was no answer.

"Raymond Latour--Latour--this is how we meet, both damned and betrayed
for the sake of a woman."

No words answered him, but Latour turned and looked full into the eyes
of Lucien Bruslart.

The tumbrils went forward slowly, a yelling mob on every side.

"Lucien! Lucien! Look at me!"

It was a woman's cry, shrill, sounding above the uproar.

Shaking with fear, yet perhaps with a glimmer of hope still in his
heart, Bruslart looked. There was a woman held high above the crowd,
supported and steadied by strong men's arms.

"I said you should see me laugh. Look, Lucien! I laugh at you."

"It is a mistake. Save me, Pauline, save me!"

"I laugh, Lucien," and a shriek of laughter, mad, riotous, fiendish, cut
like a sharp knife through all that yelling confusion.

With a cry of rage, despair, and terror, Bruslart sank trembling in a
heap to the floor of the tumbril. Latour did not move. He had not turned
to look at Pauline Vaison. The thought of another woman was in his soul.
Was she safe?

There was a pause, the crowd was so dense at this corner; then the
tumbril moved on again. The corner was turned. Straight before him
looked Raymond Latour, over the multitude of heads, over the waving arms
and red caps, straight before him across the Place de la Rev