nemies.
Perhaps they are seeking to endanger Savinien's life. I will tell you
more when I am able to go to you.

Your devoted friend,

Chaperon.

When Savinien, who was almost maddened by these proceedings, carried
this letter to the abbe, the poor priest read it and re-read it; so
amazed and horror-stricken was he to see the perfection with which his
own handwriting and signature were imitated. The dangerous condition
into which this last atrocity threw poor Ursula sent Savinien once more
to the procureur du roi with the forged letter.

"A murder is being committed by means that the law cannot touch,"
he said, "upon an orphan whom the Code places in your care as legal
guardian. What is to be done?"

"If you can find any means of repression," said the official, "I will
adopt them; but I know of none. That infamous wretch gives the best
advice. Mademoiselle Mirouet must be sent to the sisters of the
Adoration of the Sacred Heart. Meanwhile the commissary of police at
Fontainebleau shall at my request authorize you to carry arms in your
own defence. I have been myself to Rouvre, and I found Monsieur du
Rouvre justly indignant at the suspicions some of the Nemours people
have put upon him. Minoret, the father of my assistant, is in treaty
for the purchase of the estate. Mademoiselle is to marry a rich Polish
count; and Monsieur du Rouvre himself left the neighbourhood the day I
saw him, to avoid arrest for debt."

Desire Minoret, when questioned by his chief, dared not tell his
thought. He recognized Goupil. Goupil, he fully believed, was the only
man capable of carrying a persecution to the very verge of the penal
code without infringing a hair's-breadth upon it.

CHAPTER XVIII. A TWO-FOLD VENGEANCE

Impunity, secrecy, and success increased Goupil's audacity. He made
Massin, who was completely his dupe, sue the Marquis du Rouvre for
his notes, so as to force him to sell the remainder of his property to
Minoret. Thus prepared, he opened negotiations for a practice at Sens,
and then resolved to strike a last blow to obtain Ursula. He meant
to imitate certain young men in Paris who owed their wives and their
fortunes to abduction. He knew that the services he had rendered to
Minoret, to Massin, and to Cremiere, and the protection of Dionis and
the mayor of Nemours would enable him to hush up the affair. He resolved
to throw off the mask, believing Ursula too feeble in the condition to
which he had reduced