him here was gone. There was no
one else in the room, except the priest and himself.

"You are inhuman!" he said shortly. "The prayers of a dying woman are
more to me than your threats. Stand on one side!"

Paul laid his hand heavily upon the priest's shoulder. He was prepared
even to have used force had it been necessary, but it was not. The
latter moved away at once, shaking his robes free from Paul's touch
with contemptuous gesture, and calling one of the monks to him, Paul
sank on one knee by the side of the dying woman, and bent low down
over her.

"Madame de Merteuill, you have something to say to me!" he whispered.
"What is it?"

Her voice was very low and very faint. She was even then upon the
threshold of death. Each word came out with a painful effort, but with
a curious distinctness. "I am not Madame de Merteuill at all! I am the
daughter of the Count of Cruta!"

She paused to gather fresh strength, and Paul caught hold of some of
the bedclothes, and clutched them in his fingers convulsively. This
woman, the daughter of the Count of Cruta! this wan, faded creature,
the girl whom his father had borne away in triumph! His brain reeled
with the wonder of it! If only he had known a few weeks ago!
She should never have left the Hermitage until she had told him
everything! Was it too late now? She was trying to speak to him. Was
he upon the brink of a tremendous revelation? Was the whole past about
to be made clear? Oh! if the old Count would keep away for awhile.

Her lips commenced to move. He bent close over her, determined not to
lose a syllable. "You know the story about your father, Martin de Vaux
and me. I----"

"Yes, yes! I know!" he assured her softly. "I have only heard it
lately!"

"From whom?"

"From the priest who was always with you at De Vaux,--from your son!"
he added, as the truth suddenly swept in upon him. Yes; Father Adrian
was this woman's son!

Her corpse-like face was fixed steadily upon him. Her words were
monotonous and slow, yet they preserved their distinctness. "You have
come here to know the truth of the story he told you?"

"Yes; I have come to discover it, if I can!"

"The holy Saints must have brought you to me. The story----"

"Yes?"

"The story is false!"

Paul bent lower still, with strained hearing. There had been a plot,
then, after all. Oh, if she should die without finishing her story! He
looked into her bloodless face, and his pulses throbbed at fever-he