de for an act of pure friendship so
noble; urging also the reasons that rendered it impossible for a man of
honour to profit by such an act. Unhappily, what had been sent was paid
away ere I knew the facts; but I could not bear the thought of life till
my debt to her was acquitted; in short, Louvier, conceive for yourself
the sort of letter which I--which any honest man--would write, under
circumstances so cruel."

"H'm!" grunted Louvier.

"Something, however, in my letter, conjoined with what De N. had told
her as to my state of mind, alarmed this poor woman, who had deigned to
take in me an interest so little deserved. Her reply, very agitated and
incoherent, was brought to me by her maid, who had taken my letter, and
by whom, as I before said, our correspondence had been of late carried
on. In her reply she implored me to decide, to reflect on nothing till I
had seen her; stated how the rest of her day was pre-engaged; and since
to visit her openly had been made impossible by the Due's interdict,
enclosed the key to the private entrance to her rooms, by which I could
gain an interview with her at ten o'clock that night, an hour at which
the Duc had informed her he should be out till late at his club. Now,
however great the indiscretion which the Duchesse here committed, it is
due to her memory to say that I am convinced that her dominant idea was
that I meditated self-destruction; that no time was to be lost to
save me from it; and for the rest she trusted to the influence which
a woman's tears and adjurations and reasonings have over even the
strongest and hardest men. It is only one of those coxcombs in whom the
world of fashion abounds who could have admitted a thought that would
have done wrong to the impulsive, generous, imprudent eagerness of a
woman to be in time to save from death by his own hand a fellow-being
for whom she had conceived an interest. I so construed her note. At the
hour she named I admitted myself into the rooms by the key she sent. You
know the rest: I was discovered by the Duc and by the agents of police
in the cabinet in which the Duchesse's jewels were kept. The key that
admitted me into the cabinet was found in my possession."

De Mauleon's voice here faltered, and he covered his face with a
convulsive hand. Almost in the same breath he recovered from visible
sign of emotion, and went on with a half laugh.

"Ah! you envied me, did you, for being spoiled by the women? Enviable
positio