e truth; it broke me up, soul and body.
Ah, it cost me a good deal to keep quiet--it almost killed me.
But one thought sustained me; I longed to avenge myself. My mind
was always bent on that; I searched for a punishment as great as
this crime; I found none, could find none. Then you resolved to
poison me. Mark this--that the very day when I guessed about the
poison I had a thrill of joy, for I had discovered my vengeance!"

A constantly increasing terror possessed Bertha, and now stupefied
her, as well as Tremorel.

"Why do you wish for my death? To be free and marry each other?
Very well; I wish that also. The Count de Tremorel will be Madame
Sauvresy's second husband."

"Never!" cried Bertha. "No, never!"

"Never!" echoed Hector.

"It shall be so; nevertheless because I wish it. Oh, my precautions
have been well taken, and you can't escape me. Now hear me. When
I became certain that I was being poisoned, I began to write a
minute history of all three of us; I did more--I have kept a
journal day by day and hour by hour, narrating all the particulars
of my illness; then I kept some of the poison which you gave me--"

Bertha made a gesture of denial. Sauvresy proceeded:

"Certainly, I kept it, and I will tell you how. Every time that
Bertha gave me a suspicious potion, I kept a portion of it in my
mouth, and carefully ejected it into a bottle which I kept hid
under the bolster. Ah, you ask how I could have done all this
without your suspecting it, or without being seen by any of the
servants. Know that hate is stronger than love, be sure that I
have left nothing to chance, nor have I forgotten anything."

Hector and Bertha looked at Sauvresy with a dull, fixed gaze. They
forced themselves to understand him, but could scarcely do so.

"Let's finish," resumed the dying man, "my strength is waning.
This very morning, the bottle containing the poison I have preserved,
our biographies, and the narrative of my poisoning, have been put
in the hands of a trustworthy and devoted person, whom, even if
you knew him, you could not corrupt. He does not know the
contents of what has been confided to him. The day that you get
married this friend will give them all up to you. If, however,
you are not married in a year from to-day, he has instructions to
put these papers and this bottle into the hands of the officers of
the law."

A double cry of horror and anguish told Sauvresy that he had well
chosen his vengeance.

"A