three women of
such different characters smitten with him, 'what is there in him
to be so loved?'"

"Yes," answered M. Lecoq, responding to a secret thought, "women
often err; they don't judge men as we do."

"Many a time," resumed the justice of the peace, "I thought of
provoking him to fight with me, that I might kill him; but then
Laurence would not have looked at me any more. However, I should
perhaps have spoken at last, had not Sauvresy fallen ill and died.
I knew that he had made his wife and Tremorel swear to marry each
other; I knew that a terrible reason forced them to keep their
oath; and I thought Laurence saved. Alas, on the contrary she was
lost! One evening, as I was passing the mayor's house, I saw a
man getting over the wall into the garden; it was Tremorel. I
recognized him perfectly. I was beside myself with rage, and swore
that I would wait and murder him. I did wait, but he did not come
out that night."

M. Plantat hid his face in his hands; his heart bled at the
recollection of that night of anguish, the whole of which he had
passed in waiting for a man in order to kill him. M. Lecoq trembled
with indignation.

"This Tremorel," cried he, "is the most abominable of scoundrels.
There is no excuse for his infamies and crimes. And yet you want
to save him from trial, the galleys, the scaffold which await him."

The old man paused a moment before replying. Of the thoughts which
now crowded tumultuously in his mind, he did not know which to
utter first. Words seemed powerless to betray his sensations; he
wanted to express all that he felt in a single sentence.

"What matters Tremorel to me?" said he at last. "Do you think I
care about him? I don't care whether he lives or dies, whether he
succeeds in flying or ends his life some morning in the Place
Roquette."

"Then why have you such a horror of a trial?"

"Because--"

"Are you a friend to his family, and anxious to preserve the great
name which he has covered with mud and devoted to infamy?"

"No, but I am anxious for Laurence, my friend; the thought of her
never leaves me."

"But she is not his accomplice; she is totally ignorant--there's
no doubt of it--that he has killed his wife."

"Yes," resumed M. Plantat, "Laurence is innocent; she is only the
victim of an odious villain. It is none the less true, though,
that she would be more cruelly punished than he. If Tremorel is
brought before the court, she will have to appear too, as a