to be had in France, but I have only
one life. A man's life is worth more than all the situations in the
world.--Jonathan!"

Jonathan appeared.

"This is your doing, double-distilled idiot! What made you suggest
that I should see M. Porriquet?" and he pointed to the old man, who was
petrified with fright. "Did I put myself in your hands for you to tear
me in pieces? You have just shortened my life by ten years! Another
blunder of this kind, and you will lay me where I have laid my father.
Would I not far rather have possessed the beautiful Foedora? And I have
obliged that old hulk instead--that rag of humanity! I had money enough
for him. And, moreover, if all the Porriquets in the world were dying of
hunger, what is that to me?"

Raphael's face was white with anger; a slight froth marked his trembling
lips; there was a savage gleam in his eyes. The two elders shook with
terror in his presence like two children at the sight of a snake. The
young man fell back in his armchair, a kind of reaction took place in
him, the tears flowed fast from his angry eyes.

"Oh, my life!" he cried, "that fair life of mine. Never to know a kindly
thought again, to love no more; nothing is left to me!"

He turned to the professor and went on in a gentle voice--"The harm
is done, my old friend. Your services have been well repaid; and my
misfortune has at any rate contributed to the welfare of a good and
worthy man."

His tones betrayed so much feeling that the almost unintelligible
words drew tears from the two old men, such tears as are shed over some
pathetic song in a foreign tongue.

"He is epileptic," muttered Porriquet.

"I understand your kind intentions, my friend," Raphael answered
gently. "You would make excuses for me. Ill-health cannot be helped, but
ingratitude is a grievous fault. Leave me now," he added. "To-morrow or
the next day, or possibly to-night, you will receive your appointment;
Resistance has triumphed over Motion. Farewell."

The old schoolmaster went away, full of keen apprehension as to
Valentin's sanity. A thrill of horror ran through him; there had been
something supernatural, he thought, in the scene he had passed through.
He could hardly believe his own impressions, and questioned them like
one awakened from a painful dream.

"Now attend to me, Jonathan," said the young man to his old servant.
"Try to understand the charge confided to you."

"Yes, my Lord Marquis."

"I am as a man outlawed f