you not tell me that Jacques is in love
with that little Dionysia Chandore?"

"Desperately. Like a real child."

"And she?"

"She adores Jacques."

"Well. And did you not also tell me that the wedding-day was fixed?"

"Yes, three days ago."

"Has Jacques written to you about the matter?"

"An excellent letter."

"In which he tells you he is coming up?"

"Yes: he wanted to purchase the wedding-presents himself." With a
gesture of magnificent indifference the marquis tapped the top of his
snuffbox, and said,--

"And you think a boy like our Jacques, a Boiscoran, in love, and
beloved, who is about to be married, and has his head full of
wedding-presents, could have committed such a horrible crime? Such
things are not worth discussing, and, with your leave, I shall return to
my occupation."

If doubt is contagious, confidence is still more so. Gradually the
marchioness felt reassured by the perfect assurance of her husband. The
blood came back to her cheeks; and smiles reappeared on pale lips. She
said in a stronger voice,--

"In fact, I may have been too easily frightened."

The marquis assented by a gesture.

"Yes, much too easily, my dear. And, between us, I would not say much
about it. How could the officers help accusing our Jacques if his own
mother suspects him?"

The marchioness had taken up the telegram, and was reading it over once
more.

"And yet," she said, answering her own objections, "who in my place
would not have been frightened? This name of Claudieuse especially"--

"Why? It is the name of an excellent and most honorable gentleman,--the
best man in the world, in spite of his sea-dog manners."

"Jacques hates him, my dear."

"Jacques does not mind him any more than that."

"They have repeatedly quarrelled."

"Of course. Claudieuse is a furious legitimist; and as such he always
talks with the utmost contempt of all of us who have been attached to
the Orleans family."

"Jacques has been at law with him."

"And he has done right, only he ought to have carried the matter
through. Claudieuse has claims on the Magpie, which divides our
lands,--absurd claims. He wants at all seasons, and according as he may
desire, to direct the waters of the little stream into his own channels,
and thus drown the meadows at Boiscoran, which are lower than his own.
Even my brother, who was an angel in patience and gentleness, had his
troubles with this tyrant."

But the marchioness was not convi