mptuously."

"Did you speak to him?" asked M. Folgat.

"Oh, no, sir! M. Galpin would not allow me."

"And did you have time to look at the gun?"

"I could but just glance at the lock."

"And what did you see?"

The brow of the old servant grew still darker, as he replied sadly,--

"I saw that I had done well to keep silent. The lock is black. Master
must have used his gun since I cleaned it."

Grandpapa Chandore and M. Folgat exchanged looks of distress. One more
hope was lost.

"Now," said the young lawyer, "tell me how M. de Boiscoran usually
charged his gun."

"He used cartridges, sir, of course. They sent him, I think, two
thousand with the gun,--some for balls, some with large shot, and others
with shot of every size. At this season, when hunting is prohibited,
master could shoot nothing but rabbits, or those little birds, you know,
which come to our marshes: so he always loaded one barrel with tolerably
large shot, and the other with small-shot."

But he stopped suddenly, shocked at the impression which his statement
seemed to produce. Dionysia cried,--

"That is terrible! Every thing is against us!"

M. Folgat did not give her time to say any more. He asked,--

"My dear Anthony, did M. Galpin take all of your master's cartridges
away with him?"

"Oh, no! certainly not."

"Well, you must instantly go back to Boiscoran, and bring me three or
four cartridges of every number of shot."

"All right," said the old man. "I'll be back in a short time."

He started immediately; and, thanks to his great promptness, he
reappeared at seven o'clock, at the moment when the family got up from
dinner, and put a large package of cartridges on the table.

M. de Chandore and M. Folgat had quickly opened some of them; and,
after a few failures, they found two numbers of shot which seemed to
correspond exactly to the samples left them by the doctor.

"There is an incomprehensible fatality in all this," said the old
gentleman in an undertone.

The young lawyer, also, looked discouraged.

"It is madness," he said, "to try to establish M. de Boiscoran's
innocence without having first communicated with him."

"And if you could do so to-morrow?" asked Dionysia.

"Then, madam, he might give us the key to this mystery, which we are in
vain trying to solve; or, at least, he might tell us the way to find it
all out. But that is not to be thought of. M. de Boiscoran is held in
close confinement, and you may rest a