Conde is now at
an end."

There was a moment's pause, and they finished the game.--President du
Ronceret now did something very similar. Perhaps he had heard the
anecdote; perhaps, in political life, little minds and great minds are
apt to hit upon the same expression. He looked at his watch, and
interrupted the game of boston with:

"At this moment M. le Comte d'Esgrignon is arrested, and that house
which has held its head so high is dishonored forever."

"Then, have you got hold of the boy?" du Coudrai cried gleefully.

Every one in the room, with the exception of the President, the
deputy, and du Croisier, looked startled.

"He has just been arrested in Chesnel's house, where he was hiding,"
said the deputy public prosecutor, with the air of a capable but
unappreciated public servant, who ought by rights to be Minister of
Police. M. Sauvager, the deputy, was a thin, tall young man of
five-and-twenty, with a lengthy olive-hued countenance, black
frizzled hair, and deep-set eyes; the wide, dark rings beneath them
were completed by the wrinkled purple eyelids above. With a nose like
the beak of some bird of prey, a pinched mouth, and cheeks worn lean
with study and hollowed by ambition, he was the very type of a
second-rate personage on the lookout for something to turn up, and
ready to do anything if so he might get on in the world, while keeping
within the limitations of the possible and the forms of law. His
pompous expression was an admirable indication of the time-serving
eloquence to be expected of him. Chesnel's successor had discovered
the young Count's hiding place to him, and he took great credit to
himself for his penetration.

The news seemed to come as a shock to the examining magistrate, M.
Camusot, who had granted the warrant of arrest on Sauvager's
application, with no idea that it was to be executed so promptly.
Camusot was short, fair, and fat already, though he was only thirty
years old or thereabouts; he had the flabby, livid look peculiar to
officials who live shut up in their private study or in a court of
justice; and his little, pale, yellow eyes were full of the suspicion
which is often mistaken for shrewdness.

Mme. Camusot looked at her spouse, as who should say, "Was I not
right?"

"Then the case will come on," was Camusot's comment.

"Could you doubt it?" asked du Coudrai. "Now they have got the Count,
all is over."

"There is the jury," said Camusot. "In this case M. le Prefet