er voice. 'Do not
misunderstand what I am going to say next. This is no love-story; and
can have no ending such as romancers love to set to their tales. But I
am bound to mention, Mademoiselle, that this man who had lived almost
all his life about inns and eating-houses and at the gaming-tables met
here for the first time for years a good woman, and learned by the light
of her loyalty and devotion to see what his life had been, and what
was the real nature of the work he was doing. I think--nay, I know,'
I continued, 'that it added a hundredfold to his misery that when he
learned at last the secret he had come to surprise, he learned it from
her lips, and in such a way that, had he felt no shame, Hell could have
been no place for him. But in one thing I hope she misjudged him. She
thought, and had reason to think, that the moment he knew her secret he
went out, not even closing the door, and used it. But the truth was that
while her words were still in his ears news came to him that others had
the secret; and had he not gone out on the instant and done what he did,
and forestalled them, M. de Cocheforet would have been taken, but by
others.'

Mademoiselle broke her long silence so suddenly that her horse sprang
forward.

'Would to Heaven he had!' she wailed.

'Been taken by others?' I exclaimed, startled out of my false composure.

'Oh, yes, yes!' she answered with a passionate gesture. 'Why did you not
tell me? Why did you not confess to me, sir, even at the last moment?
But, no more! No more!' she continued in a piteous voice; and she tried
to urge her horse forward. 'I have heard enough. You are racking my
heart, M. de Berault. Some day I will ask God to give me strength to
forgive you.'

'But you have not heard me out,' I said.

'I will hear no more,' she answered in a voice she vainly strove to
render steady. 'To what end? Can I say more than I have said? Or did
you think that I could forgive you now--with him behind us going to his
death? Oh, no, no!' she continued. 'Leave me! I implore you to leave me,
sir. I am not well.'

She drooped over her horse's neck as she spoke, and began to weep so
passionately that the tears ran down her cheeks under her mask, and fell
and sparkled like dew on the mane; while her sobs shook her so that I
thought she must fall. I stretched out my hand instinctively to give her
help, but she shrank from me. 'No!' she gasped, between her sobs. 'Do
not touch me. There is too much