coloured girls, the lands of humming-birds, of elephants,
of roaming lions, of negro kings, from all the lands which are like
fairy-tales to us who no longer believe in the White Cat or the Sleeping
Beauty. It would be awfully jolly to be able to treat one's self to an
excursion out there; but, then, it would cost a great deal of money, no
end--"

He broke off abruptly, remembering that his brother had that money now;
and released from care, released from labouring for his daily bread,
free, unfettered, happy, and light-hearted, he might go whither he
listed, to find the fair-haired Swedes or the brown damsels of Havana.
And then one of those involuntary flashes which were common with him, so
sudden and swift that he could neither anticipate them, nor stop them,
nor qualify them, communicated, as it seemed to him, from some second,
independent, and violent soul, shot through his brain.

"Bah! He is too great a simpleton; he will marry that little Rosemilly."
He was standing up now. "I will leave you to dream of the future. I want
to be moving." He grasped his brother's hand and added in a heavy tone:

"Well, my dear old boy, you are a rich man. I am very glad to have come
upon you this evening to tell you how pleased I am about it, how truly I
congratulate you, and how much I care for you."

Jean, tender and soft-hearted, was deeply touched.

"Thank you, my good brother--thank you!" he stammered.

And Pierre turned away with his slow step, his stick under his arm, and
his hands behind his back.

Back in the town again, he once more wondered what he should do, being
disappointed of his walk and deprived of the company of the sea by his
brother's presence. He had an inspiration. "I will go and take a glass
of liqueur with old Marowsko," and he went off towards the quarter of
the town known as Ingouville.

He had known old Marowsko-_le pere Marowsko_, he called him--in the
hospitals in Paris. He was a Pole, an old refugee, it was said, who
had gone through terrible things out there, and who had come to ply
his calling as a chemist and druggist in France after passing a fresh
examination. Nothing was known of his early life, and all sorts of
legends had been current among the indoor and outdoor patients
and afterward among his neighbours. This reputation as a terrible
conspirator, a nihilist, a regicide, a patriot ready for anything and
everything, who had escaped death by a miracle, had bewitched Pierre
Roland's