took place in that mysterious house
of which our readers have as yet only seen the outside.

The servant was going from one room to another, carrying packages which
he placed in a trunk. These preparations over, he loaded a pistol,
examined his poniard, then suspended it, by the aid of a ring, to the
chain which served him for a belt, to which he attached besides a bunch
of keys and a book of prayers bound in black leather.

While he was thus occupied, a step, light as that of a shadow, came up
the staircase, and a woman, pale and phantom-like under the folds of her
white veil, appeared at the door, and a voice, sad and sweet as the song
of a bird in the wood, said: "Remy, are you ready?"

"Yes, madame, I only wait for your box."

"Do you think these boxes will go easily on our horses?"

"Oh! yes, madame, but if you have any fear, I can leave mine; I have
all I want there."

"No, no, Remy, take all that you want for the journey. Oh! Remy! I long
to be with my father; I have sad presentiments, and it seems an age
since I saw him."

"And yet, madame, it is but three months; not a longer interval than
usual."

"Remy, you are such a good doctor, and you yourself told me, the last
time we quitted him, that he had not long to live."

"Yes, doubtless; but it was only a dread, not a prediction. Sometimes
death seems to forget old men, and they live on as though by the habit
of living; and often, besides, an old man is like a child, ill to-day
and well to-morrow."

"Alas! Remy, like the child also, he is often well to-day and dead
to-morrow."

Remy did not reply, for he had nothing really reassuring to say, and
silence succeeded for some minutes.

"At what hour have you ordered the horses?" said the lady, at last.

"At two o'clock."

"And one has just struck."

"Yes, madame."

"No one is watching outside?"

"No one."

"Not even that unhappy young man?"

"Not even he."

And Remy sighed.

"You say that in a strange manner, Remy."

"Because he also has made a resolution."

"What is it?"

"To see us no more; at least, not to try to see us any more."

"And where is he going?"

"Where we are all going--to rest.".

"God give it him eternally," said the lady, in a cold voice, "and yet--"

"Yet what, madame?"

"Had he nothing to do here?"

"He had to love if he had been loved."

"A man of his name, rank, and age, should think of his future."

"You, madame, are of an age, rank, and name little