restles in a sort of
shed. A cavalry cloak that had been thrown over it covered it from head
to foot, and fell in the shroud-like folds which all draperies assume
that come in contact with the rigidity of death. A group of officers and
several soldiers in duck trousers were looking on at a distance,
whispering as if in a church; and an assistant-surgeon was writing a
report of the death on a high window-ledge. To him Sigismond spoke.

"I should like very much to see him," he said softly.

"Go and look."

He walked to the table, hesitated a minute, then, summoning courage,
uncovered a swollen face, a tall, motionless body in its rain-soaked
garments.

"She has killed you at last, my old comrade!" murmured Planus, and fell
on his knees, sobbing bitterly.

The officers had come forward, gazing curiously at the body, which was
left uncovered.

"Look, surgeon," said one of them. "His hand is closed, as if he were
holding something in it."

"That is true," the surgeon replied, drawing nearer. "That sometimes
happens in the last convulsions.

"You remember at Solferino, Commandant Bordy held his little daughter's
miniature in his hand like that? We had much difficulty in taking it from
him."

As he spoke he tried to open the poor, tightly-closed dead hand.

"Look!" said he, "it is a letter that he is holding so tight."

He was about to read it; but one of the officers took it from his hands
and passed it to Sigismond, who was still kneeling.

"Here, Monsieur. Perhaps you will find in this some last wish to be
carried out."

Sigismond Planus rose. As the light in the room was dim, he walked with
faltering step to the window, and read, his eyes filled with tears:

"Well, yes, I love you, I love you, more than ever and forever! What is
the use of struggling and fighting against fate? Our sin is stronger than
we . . . "

It was the letter which Frantz had written to his sister-in-law a year
before, and which Sidonie had sent to her husband on the day following
their terrible scene, to revenge herself on him and his brother at the
same time.

Risler could have survived his wife's treachery, but that of his brother
had killed him.

When Sigismond understood, he was petrified with horror. He stood there,
with the letter in his hand, gazing mechanically through the open window.

The clock struck six.

Yonder, over Paris, whose dull roar they could hear although they could
not see the city, a cloud of smoke ar