, while his chin rested on
his crossed hands. The young man's eyes were glowing in his pale face
with thin, compressed lips. Although they recognised one another, Victor
did not move, and Guillaume on his side understood that it was not safe
to exchange greetings in such a place. From that moment, however, he
remained conscious that Victor was there, just above him, never stirring,
but waiting silently, fiercely and with flaming eyes, for what was going
to happen.

Pierre, meantime, had recognised that most amiable deputy Duthil, and
little Princess Rosemonde, seated just in front of him. Amidst the hubbub
of the throng which chatted and laughed to while away the time, their
voices were the gayest to be heard, and plainly showed how delighted they
were to find themselves at a spectacle to which so many desired
admittance. Duthil was explaining all the arrangements to Rosemonde,
telling her to whom or to what purpose each bench and wooden box was
allotted: there was the jury-box, the prisoner's dock, the seats assigned
to counsel for the defence, the public prosecutor, and the clerk of the
court, without forgetting the table on which material evidence was
deposited and the bar to which witnesses were summoned. There was nobody
as yet in any of these places; one merely saw an attendant giving a last
look round, and advocates passing rapidly. One might indeed have thought
oneself in a theatre, the stage of which remained deserted, while the
spectators crowded the auditorium waiting for the play to begin. To fill
up the interval the little Princess ended by looking about her for
persons of her acquaintance among the close-pressed crowd of sight-seers
whose eager faces were already reddening.

"Oh! isn't that Monsieur Fonsegue over there behind the bench, near that
stout lady in yellow?" she exclaimed. "Our friend General de Bozonnet is
on the other side, I see. But isn't Baron Duvillard here?"

"Oh! no," replied Duthil; "he could hardly come; it would look as if he
were here to ask for vengeance." Then, in his turn questioning Rosemonde,
the deputy went on: "Do you happen to have quarrelled with your handsome
friend Hyacinthe? Is that the reason why you've given me the pleasure of
acting as your escort to-day?"

With a slight shrug of her shoulders, the Princess replied that poets
were beginning to bore her. A fresh caprice, indeed, was drawing her into
politics. For a week past she had found amusement in the surrounding