accompany me."

He did not reply to these last words, which were an invitation as well
as a question.

"Did you not examine her as I told you?" he asked, after a moment of
reflection.

"With all the attention of which I was capable in my anguish. Her
glance seemed to me straight and untroubled; her voice is regular, very
rhythmical; her words follow each other without hesitation; her ideas
are consecutive and clearly expressed. There is no trace of suffering on
her pale face, which bears only the mark of a resigned grief. She
moves her arms freely, but the legs, so far as I could judge under
the bedclothes, are motionless. In many ways it seems to me that her
paralysis resembles mamma's, though it is true that in others it does
not. She must be extremely sensitive to the cold, for although the
weather is not cold today, the temperature of her room seemed very
high."

"This is an examination," Saniel said, "that a physician could not have
conducted better, unless he questioned the patient; and had I been
with you during this visit we should not have learned anything more.
It appears certain that Madame Dammauville is in possession of her
faculties, which renders her testimony invulnerable."

Madame Cormier drew her daughter to her and kissed her passionately.

"I have, therefore, nothing to do with this lady," continued Saniel,
with the precipitation of a man who has just escaped a danger. "But your
part, Mademoiselle, is not finished, and you must return to her tomorrow
to fulfil that which Nougarde confides to you."

He explained what Nougarde expected of her.

"Certainly," she said. "I will do all that I am advised to do for
Florentin. I will go to Madame Dammauville; I will go everywhere. But
will you permit me to express my astonishment that immediate profit is
not made of this declaration to obtain the release of my brother?"

He repeated the reasons that Nougarede had given him for not proceeding
in this manner.

"I would not say anything that resembles a reproach," said Madame
Cormier, with more decision than she ordinarily put into her words; "but
perhaps Monsieur Nougarde has some personal ideas in his advice. Our
interest is that Florentin should return to us as quickly as possible,
and that he should be spared the sufferings of a prison. But I
understand that to an 'ordonnance de non-lieu', in which he does not
appear, Monsieur Nougarde prefers the broad light of the court, where he
could deliver