e an impossible thing, that I was obliged to
refuse, to my regret, precisely because it was impossible; but you know
that I am yours, and will do all I can for your family."

"Forgive me."

"I have nothing to forgive; in your place I should think as you do, but
I believe that in mine you would act as I do."

"Be sure that I have never had an idea of blame in my heart for what is
with you an affair of dignity. It is because you are high and proud that
I love you so passionately."

She rose.

"Are you going?" he asked.

"I want to carry Madame Dammauville's words to mamma; you can imagine
with what anguish she awaits me."

"Let us, go. I will leave you at the boulevard to go to see Nougarede."

The interview with the advocate was short.

"You see, dear friend, that my plan is good; bring Madame Dammauville to
court, and we shall have some pleasant moments."

This time Saniel had not the hesitation of the previous evening, and he
entered the first barber-shop he saw. When he returned to his rooms
he lighted two candles, and placing them on the mantle, he looked at
himself in the glass.

Coquetry had never been his sin, and often weeks passed without his
looking in a mirror, so indifferent was he when making his toilet.
However, as a young boy he sometimes looked in his small glass, asking
himself what he would become, and he could now recall his looks--an
energetic face with clearly drawn features, a physiognomy open and
frank, without being pretty, but not disagreeable. His beard had
concealed all this; but now that it was gone, he said to himself without
much reflection that he would find again, without doubt, the boy he
remembered.

What he saw in the glass was a forehead lined transversely; oblique
eyebrows, raised at the inside extremity, and a mouth with tightened
lips turned down at the corners; furrows were hollowed in the cheeks;
and the whole physiognomy, harassed, ravaged, expressed hardness.

What had become of that of the young man of other days? He had before
him the man that life had made, and of whom the violent contractions of
the muscles of the face had modelled the expression.

"Truly, the mouth of an assassin!" he murmured.

Then, looking at his shaved head, he added with a smile:

"And perhaps that of one condemned to death, whose toilet has just been
made for the guillotine."

CHAPTER XXIX. A BROKEN NEGATIVE

To have made himself unrecognizable was, without doubt, a safe