silent and passive submission of great misery that Mme.
d'Escorval obeyed the cure.

Her body alone moved in mechanical obedience; her mind and heart were
flying through space to the man who was her all, and whose mind and
heart were even then, doubtless, calling to her from the dread abyss
into which he had fallen.

But when she had passed the threshold of the drawing-room, she trembled
and dropped the priest's arm, rudely recalled to the present reality.

She recognized Marie-Anne in the lifeless form extended upon the sofa.

"Mademoiselle Lacheneur!" she faltered, "here in this costume--dead!"

One might indeed believe the poor girl dead, to see her lying there
rigid, cold, and as white as if the last drop of blood had been drained
from her veins. Her beautiful face had the immobility of marble; her
half-opened, colorless lips disclosed teeth convulsively clinched, and a
large dark-blue circle surrounded her closed eyelids.

Her long black hair, which she had rolled up closely to slip under her
peasant's hat, had become unbound, and flowed down in rich masses over
her shoulders and trailed upon the floor.

"She is only in a state of syncope; there is no danger," declared the
abbe, after he had examined Marie-Anne. "It will not be long before she
regains consciousness."

And then, rapidly but clearly, he gave the necessary directions to the
servants, who were astonished at their mistress.

Mme. d'Escorval looked on with eyes dilated with terror. She seemed
to doubt her own sanity, and incessantly passed her hand across her
forehead, thickly beaded with cold sweat.

"What a night!" she murmured. "What a night!"

"I must remind you, Madame," said the priest, sympathizingly, but
firmly, "that reason and duty alike forbid you thus to yield to
despair! Wife, where is your energy? Christian, what has become of your
confidence in a just and beneficial God?"

"Oh! I have courage, Monsieur," faltered the wretched woman. "I am
brave!"

The abbe led her to a large arm-chair, where he forced her to seat
herself, and in a gentler tone, he resumed:

"Besides, why should you despair, Madame? Your son, certainly, is with
you in safety. Your husband has not compromised himself; he has done
nothing which I myself have not done."

And briefly, but with rare precision, he explained the part which he and
the baron had played during this unfortunate evening.

But this recital, instead of reassuring the baroness, seemed