ood.

In speaking of him everyone said "Monsieur Maurice." When they said
"Monsieur d'Escorval," they referred to the baron.

After the crushing evidence against the accused had been written and
signed in her fine and aristocratic hand-writing, Mlle. de Courtornieu
bore herself with partly real and partly affected indifference. She
would not, on any account, have had people suppose that anything
relating to these plebeians--these low peasants--could possibly disturb
her proud serenity. She would not so much as ask a single question on
the subject.

But this superb indifference was, in great measure, assumed. In her
inmost soul she was blessing this conspiracy which had caused so many
tears and so much blood to flow. Had it not removed her rival from her
path?

"Now," she thought, "the marquis will return to me, and I will make him
forget the bold creature who has bewitched him!"

Chimeras! The charm had vanished which had once caused the love of
Martial de Sairmeuse to oscillate between Mlle. de Courtornieu and the
daughter of Lacheneur.

Captivated at first by the charms of Mlle. Blanche, he soon discovered
the calculating ambition and the utter worldliness concealed beneath
such seeming simplicity and candor. Nor was he long in discerning her
intense vanity, her lack of principle, and her unbounded selfishness;
and, comparing her with the noble and generous Marie-Anne, his
admiration was changed into indifference, or rather repugnance.

He did return to her, however, or at least he seemed to return to
her, actuated, perhaps, by that inexplicable sentiment that impels us
sometimes to do that which is most distasteful to us, and by a feeling
of discouragement and despair, knowing that Marie-Anne was now lost to
him forever.

He also said to himself that a pledge had been interchanged between the
duke and the Marquis de Courtornieu; that he, too, had given his word,
and that Mlle. Blanche was his betrothed.

Was it worth while to break this engagement? Would he not be compelled
to marry some day? Why not fulfil the pledge that had been made? He was
as willing to marry Mlle. de Courtornieu as anyone else, since he was
sure that the only woman whom he had ever truly loved--the only woman
whom he ever could love--was never to be his.

Master of himself when near her, and sure that he would ever remain the
same, it was easy to play the part of lover with that perfection and
that charm which--sad as it is to say