poor
fellow had the sheriff after him; he was hiding, as well he might."

"Go and ask at the hotel du Mail, rue du Mail, if he was not taken there
that morning, half dead of the fumes of charcoal, by a handsome young
woman with whom he has been in love over a year. Her letters are at
this moment under your very nose in your own house. If you want to teach
Nathan a good lesson, let us all three go there; and I'll show you,
papers in hand, how you can save him from the sheriff and Clichy if you
choose to be the good girl that you are."

"Try that on others than Florine, my little man. I am certain that
Nathan has never been in love with any one but me."

"On the contrary, he has been in love with a woman in society for over a
year--"

"A woman in society, he!" cried Florine. "I don't trouble myself about
such nonsense as that."

"Well, do you want me to make him come and tell you that he will not
take you home from here to-night."

"If you can make him tell me that," said Florine, "I'll take _you_ home,
and we'll look for those letters, which I shall believe in when I see
them, and not till then. He must have written them while I slept."

"Stay here," said Felix, "and watch."

So saying, he took the arm of his wife and moved to a little distance.
Presently, Nathan, who had been hunting up and down the foyer like a
dog looking for its master, returned to the spot where the mask had
addressed him. Seeing on his face an expression he could not conceal,
Florine placed herself like a post in front of him, and said,
imperiously:--

"I don't wish you to leave me again; I have my reasons for this."

The countess then, at the instigation of her husband, went up to Raoul
and said in his ear,--

"Marie. Who is this woman? Leave her at once, and meet me at the foot of
the grand staircase."

In this difficult extremity Raoul dropped Florine's arm, and though she
caught his own and held it forcibly, she was obliged, after a moment, to
let him go. Nathan disappeared into the crowd.

"What did I tell you?" said Felix in Florine's astonished ears, offering
her his arm.

"Come," she said; "whoever you are, come. Have you a carriage here?"

For all answer, Vandenesse hurried Florine away, followed by his wife.
A few moments later the three masks, driven rapidly by the Vandenesse
coachman, reached Florine's house. As soon as she had entered her own
apartments the actress unmasked. Madame de Vandenesse could not restrain