him, and, casting upon him those burning
glances which blazed with superhuman audacity, she sighed,--

"'If you loved me really! Ah, if you really loved me!'

"And she bent over him, tremulous with passion, watching his features so
closely, that their lips nearly touched.

"'If you loved me as I love you,' she whispered again.

"It was all over; Malgat was lost. He drew Sarah towards him, and said,
kissing her,--

"'Very well then. Yes!'

"She immediately disengaged herself, and with eager hands seized one
parcel of bank-notes after another, pushing them into a little morocco
bag which she held in her hand. And, when the bag was full, she said,--

"'Now we are safe. To-night at ten o'clock, at the gate of the court-
yard, with a carriage. To-morrow, at daybreak, we shall be out of
France, and free. Now we are bound to each other forever,--and I love
you!'

"And she went away. And he let her go away."

The old gentleman had become ghastly white, his few hairs seemed to
stand on end, and large drops of perspiration inundated his face as he
swallowed at a gulp a cup of tea, and then went on, laughing bitterly,--

"You suppose, no doubt, that, _when_ Sarah had left him, Malgat came to
himself? By no means. It seemed as if, with that kiss, with which she
had paid him for his crime, the infamous creature had inspired him with
the same genius for evil that was in her.

"Far from repenting, he rejoiced at what had been done; and when he
learned, that, on the following day, the board of directors were to meet
to examine the books, he laughed at the faces they would make; for
I told you he was mad. With all the coolness of a hardened thief, he
calculated the total amount of what had been abstracted: it was four
hundred thousand francs. Immediately, in order to conceal the true state
of things, he took his books, and, with almost diabolic skill, altered
the figures, and changed the entries, so as to make it appear that the
defalcation was of long date, and that various sums had been abstracted
for several months. When he had finished his fearful task, he wrote to
the board a hypocritical letter, in which he stated that he had robbed
the safe in order to pay his differences on 'Change, and that now, when
he could no longer conceal his crime, he was going to commit suicide.
When this was done, he left his office, as if nothing had happened.

"The proof that he acted under the incomprehensible influence of a kind
of hal