ly filled the whole room, told but
too plainly that the poison which she had taken was one of those from
which there is no rescue.

She was carried to her bed; and in less than ten minutes she was dead:
she had never uttered another word.

Henrietta and Mrs. Bertolle were kneeling by the side of the bed, and
the count was sobbing in a corner of the room, when a police-sergeant
entered.

"The woman Brian is not to be found," he said; "but M. Elgin has been
arrested. Where is the Countess Ville-Handry?"

Daniel pointed at the body.

"Dead?" said the officer. "Then I have nothing more to do here."

He was going out, when Malgat stopped him.

"I beg your pardon, sir," he said. "I wish to state that I am not
Ravinet, dealer in curiosities; but that my true name is Malgat,
formerly cashier of the Mutual Discount Society, sentenced _in
contumaciam_ to ten years' penal servitude. I am ready to be tried, and
place myself in your hands."

XXXIII.

The magistrate from Saigon saw his hopes fulfilled, and, thanks to his
promotion, was commissioned to continue the trial which he had so ably
commenced. After the jury had brought in their verdict of guilty, he
sentenced Justin Chevassat, alias Maxime de Brevan, to penal servitude
for life.

Crochard, surnamed Bagnolet, got off with twenty years; and the two
Chevassats escaped with ten years' solitary confinement.

The trial of Thomas Elgin, which came on during the same term, revealed
a system of swindling which was so strikingly bold and daring, that it
appeared at first sight almost incredible. It excited especial surprise
when it was found out that he had issued false shares, which he made
Count Ville-Handry buy in, so as to ruin, by the same process, the count
as an individual, and the company over which he presided. He was sent
for twenty years to the penitentiary.

These scandalous proceedings had one good result. They saved the poor
count; but they revealed, at the same time, such prodigious unfitness
for business, that people began to suspect how dependent he must have
been on his first wife, Henrietta's mother. He remained, however,
relatively poor. They had made Thomas Elgin refund, and had even
obtained possession of Sarah Brandon's fortune; but the count was called
upon to make amends for his want of business capacity. When he had
satisfied all his creditors, and handed over to his daughter a part of
her maternal inheritance, he had hardly more than si