ne without her protector, might well fancy she read her
death-warrant in the eyes of her rival. At the noise of the volley the
guests all sprang to their feet, but Madame du Gua remained seated.

"It is nothing," she said; "our men are despatching the Blues." Then,
seeing the marquis outside on the portico, she rose. "Mademoiselle whom
you here see," she continued, with the calmness of concentrated fury,
"came here to betray the Gars! She meant to deliver him up to the
Republic."

"I could have done so twenty times to-day and yet I saved his life,"
said Mademoiselle de Verneuil.

Madame du Gua sprang upon her rival like lightning; in her blind
excitement she tore apart the fastenings of the young girl's spencer,
the stuff, the embroidery, the corset, the chemise, and plunged her
savage hand into the bosom where, as she well knew, a letter lay hidden.
In doing this her jealousy so bruised and tore the palpitating throat
of her rival, taken by surprise at the sudden attack, that she left
the bloody marks of her nails, feeling a sort of pleasure in making
her submit to so degrading a prostitution. In the feeble struggle which
Marie made against the furious woman, her hair became unfastened and
fell in undulating curls about her shoulders; her face glowed with
outraged modesty, and tears made their burning way along her cheeks,
heightening the brilliancy of her eyes, as she quivered with shame
before the looks of the assembled men. The hardest judge would have
believed in her innocence when he saw her sorrow.

Hatred is so uncalculating that Madame du Gua did not perceive she
had overshot her mark, and that no one listened to her as she cried
triumphantly: "You shall now see, gentlemen, whether I have slandered
that horrible creature."

"Not so horrible," said the bass voice of the guest who had thrown the
first stone. "But for my part, I like such horrors."

"Here," continued the cruel woman, "is an order signed by Laplace, and
counter-signed by Dubois, minister of war." At these names several heads
were turned to her. "Listen to the wording of it," she went on.

"'The military citizen commanders of all grades, the district
administrators, the _procureur-syndics_, et cetera, of the
insurgent departments, and particularly those of the localities in
which the ci-devant Marquis de Montauran, leader of the brigands
and otherwise known as the Gars, may be found, are hereby
commanded to give aid and assistanc