ifies to the identity of Comte Chabert. I am not, as you know,
the man to take up a bad cause. If you resist our proceedings to show
that the certificate of death was false, you will lose that first case,
and that matter once settled, we shall gain every point."

"What, then, do you wish to discuss with me?"

"Neither the Colonel nor yourself. Nor need I allude to the briefs which
clever advocates may draw up when armed with the curious facts of this
case, or the advantage they may derive from the letters you received
from your first husband before your marriage to your second."

"It is false," she cried, with the violence of a spoilt woman. "I never
had a letter from Comte Chabert; and if some one is pretending to be
the Colonel, it is some swindler, some returned convict, like Coignard
perhaps. It makes me shudder only to think of it. Can the Colonel rise
from the dead, monsieur? Bonaparte sent an aide-de-camp to inquire for
me on his death, and to this day I draw the pension of three thousand
francs granted to this widow by the Government. I have been perfectly in
the right to turn away all the Chaberts who have ever come, as I shall
all who may come."

"Happily we are alone, madame. We can tell lies at our ease," said he
coolly, and finding it amusing to lash up the Countess' rage so as to
lead her to betray herself, by tactics familiar to lawyers, who are
accustomed to keep cool when their opponents or their clients are in
a passion. "Well, then, we must fight it out," thought he, instantly
hitting on a plan to entrap her and show her her weakness.

"The proof that you received the first letter, madame, is that it
contained some securities--"

"Oh, as to securities--that it certainly did not."

"Then you received the letter," said Derville, smiling. "You are caught,
madame, in the first snare laid for you by an attorney, and you fancy
you could fight against Justice----"

The Countess colored, and then turned pale, hiding her face in her
hands. Then she shook off her shame, and retorted with the natural
impertinence of such women, "Since you are the so-called Chabert's
attorney, be so good as to--"

"Madame," said Derville, "I am at this moment as much your lawyer as I
am Colonel Chabert's. Do you suppose I want to lose so valuable a client
as you are?--But you are not listening."

"Nay, speak on, monsieur," said she graciously.

"Your fortune came to you from M. le Comte Chabert, and you cast him
off.