side the ordinary life of humanity,
outside the law of love!... A desire to explain, to convince, to
justify herself, the desire of a desperate creature at bay, burned up
in her like a flame: it flashed and died. Henri had no confidence in
her! He believed this odious thing of her--this abominable, incredible
thing!... Her heart was full to bursting with an agony of grief, of
outraged innocence.... She looked him straight in the eyes--her own
flashing fury.

"You insult me!" she cried.... "Withdraw what you have just said!...
You will apologise!"

De Loubersac said in a low, distinct voice:

"I maintain my accusation, Mademoiselle, until you have furnished me
with absolute, undeniable proofs!"...

De Loubersac's voice failed him. Wilhelmine had turned from him. She
hurried to the door, descended the church steps, and threw herself
into a passing cab.

De Loubersac had followed her.

In tones of contempt she had flung at him the words:

"Farewell, monsieur--and for ever!"

Henri's answer was a shrug of the shoulder.

As he stood there, an outline, a shadow, appeared under the church
porch: a something, a being, indescribable, appeared, disappeared,
running with spirit-like swiftness, vanishing. Henri de Loubersac had
a clear conviction that during his conversation with her who might
have been his fiancee in days to come, they had been shadowed, spied
upon!

XXVII

THE TWO VINSONS

There were strange happenings elsewhere on the day Henri de Loubersac
and Wilhelmine de Naarboveck had parted in grief and anger.

It was on the stroke of noon when Corporal Vinson heard a key turn in
the lock of his cell. Two military jailors confronted him.

"Butler?"

The traitor answered to that name.

Juve, for reasons of his own, had not revealed the prisoner's true
quality. Vinson had therefore been entered in the jail book as Butler.

One of the jailors, an old veteran, whose uniform was a mixture of the
civil and the military, took the word.

"Butler, you are to be transferred to a building belonging to the
Council of War: there you will occupy cell 27.... Our prison here is
for the condemned only, so you cannot remain. You belong to the
accused section."

All that mattered to Butler-Vinson for the moment was--he had to reach
his new quarters by crossing the rue Cherche-Midi between two
jailors.... He would be exposed to the curious glances of the public!
He shuddered at the thought!... And there was