I had forgotten him. Jonquil, Jonquil! come here, boy."

The old dog came scrambling along, and looking up into Le Prun's face, yelped strangely.

"What!-hungry? They have forgotten you, I dare say. What! not a scrap, not a bone! But where is your master ?"

Le Prun entered the inner room, and the dog, preceding him, ran behind the fauteuil that stood at the table; and then running a step or two towards Le Prun, raised a howl that made him jump.

"Hey! what's the matter? But, sacre! there is something-what is this?" There was a candle burning on the table, and writing materials. The Visconte de Charrebourg, who had evidently been writing, had fallen forward upon the table-dead. Le Prun touched him, he was quite cold. He raised the tall lank figure as well as he could, so that it leaned back in the chair; a little blood came from the corner of the mouth, the eyes were glazed, but the features wore, even in death, a character of sternness and dignity. He had fallen forward upon the fingers that held the pen, and the hand came stiffly back along with the body, still holding the pen in the attitude in which the chill of death had stiffened them. In this attitude he looked as if he only awaited a phrase or a thought of which he was in search to resume his writing.

"Dead-dead-a long time dead! how the devil has all this happened?"

And he looked for a moment at the old hound, that was sniffing and whimpering in his master's ears, as if he could answer him. Poor Jonquil! he has shared his master's fortune fairly -the better and the worse; for years his humble comrade in the sylvan solitudes of Charrebourg, and here the solitary witness of his parting moment. Who can say with what more than human grief that dumb heart is swelling! He will not outlive his old friend many days-Jonquil is past the age for making new ones.

Le Prun glanced at the letter, a few lines of which the dead man had traced when he was thus awfully interrupted. "Sir," it began "the family of Charrebourg, of which I am the unworthy representative, have been remarkable at all times for a chivalric and honourable spirit. They have maintained their dignity in prosperity by great deeds and princely munificence -in adversity, by encountering grief with patience, and insolence with defiance. Insult has never approached them unexpiated by blood; and I, old as I am, in consequence of what this morning" here the summons had interrupted him.

"Intended for me !" said Le Prun, with an ugly sneer. "Well, he can't now put his daughter on her guard, or inflame her with the magnificent spirit of the beggarly Charrebourgs."

And so saying, he surrendered the chamber to the dead Visconte and his canine watcher.

Blassemare kept his counsel and his word. He dropped no hint to Le Prun of his interview with the Marquis de Secqville. His own vanity was at once mortified and excited by the discovery he had made. He was resolved to obliterate the digrace of having been duped, by the reality of his meditated triumph. Love and war have much in common, a truth perhaps embodied in the allegoric loves of Mars and Venus. Certain, at least, it is, that in each pursuit all authorities agree that every stratagem is fair. Blassemare was not the man to rob this canon of its force by any morbid scruples of conscience; and having the courage

of a lion, associated with some of the vulpine attributes, and a certain prankish love of mischief, he was tolerably qualified by nature for the enterprises of rivalry and intrigue.

Le Prun brooded savagely over his suspected wrongs. He awaited with affected contempt, but a real and malignant anxiety, the verdict of Blassemare, who insisted upon deferring his interview with Madame Le Prun until some weeks had passed over the grave of that "high and puissant signor, the Visconte de Charrebourg."

It was nearly a month after the death of that old gentleman, when Blassemare, happening to meet Madame Le

Prun as she walked upon one of the terraces, dressed in so exquisite a suit of mourning, and looking altogether so irresistibly handsome, that, for the life of him, he could not forbear saluting, approaching, and addressing her. He was affably received, and the conversation, at first slight and indifferent, turned gradually, without premeditation on his part, but, as it were, by a sort of irresistible fatality, into that sombre and troubled channel whither, sooner or later, though not exactly then, he had determined to direct it. "Monsieur Le Prun is unaccountably out of spirits, madame-I should say morose, ill-tempered. I almost fear to approach him."

"Is there anything to surprise one in that?"

"Why, no, considering his provocations."

"Provocations! what do you mean,

sir ?"

"Madame must pardon me. I happen to be in possession of some secrets."

There was a short pause, during which Madame Le Prun's colour came and went more than once.

"Will Madame Le Prun be so kind as to sit down here for a few minutes, and I will convince her that I have kept those secrets well, and that I am -I dare not say her friend-but the most devoted of her servants?"

Madame Le Prun sate down upon the marble couch that stood there, carved with doves and Cupids, and embowered, in the transparent shadows of myrtle, like a throne of Venus. Blassemare fancied that he had never beheld so beautiful and piquante an image as Lucille at that moment presented: her cheeks glowing, her long lashes half dropped over the quenched fires of her proud dark eyes; her countenance full of a confusion that was at once beautiful and sinister; one hand laid upon her heart, as if to quell its beatings, and shut with an expression half defiant, half irresolute-and the pretty fingers of the other unconsciously playing with the tendrils of a pavenche.

Blassemare enjoyed this pretty picture too much to disturb it by a word. Perhaps, too, there was comfort to his vanity in the spectacle of her humiliation; at all events he suffered some time to pass before he spoke to her. When he did, it was with a great deal of respect; for Blassemnare, not

withstanding his coarseness, had a sufficiency of tact.

"Madame perceives that I am not without discretion and zeal in her service."

"Sir, you speak enigmas; you talk of secrets and provocation; and while you affect an air of deference, your meaning is full of insolence."

It was plain her pride was mastering her fears. Blassemare thought it high time to lower his key. He therefore said, with a confident smile and an easy air

"My meaning may be disagreeable, but that is chargeable not upon me, but on the circumstances of our retrospect; and if I am enigmatical rather than explicit, I am so from respect, not insolence. My dear madame, on the honour of a gentleman, I saw Monsieur le Marquis de Secqville take his abrupt departure from your window-you understand. I not only saw him, but found and retained proofs of his identity, armed with which, I taxed him with the fact, and obtained his full confession. Now, madame, perhaps you will give me credit for something better than hypocrisy and insolence."

Lucille looked thunderstruck for a moment, then rising, she darted on him a glance of rage and defiance, and overpowered by the tumult within her, she burst into a flood of tears, and covering her face with her hands, sob bed in silence, almost hysterically.

Blassemare waited patiently while she wept on. Suddenly she looked full and fiercely on him, and cried—

"Perhaps you have told me falsehoods, and dared thus to trifle with me."

"I swear, madame, on the honour of a nobleman of France, I have told you the simple truth. De Secqville did not venture to deny the fact; on the contrary, he confessed it frankly."

"Yes I see you tell me the truth; it was base of De Secqville!"

"Well, to say truth, I did think he might have kept a lady's secret better."

Blassemare was ready and unscrupulous; but all is fair in love.

"I am innocent!" she cried, with abrupt vehemence, and fixing her fiery gaze full upon him.

"Of course, madame."

"I say I am innocent, sir. Why do you say of course."

Yes, it was base of De Secqville; he ought to have perished rather."

66

Egad," thought Blassemare, "my project prospers-she is at my mercy -and disgusted with the Marquis. I'm no general or she surrenders at discretion."

"De Secqville, madame, is a handsome fellow; but he admires nobody but himself. He has been all his life -and trust me, he is not quite so young as he pretends-a man of intrigue. He is not content with his bonnes fortunes, but he boasts of his conquests, and sacrifices reputations to his vanity Such men are not to be trusted with impunity, or loved without disgrace. It is best never to have favoured them, and next best to discard them promptly."

He fancied his speech had hit the He fierce temper of his auditor. paused for a time, to let it work, and then, in a tone of profound humility, said

"As for me, madame, if one so unworthy dare invite a passing thought of your's, I have but to ask your forgiveness; if I have said one word that gave you pain, I implore your forgive

ness.

Here he sank upon his knee. Lucille was by no means as experienced in the ways of the wicked gender as many Blassemare looked younger women.

very humble, and she took his humility in good faith. She looked on him then with a softened aspect, and the heart of the profligate beat thick with anticipated triumph.

"You have had, madam, in these recent transactions, signal proofs of my fidelity. The secret so lightly esteemed by De Secqville I would rather lose my last drop of blood than reveal to a living mortal. I am secrecy itself. Judge what I have endured. I have striven-how vainly my own heart tells me-to hide the sentiments of my soul from you, madame. I could see with comparative indifference the happiness of that rival whom the forms of law, and not the preference of the heart, had elevated; but judge how I could endure the fortune of an unworthy and

faithless competitor. Imagine, if you can, my despair. Compassionate, I conjure you, my misery, and with one relenting word or look of pity, raise me from the abyss, and see at your feet the happiest, as he is the most devoted, of mortals."

At the same moment Blassemare attempted to take Lucille's hand; it was, however, instantly withdrawn, and the back of it, instead, struck him in the face, with all the force of enraged and insulted pride.

"How dare you, sirrah, hold such language to me-how dare you? Another word, and I denounce you to my husband-ay, sir, I-to Monsieur Le Prun. I defy you."

Blassemare had started to his feet, very much astonished; his cheek tingling, his self-love stung to the quick. But he was too experienced in such affairs to indulge any tragical emotions on the occasion. He stared at her for a minute with an expression of absurd bewilderment. There was no very graceful exit from the undignified predicament to which he had, like a simpleton, reduced himself. Recovering his self-possession, however, he broke into a cold laugh, and said—

"Madame, I have misunderstood you with a vengeance; I pray you believe that you have misunderstood me. We now, however, thoroughly understand one another. I keep your little secret on condition that you keep mine."

Lucille deigned no answer; but the compact had, it seemed, been silently ratified by her, for Le Prun and Blassemare continued to be the best friends imaginable.

Blassemare was not vindictive, but he was exquisitely vain. He had a good-humoured turn for mischief, too; and, notwithstanding the repulse he had experienced, or perhaps, such is human perversity-in consequence of it he was more that ever resolved to pursue his guilty designs upon the heart of Madame Le Prun.

His hands were, therefore, tolerably full; for he had not only this little affair to attend to, but to exercise his vigilance to prevent De Secqville's hearing of his breach of faith, and at the same time to confirm and exasperate, in furtherance of his own schemes, the suspicions of Monsieur Le Prun.

This latter task circumstances rendered an easy one, and Blassemare

executed it without giving any definite direction to Le Prun's inflamed jealousy. So far, indeed, was he from suspecting the identity of the criminal, that he brought De Secqville two or three times to sup at the Chateau des Anges, an act of temerity which excited Blassemare's anxiety and vigilance. That gentleman had therefore kept so close and constant a watch upon the handsome marquis, that he had not, upon any of these occasions, an opportunity of exchanging a single sentence with Madame Le Prun.

The occasional appearance of De Secqville at the Chateau des Anges was a sufficient proof that Blassemare had kept the secret with fidelity. Madam Le Prun, therefore, was far from suspecting that he was in secret the inspiring cause of that ominous restraint, the pressure of which she began to feel every day more and more severely. One by one her personal attendants were removed. Gradually she felt the process of isolation shrouding her from the eyes of her fellow-creatures. Her walks were prescribed and restricted; and with bitter resentment she perceived that she was subjected to the outrage of a systematic espionage. The face of M. Le Prun was always darkened with hatred and menace. Every day made his power more directly felt, and more nearly reduced her to his solitary, rare, and sinister companionship. At last a note, in M. Le Prun's hand, upon her table, announced in a few barbarous and insulting words that his niece Julie had been removed,

by his orders, from the contagion of a companionship unfit for innocence. This was to Lucille a frightful blow. Her solitude was now virtually complete. Her own old faithful servant, Marguerite, had been withdrawn; and a tall pale Norman matron, taciturn and sardonic, was now her sole attendant. It was plain, too, that M. Le Prun had gradually removed his establishment from the Chateau des Anges. The gay and gorgeous staff of servants and grooms had disappeared. The salons, halls, and lobbies of the vast mansion were silent as the chambers of a mausoleum the outer courts still and deserted. She was becoming the prisoner of an enraged tyrant, alone, in the midst of an impenetrable and funereal solitude.

In fact, many prisoners of state enjoyed a great deal more liberty than she; for not only was she restricted to her own apartment, but confined to the range of the small court which lay immediately under her own windows.

The indignation and fury which these outrages inspired, by degrees gave place to something like despair and panic. With the exception of her illlooking handmaid, and the no less sinister-visaged sentinel who stealthily watched her movements, and between both of whom a sort of ominous correspondence seemed to be carried on by signals, she had latterly seen no one, but at rare intervals the hated and dreaded apparition of Le Prun at a distance, and Blassemare once twice.

or

One day Lucille was walking in the little court we have described, when the door of the park, which we have had occasion to signalise, opened, and Blassemare stood within a yard or two of her.

"Good-day, madam."
"Good day, sir."

A glance at the attendant, who seemed to regard Blassemare as Le Prun's vicegerent, was sufficient to cause her to withdraw to some distance, and affecting a light and easy air, which might well mislead the more distant observers as to the serious purport of his discourse, he continued

"I am afraid madame is very unhappy."

"Truly, I am so."

"I fear she is also in danger."

She started as if a bolt of ice had pierced her heart. He had spoken in that word the secret fears of many a long night. How inexpressibly more

terrible do our untold terrors become when they are spoken in our ears by the lips of strangers!

"Yes, madaine, I say in danger. There are odd stories afloat about Monsieur Le Prun-they may be all lies, I don't pretend to say; for in truth I don't very well comprehend my friend Le Prun. But it cannot be hidden from madame, that when one wants to make away with an individual, the first step is to conceal them—

to cut them off from all intercourse with the world, and cause them to be forgotten. Madame understands me?" "Yes, yes-oh, my God!"

"Madame must learn to command herself, if she wishes to prolong our conversation. We must appear, at least, indifferent. There are spies watching our gestures and countenances, though they can't hear our words."

"I will-thank you, thank you; but for the mercy of God, monsieur, will you suffer me to perish ?"

"No, madame, if you will aid in your own deliverance. Will you fly with me to-morrow night?"

"If monsieur, for the charity of heaven, will undertake to act only as my brother and protector."

"By my faith, madame, I'll put myself under no conditions."

"Monsieur de Blassemare, have you no honour, no pity, no manhood? Will you be accessory to a murder? I will go with you on no other terms." "I accept none, madame."

"You are a coward, sir, and a criminal."

"Madame might command at least, her countenance and her gestures; imitate me. You call me hard names; I'm prepared for them. Now listen; I won't accept your condition, because, if I did, I should keep my word; and, I tell you frankly, I won't despair, and I don't despair. But, madame, you shan't perish. What do you say to leaving the chateau with De Secqville?"

"Yes, he will agree to whatever I propose."

"I dare say."

"But when-how?"

"To-morrow night, at ten o'clock, through that door; a coach shall wait in the park. You know the well under the two chesnut-trees; there he will await you; don't fail-a moment late, and all may be lost."

"But-but how to evade the woman who watches me?"

"She shall be perfectly drunk."
"And the man?"

"Drunker still. Leave all details to me. There are more than one Argus besides these; but a man of resource is at home among difficulties. Watch at ten o'clock. When you see a light in the window of the small pavilion, all is prepared: you will find the door open."

"Madame shall be obeyed."

So, with an air of affected defiance on the one side, and of sarcastic levity on the other, the two conspirators parted. Her protracted residence in the Chateau des Anges, gloomy and anxious before, had become absolutely terrifying since she had heard the dark and menacing insinuations used by Blassemare. The evening that followed that scene, the night, and the ensuing morning, seemed endless, filled with horrid images, and haunted by the hideous thought that the catastrophe might possibly anticipate the hour of escape, or that some one untoward chance might defeat the entire scheme, and leave her at the mercy of a more than ever exasperated tyrant.

Her

As the day wore on, every incident appeared to her over-strained mind an omen of good or ill-success. Towards evening the sky became overcast, and finally an awful thunder-storm swept over the Chateau des Anges. heart sank within her at the inauspi cious augury; but as the same tempest an hour later rolled over other regions, it left one trifling token of its passage, which, by a mysterious stroke of fate, was nearly connected with her destiny.

Poor Gabriel, his head full of chimeras, his heart of true love, was slowly walking through the woodlands of the Parcq de Charrebourg, towards that haunted spot, the cottage in which the beautiful demoiselle had passed her happiest days, when the storm began to mutter over the rising grounds, and before he had made much way, the thunder burst above his head with fury, and in a little time the rain descended with such tropical violence as to arrest his further progress, under the dense canopy of a chesnut tree.

Here he waited until the thunderclouds had quite passed away; and then, amid red glances of western sunshine, he resumed that pilgrimage, to him so full of melancholy, of am bition, and of tenderness.