Monsieur de Granville, a worthy successor of the great magistrates of the ancient Parlement, would not leave Paris without coming to some conclusion in the matter of Lucien.  He expected to hear from Camusot, and the judge’s message had plunged him into the involuntary suspense which waiting produces on even the strongest minds.  He had been sitting in the window-bay of his private room; he rose, and walked up and down, for having lingered in the morning to intercept Camusot, he had found him dull of apprehension; he was vaguely uneasy and worried.

And this was why.

The dignity of his high functions forbade his attempting to fetter the perfect independence of the inferior judge, and yet this trial nearly touched the honor and good name of his best friend and warmest supporter, the Comte de Serizy, Minister of State, member of the Privy Council, Vice-President of the State Council, and prospective Chancellor of the Realm, in the event of the death of the noble old man who held that august office.  It was Monsieur de Serizy’s misfortune to adore his wife “through fire and water,” and he always shielded her with his protection.  Now the public prosecutor fully understood the terrible fuss that would be made in the world and at court if a crime should be proved against a man whose name had been so often and so malignantly linked with that of the Countess.

“Ah!” he sighed, folding his arms, “formerly the supreme authority could take refuge in an appeal.  Nowadays our mania for equality”—­he dared not say for Legality, as a poetic orator in the Chamber courageously admitted a short while since—­“is the death of us.”

This noble magistrate knew all the fascination and the miseries of an illicit attachment.  Esther and Lucien, as we have seen, had taken the rooms where the Comte de Granville had lived secretly on connubial terms with Mademoiselle de Bellefeuille, and whence she had fled one day, lured away by a villain. (See A Double Marriage.)

At the very moment when the public prosecutor was saying to himself, “Camusot is sure to have done something silly,” the examining magistrate knocked twice at the door of his room.

“Well, my dear Camusot, how is that case going on that I spoke of this morning?”

“Badly, Monsieur le Comte; read and judge for yourself.”

He held out the minutes of the two examinations to Monsieur de Granville, who took up his eyeglass and went to the window to read them.  He had soon run through them.

“You have done your duty,” said the Count in an agitated voice.  “It is all over.  The law must take its course.  You have shown so much skill, that you need never fear being deprived of your appointment as examining judge—–­”

If Monsieur de Granville had said to Camusot, “You will remain an examining judge to your dying day,” he could not have been more explicit than in making this polite speech.  Camusot was cold in the very marrow.