“‘It is done, godmother.’

“‘God be praised!’ she whispered; ‘Sairmeuse is saved!’

“I heard a deep sigh.  I turned; she was dead.”

This scene that M. Lacheneur was relating rose vividly before him.

To feign, to disguise the truth, or to conceal any portion of it was an impossibility.

He forgot himself and his daughter; he thought only of the dead woman, of Mlle. Armande de Sairmeuse.

And he shuddered on pronouncing the words:  “She was dead.”  It seemed to him that she was about to speak, and to insist upon the fulfilment of his pledge.

After a moment’s silence, he resumed, in a hollow voice: 

“I called for aid; it came.  Mademoiselle Armande was adored by everyone; there was great lamentation, and a half hour of indescribable confusion followed her death.  I was able to withdraw, unnoticed, to run into the garden, and to carry away the oaken chest.  An hour later, it was concealed in the miserable hovel in which I dwelt.  The following year I purchased Sairmeuse.”

He had confessed all; and he paused, trembling, trying to read his sentence in the eyes of his daughter.

“And can you hesitate?” she demanded.

“Ah! you do not know——­”

“I know that Sairmeuse must be given up.”

This was the decree of his own conscience, that faint voice which speaks only in a whisper, but which all the tumult on earth cannot overpower.

“No one saw me take away the chest,” he faltered.  “If anyone suspected it, there is not a single proof against me.  But no one does suspect it.”

Marie-Anne rose, her eyes flashed with generous indignation.

“My father!” she exclaimed; “oh! my father!”

Then, in a calmer tone, she added: 

“If others know nothing of this, can you forget it?”

M. Lacheneur appeared almost ready to succumb to the torture of the terrible conflict raging in his soul.

“Return!” he exclaimed.  “What shall I return?  That which I have received?  So be it.  I consent.  I will give the duke the eighty thousand francs; to this amount I will add the interest on this sum since I have had it, and—­we shall be free of all obligation.”

The girl sadly shook her head.

“Why do you resort to subterfuges which are so unworthy of you?” she asked, gently.  “You know perfectly well that it was Sairmeuse which Mademoiselle Armande intended to intrust to the servant of her house.  And it is Sairmeuse which must be returned.”

The word “servant” was revolting to a man, who, at least, while the empire endured, had been a power in the land.

“Ah! you are cruel, my daughter,” he said, with intense bitterness; “as cruel as a child who has never suffered—­as cruel as one who, having never himself been tempted, is without mercy for those who have yielded to temptation.

“It is one of those acts which God alone can judge, since God alone can read the depths of one’s secret soul.