pardon."

I was silent, and looked at him closely so as to carve his features,
as it were, on my memory. Presently an expression of disgust crossed
his face.

"I have been very cowardly," he said. "During all last night I begged
for mercy of these walls," and he pointed to the sides of his dungeon.
"Yes, yes, I howled with despair, I rebelled, I suffered the most
awful moral agony--I was alone! Now I think of what others will say of
me. Courage is a garment to put on. I desire to go decently to death,
therefore--"



A DOUBLE RETRIBUTION

"Oh, stop! stop!" cried the young lady who had asked for this history,
interrupting the narrator suddenly. "Say no more; let me remain in
uncertainty and believe that he was saved. If I hear now that he was
shot I shall not sleep all night. To-morrow you shall tell me the
rest."

We rose from table. My neighbor in accepting Monsieur Hermann's arm,
said to him--

"I suppose he was shot, was he not?"

"Yes. I was present at the execution."