she was cured. There are joys in which we have ceased to believe; they
fall on us, it is like a thunderbolt; they burn us. The poor man's
gratitude was too great to find utterance. To superficial observers he
seemed cold, but Derville saw complete honesty under this amazement. A
swindler would have found his voice.

"Where was I?" said the Colonel, with the simplicity of a child or of
a soldier, for there is often something of the child in a true
soldier, and almost always something of the soldier in a child,
especially in France.

"At Stuttgart. You were out of prison," said Derville.

"You know my wife?" asked the Colonel.

"Yes," said Derville, with a bow.

"What is she like?"

"Still quite charming."

The old man held up his hand, and seemed to be swallowing down some
secret anguish with the grave and solemn resignation that is
characteristic of men who have stood the ordeal of blood and fire on
the battlefield.

"Monsieur," said he, with a sort of cheerfulness--for he breathed
again, the poor Colonel; he had again risen from the grave; he had
just melted a covering of snow less easily thawed than that which had
once before frozen his head; and he drew a deep breath, as if he had