quite casually, and she never suspected they were carefully calculated
and thought out long before.

Derues carried dishonesty as far as possible, but he knew how to stop
when suspicion was likely to be aroused, and though always planning
either to deceive or to hurt, he was never taken by surprise. Like the
spider which spreads the threads of her web all round her, he concealed
himself in a net of falsehood which one had to traverse before arriving
at his real nature. The evil destiny of this poor woman, mother of four
children, caused her to engage him as her shopman in the year 1767,
thereby signing the warrant for her own ruin.

Derues began life under his new mistress with a master-stroke. His
exemplary piety was the talk of the whole quarter, and his first care had
been to request Madame Legrand to recommend him a confessor. She sent
him to the director of her late husband, Pere Cartault, of the Carmelite
order, who, astonished at the devotion of his penitent, never failed, if
he passed the shop, to enter and congratulate Madame Legrand on the
excellent acquisition she had made in securing this young man, who would
certainly bring her a blessing along with him. Derues affected the
greatest modesty, and blushed at these praises, and often, when he saw
the good father approaching, appeared not to see him, and found something
to do elsewhere; whereby the field was left clear for his too credulous
panegyrists.

But Pere Cartault appeared too indulgent, and Derues feared that his sins
were too easily pardoned; and he dared not find peace in an absolution
which was never refused. Therefore, before the year was out, he chose a
second confessor, Pere Denys, a Franciscan, consulting both alternately,
and confiding his conscientious scruples to them. Every penance appeared