"Water!" cried the dying woman in a broken voice,--"water! A doctor, a
confessor! My children--I want my children!"

And as the duke paid no heed, but stood moodily silent, the poor mother,
prostrated by pain, fancied that grief had robbed her son of all power
of speech or movement, and so, by a desperate effort, sat up, and
seizing him by the arm, cried with all the strength she could muster--

"Charles, my son, what is it? My poor boy, courage; it is nothing, I
hope. But quick, call for help, call a doctor. Ah, you have no idea of
what I suffer."

"Your doctor," said Charles slowly and coldly, each word piercing his
mother's heart like a dagger,--"your doctor cannot come."

"Oh why?" asked Agnes, stupefied.

"Because no one ought to live who knows the secret of our shame."

"Unhappy man!" she cried, overwhelmed with, pain and terror, "you
have murdered him! Perhaps you have poisoned your mother too! Charles,
Charles, have mercy on your own soul!"

"It is your doing," said Charles, without show of emotion: "you have
driven me into crime and despair; you have caused my dishonour in this
world and my damnation in the next."

"What are you saying? My own Charles, have mercy! Do not let me die in
this horrible uncertainty; what fatal delusion is blinding you? Speak,
my son, speak: I am not feeling the poison now. What have I done? Of