hear me."

And, overcoming with all his energy the kind of torpor which was
mastering him, he continued,--

"This trip to Fontainebleau decided our fate. Other trips followed. The
countess spent her days with her friend, and I passed the long hours
in roaming through the woods. But in the evening we met again at the
station. We took a _coupe_, which I had engaged beforehand, and I
accompanied her in a carriage to her father's house.

"Finally, one evening, she left her friend's house at the usual hour;
but she did not return to her father's house till the day after."

"Jacques!" broke in M. Magloire, shocked, as if he had heard a
curse,--"Jacques!"

M. de Boiscoran remained unmoved.

"Oh!" he said, "I know you must think it strange. You fancy that there
is no excuse for the man who betrays the confidence of a woman who has
once given herself to him. Wait, before you judge me."

And he went on, in a firmer tone of voice,--

"At that time I thought I was the happiest man on earth; and my heart
was full of the most absurd vanity at the thought that she was mine,
this beautiful woman, whose purity was high above all calumny. I had
tied around my neck one of those fatal ropes which death alone can
sever, and, fool that I was, I considered myself happy.