had borne a part. Death was about to deliver her from the odious tyranny
of the people whose yoke weighed upon her, and she was at length in a
position to reveal everything to Adrienne. The latter thus learned how
she had been continually betrayed by Florine, and also the cause of the
sewing-girl's abrupt departure. At these revelations, Adrienne felt her
affection and tender pity for the poor sempstress greatly increase. By
her command, the most active steps were taken to discover traces of the
hunchback; but Florine's confession had a still more important result.
Justly alarmed at this new evidence of Rodin's machinations, Adrienne
remembered the projects formed, when, believing herself beloved, the
instinct of affection had revealed to her the perils to which Djalma and
other members of the Rennepont family were exposed. To assemble the race
around her, and bid them rally against the common enemy, such was
Adrienne's first thought, when she heard the confession of Florine. She
regarded it as a duty to accomplish this project. In a struggle with such
dangerous and powerful adversaries as Rodin, Father d'Aigrigny, and the
Princess de Saint-Dizier, and their allies, Adrienne saw not only the
praiseworthy and perilous task of unmasking hypocrisy and cupidity, but
also, if not a consolation, at least a generous diversion in the midst of
terrible sorrows.

From this moment, a restless, feverish activity took the place of the
mournful apathy in which the young lady had languished. She called round
her all the members of her family capable of answering the appeal, and,
as had been mentioned in the secret note delivered to Father d'Aigrigny,
Cardoville House soon became the centre of the most active and unceasing
operations, and also a place of meeting, in which the modes of attack and
defence were fully discussed. Perfectly correct in all points, the secret
note of which we have spoken stated, as a mere conjecture, that Mdlle. de
Cardoville had granted an interview to Djalma. This fact was untrue, but