that your marriage with Claudet is impossible. I now declare that it
would be criminal, for the reason that incest is an abomination."

"Incest!" repeated Reine, pale and trembling, "what do you mean?"

"I mean," sighed the cure, "that you are Claudet's sister, not having the
same mother, but the same father: Claude-Odouart de Buxieres."

"Oh! you are mistaken! that cannot be!"

"I am stating facts. It grieves me to the heart, my dear child, that in
speaking of your deceased mother, I should have to reveal an error over
which she lamented, like David, with tears of blood. She confessed her
sin, not to the priest, but to a friend, a few days before her death.
In justice to her memory, I ought to add that, like most of the
unfortunates seduced by this untamable de Buxieres, she succumbed to his
wily misrepresentations. She was a victim rather than an accomplice.
The man himself acknowledged as much in a note entrusted to my care,
which I have here."

And the Abbe' drew from his pocket an old, worn letter, the writing
yellow with age, and placed it before Reine. In this letter, written in
Claude de Buxieres's coarse, sprawling hand, doubtless in reply to a
reproachful appeal from his mistress, he endeavored to offer some kind of
honorable amends for the violence he had used, and to calm Madame
Vincart's remorse by promising, as was his custom, to watch over the
future of the child which should be born to her.

"That child was yourself, my poor girl," continued the Abbe, picking up
the letter which Reine had thrown down, after reading it, with a gesture