pitiable, horrible; but this open avowal, insult as it was to the
Comtesse Chantavoine, could be no worse than the rumours which would
surely have reached her one day. So let the game fare on. He had thrown
down the glove now, and he could not see the end; he was playing for one
thing only--for the woman he had lost, for his own child. If everything
went by the board, why, it must go by the board. It all flashed through
his brain: to-morrow he must send in his resignation to the Admiralty--
so much at once. Then Bercy--come what might, there was work for him to
do at Bercy. He was a sovereign duke of Europe, as Guida had said. He
would fight for the duchy for his son's sake. Standing there he could
feel again the warm cheek of the child upon his own, as last night he
felt it riding across the island from Plemont to the village near Mont
Orgueil. That very morning he had hurried down to a little cottage in
the village and seen it lying asleep, well cared for by a peasant woman.
He knew that to-morrow the scandal of the thing would belong to the
world, but he was not dismayed. He had tossed his fame as an admiral
into the gutter, but Bercy still was left. All the native force, the
stubborn vigour, the obdurate spirit of the soil of Jersey of which he
was, its arrogant self-will, drove him straight into this last issue.
What he had got at so much cost he would keep against all the world.
He would--

But he stopped short in his thoughts, for there now at the court-room
door stood Detricand, the Chouan chieftain.

He drew his hand quickly across his eyes. It seemed so wild, so
fantastic, that of all men, Detricand should be there. His gaze was so
fixed that every one turned to see--every one save Guida.

Guida was not conscious of this new figure in the scene. In her heart