As he spoke the Duchess heard the smothered sound of a pair of
bellows. Those mysterious figures which she had just seen were
blowing up the fire, no doubt; the glow shone through the
curtain. But Montriveau's lurid face was turned upon her; she
could not choose but wait with a fast-beating heart and eyes
fixed in a stare. However curious she felt, the heat in Armand's
words interested her even more than the crackling of the
mysterious flames.

"Madame," he went on after a pause, "if some poor wretch
commits a murder in Paris, it is the executioner's duty, you
know, to lay hands on him and stretch him on the plank, where
murderers pay for their crimes with their heads. Then the
newspapers inform everyone, rich and poor, so that the former are
assured that they may sleep in peace, and the latter are warned
that they must be on the watch if they would live. Well, you
that are religious, and even a little of a bigot, may have masses
said for such a man's soul. You both belong to the same family,
but yours is the elder branch; and the elder branch may occupy
high places in peace and live happily and without cares. Want or
anger may drive your brother the convict to take a man's life;
you have taken more, you have taken the joy out of a man's life,
you have killed all that was best in his life--his dearest
beliefs. The murderer simply lay in wait for his victim, and
killed him reluctantly, and in fear of the scaffold; but _you_
. . . ! You heaped up every sin that weakness can commit against
strength that suspected no evil; you tamed a passive victim, the
better to gnaw his heart out; you lured him with caresses; you
left nothing undone that could set him dreaming, imagining,
longing for the bliss of love. You asked innumerable sacrifices