"If I can, count it rendered; move to this sofa--join me in a cigar, and
let us talk at ease _comme de vieux amis_, whose fathers or brothers
might have fought side by side in the Crimea." Graham removed to the
sofa beside Rochebriant, and after one or two whiffs laid aside the cigar
and began:

"Among the correspondence which Monsieur your father has left, are there
any letters of no distant date signed Marigny--Madame Marigny? Pardon
me, I should state my motive in putting this question. I am intrusted
with a charge, the fulfilment of which may prove to the benefit of this
lady or her child; such fulfilment is a task imposed upon my honour. But
all the researches to discover this lady which I have instituted stop at
a certain date, with this information,--viz., that she corresponded
occasionally with the late Marquis de Rochebriant; that he habitually
preserved the letters of his correspondents; and that these letters were
severally transmitted to you at his decease."

Alain's face had taken a very grave expression while Graham spoke, and he
now replied with a mixture of haughtiness and embarrassment:

"The boxes containing the letters my father received and preserved were
sent to me as you say--the larger portion of them were from ladies--
sorted and labelled, so that in glancing at any letter in each packet I
could judge of the general tenor of these in the same packet without the
necessity of reading them. All packets of that kind, Monsieur Vane, I
burned. I do not remember any letters signed 'Marigny!"

"I perfectly understand, my dear Marquis, that you would destroy all
letters which your father himself would have destroyed if his last