"Horrible! dead!--your own son, whom you hardly ever saw--never since he
was an Infant!"

"Yes, that softens the blow very much. And now you see I must marry. If
the boy had been good-looking, and like me, and so forth, why, as you
observed, he might have made a good match, and allowed me a certain sum,
or we could have all lived together."

"And your son is dead, and you come to a ball!"

"_Je suis philosophe_," said the Vicomte, shrugging his shoulders. "And,
as you say, I never saw him. It saves me seven hundred francs a-year.
Don't say a word to any one--I sha'n't give out that he is dead, poor
fellow! Pray be discreet: you see there are some ill-natured people who
might think it odd I do not shut myself up. I can wait till Paris is
quite empty. It would be a pity to lose any opportunity at present, for
now, you see, I must marry!" And the philosophe sauntered away.




CHAPTER XII.

GUIOMAR.
"Those devotions I am to pay
Are written in my heart, not in this book."

Enter RUTILIO.
"I am pursued--all the ports are stopped too,