is feel him. What he
wanted now was to put me in his place; he wanted to give me a chance to
make the marquis feel ME."

"Mercy on us!" cried the old waiting-woman, "how wicked we all are!"

"I don't know," said Newman; "some of us are wicked, certainly. I am
very angry, I am very sore, and I am very bitter, but I don't know that
I am wicked. I have been cruelly injured. They have hurt me, and I want
to hurt them. I don't deny that; on the contrary, I tell you plainly
that it is the use I want to make of your secret."

Mrs. Bread seemed to hold her breath. "You want to publish them--you
want to shame them?"

"I want to bring them down,--down, down, down! I want to turn the tables
upon them--I want to mortify them as they mortified me. They took me up
into a high place and made me stand there for all the world to see me,
and then they stole behind me and pushed me into this bottomless pit,
where I lie howling and gnashing my teeth! I made a fool of myself
before all their friends; but I shall make something worse of them."

This passionate sally, which Newman uttered with the greater fervor that
it was the first time he had had a chance to say all this aloud, kindled
two small sparks in Mrs. Bread's fixed eyes. "I suppose you have a right
to your anger, sir; but think of the dishonor you will draw down on
Madame de Cintre."

"Madame de Cintre is buried alive," cried Newman. "What are honor or
dishonor to her? The door of the tomb is at this moment closing behind
her."

"Yes, it's most awful," moaned Mrs. Bread.

"She has moved off, like her brother Valentin, to give me room to work.
It's as if it were done on purpose."

"Surely," said Mrs. Bread, apparently impressed by the ingenuity of this
reflection. She was silent for some moments; then she added, "And would
you bring my lady before the courts?"

"The courts care nothing for my lady," Newman replied. "If she has
committed a crime, she will be nothing for the courts but a wicked old
woman."

"And will they hang her, Sir?"

"That depends upon what she has done." And Newman eyed Mrs. Bread
intently.

"It would break up the family most terribly, sir!"

"It's time such a family should be broken up!" said Newman, with a
laugh.

"And me at my age out of place, sir!" sighed Mrs. Bread.

"Oh, I will take care of you! You shall come and live with me. You shall
be my housekeeper, or anything you like. I will pension you for life."

"Dear, dear, sir, you t