ttention. "Do you know
this gentleman?" inquired one of the guests.

"No. He came with Coralth."

"He is an advocate, I understand."

And all these whispered doubts and suspicions, these questions fraught
with an evil significance, these uncharitable replies, grew into a
malevolent murmur, which resounded in Pascal's ears and bewildered
him. He was really becoming most uncomfortable, when Madame d'Argeles
approached the card-table and exclaimed: "This is the third time,
gentlemen, that you have been told that supper is ready. What gentleman
will offer me his arm?"

There was an evident unwillingness to leave the table, but an old
gentleman who had been losing heavily rose to his feet. "Yes, let us go
to supper!" he exclaimed; "perhaps that will change the luck."

This was a decisive consideration. The room emptied as if by magic; and
no one was left at the table but Pascal, who scarcely knew what to
do with all the gold piled up before him. He succeeded, however, in
distributing it in his pockets, and was about to join the other guests
in the dining-room, when Madame d'Argeles abruptly barred his passage.

"I desire a word with you, monsieur," she said. Her face still retained
its strange immobility, and the same stereotyped smile played about her
lips. And yet her agitation was so evident that Pascal, in spite of his
own uneasiness, noticed it, and was astonished by it.

"I am at your service, madame," he stammered, bowing.

She at once took his arm, and led him to the embrasure of a window. "I
am a stranger to you, monsieur," she said, very hurriedly, and in very
low tones, "and yet I must ask, and you must grant me, a great favor."

"Speak, madame."

She hesitated, as if at a loss for words, and then all of a sudden she
said, eagerly: "You will leave this house at once, without warning any
one, and while the other guests are at supper."

Pascal's astonishment changed into stupor.

"Why am I to go?" he asked.

"Because--but, no; I cannot tell you. Consider it only a caprice on my
part--it is so; but I entreat you, don't refuse me. Do me this favor,
and I shall be eternally grateful."

There was such an agony of supplication in her voice and her attitude,
that Pascal was touched. A vague presentiment of some terrible,
irreparable misfortune disturbed his own heart. Nevertheless, he sadly
shook his head, and bitterly exclaimed: "You are, perhaps, not aware
that I have just won over thirty thousand franc