chair, in a semi-recumbent position. "Upon my word, I
don't know," he replied. "Pascal had always seemed to be the most
irreproachable man in the world--a man you might call a philosopher! He
lives in a retired part of the city, near the Pantheon, with his mother,
who is a widow, a very respectable woman, always dressed in black. When
she opened the door for me, on the occasion of my first visit, I thought
some old family portrait had stepped down from its frame to receive
me. I judge them to be in comfortable circumstances. Pascal has the
reputation of being a remarkable man, and people supposed he would rise
very high in his profession."

"But now he is ruined; his career is finished."

"Certainly! You can be quite sure that by this evening all Paris will
know what occurred here last night."

He paused, meeting Madame Argeles's look of withering scorn with a
cleverly assumed air of astonishment. "You are a villain! Monsieur de
Coralth," she said, indignantly.

"I--and why?"

"Because it was you who slipped those cards, which made M. Ferailleur
win, into the pack; I saw you do it! And yielding to my entreaties,
the young fellow was about to leave the house when you, intentionally,
prevented him from saving himself. Oh! don't deny it."

M. de Coralth rose in the coolest possible manner. "I deny nothing, my
dear lady," he replied, "absolutely nothing. You and I understand each
other."

Confounded by his unblushing impudence, Madame d'Argeles remained
speechless for a moment. "You confess it!" she cried, at last. "You dare
to confess it! Were you not afraid that I might speak and state what I
had seen?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "No one would have believed you," he
exclaimed.

"Yes, I should have been believed, Monsieur de Coralth, for I could have
given proofs. You must have forgotten that I know you, that your past
life is no secret to me, that I know who you are, and what dishonored
name you hide beneath your borrowed title! I could have told my guests
that you are married--that you have abandoned your wife and child,
leaving them to perish in want and misery--I could have told them where
you obtain the thirty or forty thousand francs you spend each year. You
must have forgotten that Rose told me everything, Monsieur--Paul!"

She had struck the right place this time, and with such precision that
M. de Coralth turned livid, and made a furious gesture, as if he were
about to fell her to the ground. "Ah, ta