possible that you possess none of these fine advantages, and yet are
audacious enough to ask me for my daughter's hand?"

M. Moriaz ended this harangue as the Samaden mail-coach passed. Count
Abel, seated on the outside, bowed and waved his hand to them.

"Look well at that man," said M. Moriaz to Camille, "for he is the
enemy."

And then, instead of giving him the remaining information that the youth
desired, he said:

"Go away and forget; it is the best thing that you can do."

"You do not know me yet," replied Camille. "I am obstinate, I fire to
the last cartridge. I will follow your steps. Oh! don't be afraid, I
will lie--deceive Antoinette; let her think that I have relinquished my
claims. I shall pay her only a friendly visit; but my eyes hunger to see
her, and I will see her."

The morning of the following day the enemy arrived at Chur, whence he
proceeded to Berne. Deponent saith not why he failed to turn aside at
Soleure, as he had expressed his intention of doing in order to pay
tribute there to the memory of the great Kosciuszko. The facts of
the case are, that from Berne he went direct to Lausanne, and that
immediately on reaching there he hastened to the Saxon Casino. When he
seated himself at the gaming-table, he experienced a violent palpitation
of the heart. His ears tingled, his brain was on fire, and the cold
sweat started out on his forehead. He cast fierce glances right and
left; he seemed to see in his partner's eyes his past, his future, and
Mlle. Moriaz life-size. Fortune made amends for the harshness she had
shown him at Milan. After a night of anguish and many vicissitudes, at
daybreak Count Abel had twenty thousand francs in his pocket. It was
sufficient to pay his debts, which he was anxious to do, and to enable
him to await without too much impatience the moment for executing his
projects.

He left the casino, his face flushed and radiant; he was so joyful that
he became tender and affectionate, and, had M. Guldenthal himself come
in his way, he could have embraced him.

CHAPTER IV

Although he had said nothing about it to Mlle. Moriaz in narrating to
her his voyages and Odysseys, Count Abel was already acquainted
with Paris, having made several long sojourns there. This may seem
improbable. Gone in his early youth to America, he had not recrossed the
ocean until he returned to fight in Poland; since then he had lived in
Roumania and Vienna. Where, then, had he found time to v