plaything, you are a poor
devil, I have bestowed charity upon you, and you should be content
therewith---- '"

"Sir!"

"When you have said all this, do not think that I was humiliated. No,
that hurt me, hurt me much, but I quickly forgot this injury, when I saw
that you understood that, poor as I am, I could be touched by something
else than money. Then you said to me some kind words, you called me your
friend--your friend! After this I would have thrown myself into the fire
for you, and that for the sole pleasure of throwing myself into it, for
I had nothing more to hope for from you; the time of my folly is past; I
see too clearly into my heart not to recognize that I was a kind of
mendicant buffoon; I can never have anything in common with a woman as
beautiful and as young as you. My only ambition--and this can offend no
one--would have been to devote myself to you. But how to have such
happiness? I, a vagabond, with nothing but my old sword, my old hat, and
my pink hose! Ah! well, by a chance which I at first blessed, Colonel
Rutler to-night mistook me for him they call your husband; this mistake
might be useful to you. Judge of my joy--I could save the man whom you
so passionately loved. I should have preferred to save something else,
but I had no time to choose. I risked all, including the everlasting
dagger of the colonel. I augmented, by every means possible, his double
mistake. You came to my assistance; that is, you buried me in the mud up
to the neck, by means of the bagatelles with which you loaded me. It is
all the same--I go with all my heart; I am satisfied to do so, and I
leave this house without hope of ever seeing you again, with the gallows
or prison in prospect, not to count the everlasting dagger of the
Dutchman. Ah, well, in spite of all, I repeat, I was content: I said to
myself, I know not what awaits me, rope or dungeon; but I am sure Blue
Beard will say, 'It is fortunate, very fortunate for us at least, that
this eccentric Gascon came here. Poor devil! what has happened to him?'
There! that was my ambition. But I did not ask even a regret, a
memory--a memory," said the Gascon, moved in spite of himself.

"Sir," said Angela, "as long as I believed you really generous, my
gratitude did not fail you."

These words increased the Gascon's wrath; he exclaimed, "Your gratitude,
madame! Zounds! it is beautiful. But to proceed. We started from this
place with the Belgian. In descending the hill we