astard; but the bastard
of a Comte de Savarus is noble," answered Rosalie.

"Enough, that will do, mademoiselle!" said the Baroness.

"You insisted on her learning heraldry," said Monsieur de Watteville,
"and she knows it very well."

"Go on, I beg, Monsieur de Soulas."

"You may suppose that in a town where everything is classified, known,
pigeon-holed, ticketed, and numbered, as in Besancon, Albert Savaron
was received without hesitation by the lawyers of the town. They were
satisfied to say, 'Here is a man who does not know his Besancon. Who the
devil can have sent him here? What can he hope to do? Sending his card
to the Judges instead of calling in person! What a blunder!' And so,
three days after, Savaron had ceased to exist. He took as his servant
old Monsieur Galard's man--Galard being dead--Jerome, who can cook a
little. Albert Savaron was all the more completely forgotten, because no
one had seen him or met him anywhere."

"Then, does he not go to mass?" asked Madame de Chavoncourt.

"He goes on Sundays to Saint-Pierre, but to the early service at eight
in the morning. He rises every night between one and two in the morning,
works till eight, has his breakfast, and then goes on working. He walks
in his garden, going round fifty, or perhaps sixty times; then he goes
in, dines, and goes to bed between six and seven."

"How did you learn all that?" Madame de Chavoncourt asked Monsieur de
Soulas.

"In the first place, madame, I live in the Rue Neuve, at the corner
of the Rue du Perron; I look out on the house where this mysterious
personage lodges; then, of course, there are communications between my
tiger and Jerome."

"And you gossip with Babylas?"

"What would you have me do out riding?"

"Well--and how was it that you engaged a stranger for your defence?"
asked the Baroness, thus placing the conversation in the hands of the
Vicar-General.

"The President of the Court played this pleader a trick by appointing
him to defend at the Assizes a half-witted peasant accused of forgery.
But Monsieur Savaron procured the poor man's acquittal by proving his
innocence and showing that he had been a tool in the hands of the real
culprits. Not only did his line of defence succeed, but it led to the
arrest of two of the witnesses, who were proved guilty and condemned.
His speech struck the Court and the jury. One of these, a merchant,
placed a difficult case next day in the hands of Monsieur Savaron, and
he w