fell half fainting on the sofa. Then she negotiated in order
to gain time; she asked to have the journey postponed for a week, under
pretence of making preparations; inwardly resolving to turn Calyste off
in a way that she could satisfy La Palferine,--for such are the wretched
calculations and the fiery anguish concealed with these lives which have
left the rails along which the great social train rolls on.

When Calyste had left her, Beatrix felt so wretched, so profoundly
humiliated, that she went to bed; she was really ill; the violent
struggle which wrung her heart seemed to reach a physical reaction,
and she sent for the doctor; but at the same time she despatched to La
Palferine the following letter, in which she revenged herself on Calyste
with a sort of rage:--

To Monsieur le Comte de la Palferine.

My Friend,--Come and see me; I am in despair. Antoine sent you
away when your arrival would have put an end to one of the most
horrible nightmares of my life and delivered me from a man I hate,
and whom I trust never to see again. I love you only in this
world, and I can never again love any one but you, though I have
the misfortune not to please you as I fain would--

She wrote four pages which, beginning thus, ended in an exaltation too
poetic for typography, in which she compromised herself so completely
that the letter closed with these words: "Am I sufficiently at your
mercy? Ah! nothing will cost me anything if it only proves to you how
much you are loved." And she signed the letter, a thing she had never
done for Conti or Calyste.

The next day, at the hour when La Palferine called, Beatrix was in her
bath, and Antoine begged him to wait. He, in his turn, saw Calyste
sent away; for du Guenic, hungry for love, came early. La Palferine was
standing at the window, watching his rival's departure, when Beatrix
entered the salon.

"Ah! Charles," she cried, expecting what had happened, "you have ruined
me!"

"I know it, madame," replied La Palferine, tranquilly. "You have sworn
to love me alone; you have offered to give me a letter in which you
will write your motives for destroying yourself, so that, in case of
infidelity, I may poison you without fear of human justice,--as if
superior men needed to have recourse to poison for revenge! You have
written to me: 'Nothing will cost me anything if it only proves to
you how much you are loved.' Well, after that, I find a contradiction
between thos