s.

"He makes up his accounts to-morrow?"

"Yes."

Someone in the room groaned; it should have been the culprit, but
unless I was mistaken the sound came through the curtains. A long
pause followed. Then, "And if I help you," the muffled voice resumed,
"will you swear to lead an honest life?"

But the answer may be guessed. I need not repeat the assurances, the
protestations and vows of repentance, the cries and tears of gratitude
which ensue; and to which the poor wretch, stripped of his sullen
indifference, completely abandoned himself. Suffice it that we
presently heard the clinking of coins, a word or two of solemn advice
from the cure, and a man's painful sobbing; then the King touched my
arm, and we crept down the stairs. I was for stopping on the landing
where we had hidden ourselves before; but Henry drew me on to the foot
of the stairs and into the street.

He turned towards home, and for some time did not speak. At length he
asked me what I thought of it.

"In what way, sire?"

"Do you not think," he said in a voice of much emotion, "that if we
could do what he does, and save a man instead of hanging him, it would
be better?"

"For the man, sire, doubtless," I answered drily; "but for the State it
might not be so well. If mercy became the rule and justice the
exception--there would be fewer bodies at Montfaucon and more in the
streets at daylight. I feel much greater doubt on another point."

Shaking off the moodiness that had for a moment overcome him, Henry
asked with vivacity what that was.

"Who he is, and what is his motive?"

"Why?" the King replied in some surprise--he was ever of so kind a
nature that an appeal to his feelings displaced his judgment. "What
should he be but what he seems?"

"Benevolence itself?"

"Yes."

"Well, sire, I grant that he may be M. de Joyeuse, who has spent his
life in passing in and out of monasteries, and has performed so many
tricks of the kind that I could believe anything of him. But if it be
not he--"

"It was not his voice," Henry said, positively.

"Then there is something here," I answered, "still unexplained.
Consider the oddity of the conception, sire, the secrecy of the
performance, the hour, the mode, all the surrounding circumstances! I
can imagine a man currying favour with the basest and most dangerous
class by such means. I can imagine a conspiracy recruited by such
means. I can imagine this shibboleth of the shutter grown t