isit of his nephew Philippe. Flore was terrified by the
presentiment of some evil that threatened Max. Weary of her master, and
fearing that he might live to be very old, since he was able to bear
up under their criminal practices, she formed the very simple plan of
leaving Issoudun and being married to Maxence in Paris, after obtaining
from Jean-Jacques the transfer of the income in the Funds. The old
bachelor, guided, not by any justice to his family, nor by personal
avarice, but solely by his passion, steadily refused to make the
transfer, on the ground that Flore was to be his sole heir. The unhappy
creature knew to what extent Flore loved Max, and he believed he would
be abandoned the moment she was made rich enough to marry. When Flore,
after employing the tenderest cajoleries, was unable to succeed, she
tried rigor; she no longer spoke to her master; Vedie was sent to wait
upon him, and found him in the morning with his eyes swollen and red
with weeping. For a week or more, poor Rouget had breakfasted alone, and
Heaven knows on what food!

The day after Philippe's conversation with Monsieur Hochon, he
determined to pay a second visit to his uncle, whom he found much
changed. Flore stayed beside the old man, speaking tenderly and looking
at him with much affection; she played the comedy so well that Philippe
guessed some immediate danger, merely from the solicitude thus displayed
in his presence. Gilet, whose policy it was to avoid all collision with
Philippe, did not appear. After watching his uncle and Flore for a time
with a discerning eye, the colonel judged that the time had come to
strike his grand blow.

"Adieu, my dear uncle," he said, rising as if to leave the house.

"Oh! don't go yet," cried the old man, who was comforted by Flore's
false tenderness. "Dine with us, Philippe."

"Yes, if you will come and take a walk with me."

"Monsieur is very feeble," interposed Mademoiselle Brazier; "just now he
was unwilling even to go out in the carriage," she added, turning upon
the old man the fixed look with which keepers quell a maniac.

Philippe took Flore by the arm, compelling her to look at him, and
looking at her in return as fixedly as she had just looked at her
victim.

"Tell me, mademoiselle," he said, "is it a fact that my uncle is not
free to take a walk with me?"

"Why, yes he is, monsieur," replied Flore, who was unable to make any
other answer.

"Very well. Come, uncle. Mademoiselle, give