wards Philippe a tooth,
fastened upon a piece of black velvet embroidered in gold, to which she
had sewn a pair of green strings. Having shown it to him, she replaced
it in a little bag. "It is a relic of Sainte Solange, the patron saint
of Berry," she said, "I saved it during the Revolution; wear it on your
breast to-morrow."

"Will it protect me from a sabre-thrust?" asked Philippe.

"Yes," replied the old lady.

"Then I have no right to wear that accoutrement any more than if it were
a cuirass," cried Agathe's son.

"What does he mean?" said Madame Hochon.

"He says it is not playing fair," answered Hochon.

"Then we will say no more about it," said the old lady, "I shall pray
for you."

"Well, madame, prayer--and a good point--can do no harm," said Philippe,
making a thrust as if to pierce Monsieur Hochon's heart.

The old lady kissed the colonel on his forehead. As she left the house,
she gave thirty francs--all the money she possessed--to Benjamin,
requesting him to sew the relic into the pocket of his master's
trousers. Benjamin did so,--not that he believed in the virtue of the
tooth, for he said his master had a much better talisman than that
against Gilet, but because his conscience constrained him to fulfil a
commission for which he had been so liberally paid. Madame Hochon went
home full of confidence in Saint Solange.

At eight o'clock the next morning, December third, the weather being
cloudy, Max, accompanied by his seconds and the Pole, arrived on the
little meadow which then surrounded the apse of the church of the
Capuchins. There he found Philippe and his seconds, with Benjamin,
waiting for him. Potel and Mignonnet paced off twenty-four feet; at each
extremity, the two attendants drew a line on the earth with a spade:
the combatants were not allowed to retreat beyond that line, on pain of
being thought cowardly. Each was to stand at his own line, and advance
as he pleased when the seconds gave the word.

"Do we take off our coats?" said Philippe to his adversary coldly.

"Of course," answered Maxence, with the assumption of a bully.

They did so; the rosy tints of their skin appearing through the cambric
of their shirts. Each, armed with a cavalry sabre selected of equal
weight, about three pounds, and equal length, three feet, placed himself
at his own line, the point of his weapon on the ground, awaiting the
signal. Both were so calm that, in spite of the cold, their muscles
quivered