ttle
fool."

"Monsieur," interrupted Gaston, indignantly; "I have told you that I
love her, and have promised to marry her. You seem to forget."

"Ta, ta ta!" cried the marquis, "your scruples are absurd. You know full
well that her great-grandfather led our great-grandmother astray. Now we
are quits! I am delighted at the retaliation, for the old witch's sake."

"I swear by the memory of my mother, that Valentine shall be my wife!"

"Do you dare assume that tone toward me?" cried the exasperated marquis.
"Never, understand me clearly; never will I give my consent. You know
how dear to me is the honor of our house. Well, I would rather see you
tried for murder, and even chained to the galleys, than married to this
worthless jade!"

This last word was too much for Gaston.

"Then your wish shall be gratified, monsieur. I will remain here, and be
arrested. I care not what becomes of me! What is life to me without the
hope of Valentine? Take back these jewels: they are useless now."

A terrible scene would have taken place between the father and son, had
they not been interrupted by a domestic who rushed into the room, and
excitedly cried:

"The gendarmes! here are the gendarmes!"

At this news the old marquis started up, and seemed to forget his gout,
which had yielded to more violent emotions.

"Gendarmes!" he cried, "in my house at Clameran! They shall pay dear for
their insolence! You will help me, will you not, my men?"

"Yes, yes," answered the servants. "Down with the gendarmes! down with
them!"

Fortunately Louis, during all this excitement, preserved his presence of
mind.

"To resist would be folly," he said. "Even if we repulsed the gendarmes
to-night, they would return to-morrow with reinforcements."

"Louis is right," said the marquis, bitterly. "Might is right, as they
said in '93. The gendarmes are all powerful. Do they not even have the
impertinence to come up to me while I am hunting, and ask to see my
shooting-license?--I, a Clameran, show a license!"

"Where are they?" asked Louis of the servants.

"At the outer gate," answered La Verdure, one of the grooms. "Does not
monsieur hear the noise they are making with their sabres?"

"Then Gaston must escape over the garden wall."

"It is guarded, monsieur," said La Verdure, "and the little gate in
the park besides. There seems to be a regiment of them. They are even
stationed along the park walls."

This was only too true. The rumor of L