front of an old convent then
transformed into a prison. The sight of those high gray walls, with
every window barred, of the wicket through which none can enter without
stooping (horrible lesson!), of the whole gloomy structure in a quarter
full of wretchedness, where it rises amid squalid streets like a supreme
misery,--this assemblage of dismal things so oppressed Ursula's heart
that she burst into tears.

"Oh!" she said, "to imprison young men in this dreadful place for money!
How can a debt to a money-lender have a power the king has not? _He_
there!" she cried. "Where, godfather?" she added, looking from window to
window.

"Ursula," said the old man, "you are making me commit great follies.
This is not forgetting him as you promised."

"But," she argued, "if I must renounce him must I also cease to feel an
interest in him? I can love him and not marry at all."

"Ah!" cried the doctor, "there is so much reason in your
unreasonableness that I am sorry I brought you."

Three days later the worthy man had all the receipts signed, and the
legal papers ready for Savinien's release. The payings, including the
notaries' fees, amounted to eighty thousand francs. The doctor went
himself to see Savinien released on Saturday at two o'clock. The young
viscount, already informed of what had happened by his mother, thanked
his liberator with sincere warmth of heart.

"You must return at once to see your mother," the old doctor said to
him.

Savinien answered in a sort of confusion that he had contracted certain
debts of honor while in prison, and related the visit of his friends.

"I suspected there was some personal debt," cried the doctor, smiling.
"Your mother borrowed a hundred thousand francs of me, but I have paid
out only eighty thousand. Here is the rest; be careful how you spend it,
monsieur; consider what you have left of it as your stake on the green
cloth of fortune."

During the last eight days Savinien had made many reflections on the
present conditions of life. Competition in everything necessitated
hard work on the part of whoever sought a fortune. Illegal methods and
underhand dealing demanded more talent than open efforts in face of day.
Success in society, far from giving a man position, wasted his time and
required an immense deal of money. The name of Portenduere, which his
mother considered all-powerful, had no power at all in Paris. His cousin
the deputy, Comte de Portenduere, cut a very poor fig