But alas! the heart was enslaved already. It was under the most fatal of
all spells,--first love conceived at first sight. He was wretched; and
in his wretchedness his resolves became involuntarily weakened. He found
himself making excuses for the beloved. What cause had he, after all,
for that jealousy of the young poet which had so offended him; and if in
her youth and inexperience Isaura had made her dearest friend of a great
writer by whose genius she might be dazzled, and of whose opinions she
might scarcely be aware, was it a crime that necessitated her eternal
banishment from the reverence which belongs to all manly love? Certainly
he found no satisfactory answers to such self-questionings. And then
those grave reasons known only to himself, and never to be confided
to another--why he should yet reserve his hand unpledged--were not so
imperative as to admit of no compromise. They might entail a sacrifice,
and not a small one to a man of Graham's views and ambition. But what is
love if it can think any sacrifice, short of duty and honour, too great
to offer up unknown uncomprehended, to the one beloved? Still, while
thus softened in his feelings towards Isaura, he became, perhaps in
consequence of such softening, more and more restlessly impatient to
fulfil the object for which he had come to Paris, the great step towards
which was the discovery of the undiscoverable Louise Duval.

He had written more than once to M. Renard since the interview with that
functionary already recorded, demanding whether Renard had not made
some progress in the research on which he was employed, and had received
short unsatisfactory replies preaching patience and implying hope.

The plain truth, however, was that M. Renard had taken no further pains
in the matter. He considered it utter waste of time and thought to
attempt a discovery to which the traces were so faint and so obsolete.
If the discovery were effected, it must be by one of those chances which
occur without labour or forethought of our own. He trusted only to such
a chance in continuing the charge he had undertaken. But during the
last day or two Graham had become yet more impatient than before, and
peremptorily requested another visit from this dilatory confidant.

In that visit, finding himself pressed hard, and though naturally
willing, if possible, to retain a client unusually generous, yet being
on the whole an honest member of his profession, and feeling it to
be s