nvent."

"With your brother?"

"Yes, my brother was her first lover, and she caused his death. Oh,
father, do not look in that way at me! Oh, I am guilty, then; you will
not pardon me?"

The monk recovered his usual expression.

"Yes, yes," he said, "I will pardon you if you tell me all."

"Oh!" cried the executioner, "all! all! all!"

"Answer, then. If she seduced your brother--you said she seduced him,
did you not?"

"Yes."

"If she caused his death--you said that she caused his death?"

"Yes," repeated the executioner.

"Then you must know what her name was as a young girl."

"Oh, mon Dieu!" cried the executioner, "I think I am dying. Absolution,
father! absolution."

"Tell me her name and I will give it."

"Her name was----My God, have pity on me!" murmured the executioner; and
he fell back on the bed, pale, trembling, and apparently about to die.

"Her name!" repeated the monk, bending over him as if to tear from him
the name if he would not utter it; "her name! Speak, or no absolution!"

The dying man collected all his forces.

The monk's eyes glittered.

"Anne de Bueil," murmured the wounded man.

"Anne de Bueil!" cried the monk, standing up and lifting his hands to
Heaven. "Anne de Bueil! You said Anne de Bueil, did you not?"

"Yes, yes, that was her name; and now absolve me, for I am dying."

"I, absolve you!" cried the priest, with a laugh which made the dying
man's hair stand on end; "I, absolve you? I am not a priest."

"You are not a priest!" cried the executioner. "What, then, are you?"

"I am about to tell you, wretched man."

"Oh, mon Dieu!"

"I am John Francis de Winter."

"I do not know you," said the executioner.

"Wait, wait; you are going to know me. I am John Francis de Winter," he
repeated, "and that woman----"

"Well, that woman?"

"Was my mother!"

The executioner uttered the first cry, that terrible cry which had been
first heard.

"Oh, pardon me, pardon me!" he murmured; "if not in the name of God, at
least in your own name; if not as priest, then as son."

"Pardon you!" cried the pretended monk, "pardon you! Perhaps God will
pardon you, but I, never!"

"For pity's sake," said the executioner, extending his arms.

"No pity for him who had no pity! Die, impenitent, die in despair, die
and be damned!" And drawing a poniard from beneath his robe he thrust it
into the breast of the wounded man, saying, "Here is my absolution!"

Then was heard that secon