ings in the happiness of their deep and genuine mutual affection.
"No," she said to herself, "it is only a pure heart which is capable of
such happy oblivion."

The bright beams of morning broke in through the window. Desgrais
knocked softly at the room door, and reminded those within that it was
time to take Olivier Brusson away, since this could not be done later
without exciting a commotion. The lovers were obliged to separate.

The dim shapeless feelings which had taken possession of De Scuderi's
mind on Olivier's first entry into the room, had now acquired form and
content--and in a fearful way. She saw the son of her dear Anne
innocently entangled in such a way that there hardly seemed any
conceivable means of saving him from a shameful death. She honoured the
young man's heroic purpose in choosing to die under an unjust burden of
guilt rather than divulge a secret that would certainly kill his
Madelon. In the whole region of possibility she could not find any
means whatever to snatch the poor fellow out of the hands of the cruel
tribunal. And yet she had a most clear conception that she ought not to
hesitate at any sacrifice to avert this monstrous perversion of justice
which was on the point of being committed. She racked her brain with a
hundred different schemes and plans, some of which bordered upon the
extravagant, but all these she rejected almost as soon as they
suggested themselves. Meanwhile the rays of hope grew fainter and
fainter, till at last she was on the verge of despair. But Madelon's
unquestioning child-like confidence, the rapturous enthusiasm with
which she spoke of her lover, who now, absolved of all guilt, would
soon clasp her in his arms as his bride, infused De Scuderi with new
hope and courage, exactly in proportion as she was the more touched by
the girl's words.

At length, for the sake of doing something. De Scuderi wrote a long
letter to La Regnie, in which she informed him that Olivier Brusson had
proved to her in the most convincing manner his perfect innocence of
Cardillac's death, and that it was only his heroic resolve to carry
with him into the grave a secret, the revelation of which would entail
disaster upon virtue and innocence, that prevented him making a
revelation to the court which would undoubtedly free him, not only from
the fearful suspicion of having murdered Cardillac, but also of having
belonged to a band of vile assassins. De Scuderi did all that burning
zeal, t