THE WILL

A COUNTRY EXCURSION

THE LANCER'S WIFE

THE COLONEL'S IDEAS

ONE EVENING

THE HERMAPHRODITE

MARROCA

AN ARTIFICE

THE ASSIGNATION

AN ADVENTURE

THE DOUBLE PINS

UNDER THE YOKE

THE REAL ONE AND THE OTHER

THE UPSTART

THE CARTER'S WENCH

THE MARQUIS

THE BED

AN ADVENTURE IN PARIS

MADAME BAPTISTE

HAPPINESS

THE VIATICUM

"After all," Count d'Avorsy said, stirring his tea with the slow
movements of a prelate, "what truth was there in anything that was said
at Court, almost without any restraint, and did the Empress, whose
beauty has been ruined by some secret grief, who will no longer see
anyone and who soothes her continual mental weariness by some journeys
without an object and without a rest, in foggy and melancholy islands,
and did she really forget Caesar's wife ought not even to be suspected,
did she really give herself to that strange and attractive corrupter,
Ladislas Ferkoz?"

The bright night seemed to be scattering handfuls of stars into the
placid sea, which was as calm as a blue pond, slumbering in the depths
of a forest. Among the tall climbing roses, which hung a mantle of
yellow flowers to the fretted baluster of the terrace, there stood out
in the distance the illuminated fronts of the hotels and villas, and
occasionally women's laughter was heard above the dull, monotonous sound
of surf and the noise of the fog-horns.

Then Captain Sigmund Oroshaz, whose sad and pensive face of a soldier
who has seen too much slaughter and too many charnel houses, was marked
by a large scar, raised his head and said in a grave, haughty voice:

"Nobody has lied in accusing Maria-Gloriosa of adultery, and nobody has
calumniated the Empress and her minister, whom God has damned in the
other world. Ladislas Ferkoz was his sovereign's lover until he died,
and made his august master ridiculous and almost odious, for the man, no
matter who he be, who allows himself to be flouted by a creature who is
unworthy of bearing his name and of sharing his bread; who puts up with
such disgrace, who does not crush the guilty couple with all the weight
of his power, is not worth pity, nor does he deserve to be spared the
mockery. And if I affirm that so harshly, my dear Count--although years
and years have passed since the sponge passed over that old story--the
reason is that I saw the last chapter of it, quite in spite of m