himself that it was quite true that Marie Perier had really been
promised to a man whom an unlucky affair had driven into exile, and whom
he had supposed to be dead. This revelation, coming from Derues, who had
the strongest interest in lying, by no means convinced him of his wife's
dishonour, nor destroyed the feelings of a husband and father; but
Derues was not speaking for him lone, and what appeared incredible to
Monsieur de Lamotte might easily seem less improbable to the colder and
less interested judgment of the magistrate.

"I was wrong," Derues continued, "in allowing myself to be touched by
her tears, wrong in believing in her repentance, more wrong still
in going to Buisson to satisfy her husband. But I only consented on
conditions: Madame de Lamotte promised me to return shortly to Paris,
vowing that her son should never know the truth, and that the rest
of her life should be devoted to atoning for her sin by a boundless
devotion. She then begged me to leave her, and told me she would write
to me at Paris to fix the day of her return. This is what happened, and
this is why I went to Buissan and gave my support to a lying fiction.
With one word I might have destroyed the happiness of seventeen years. I
did not wish to do so. I believed in the remorse; I believe in it still,
in spite of all appearances; I have refused to speak this very day,
and made every effort to prolong an illusion which I know it will be
terrible to lose."

There was a moment of silence. This fable, so atrociously ingenious,
was simply and impressively narrated, and with an air of candour well
contrived to impose on the magistrate, or, at least, to suggest grave
doubts to his mind. Derues, with his usual cunning, had conformed his
language to the quality of his listener. Any tricks, profession of
piety, quotations from sacred books, so largely indulged in when he
wished to bamboozle people of a lower class, would here have told
against him. He knew when to abstain, and carried the art of deception
far enough to be able to lay aside the appearance of hypocrisy. He
had described all the circumstances without affectation, and if this
unexpected accusation was wholly unproved, it yet rested on a possible
fact, and did not appear absolutely incredible. The magistrate went
through it all again, and made him repeat every detail, without being
able to make him contradict himself or show the smallest embarrassment.
While interrogating Derues, he