give these miserable adventurers the
joy and the satisfaction of a new humiliation.

"Let them crush me," she said to herself; "they shall never hear me
complain, or cry for mercy."

And when her father, who had been quietly watching her, asked,--

"Well?"

"You shall be obeyed this very night," she replied.

And by a kind of miracle of energy, she went out of the room calmly, her
head on high; without having shed a tear.

But God knew what she suffered.

To give up those little rooms in which she had spent so many happy
hours, where every thing recalled to her sweet memories, certainly that
was no small grief: it was nothing however, in comparison with that
frightful perspective of having to live under the wary eye of Countess
Sarah, under lock and key.

They would not even leave her at liberty to weep. Her intolerable
sufferings would not extort a sigh from her that the countess did not
hear on the other side of the partition, and delight in.

She was thus harassing herself, when she suddenly remembered the letter
which she had written to Daniel. If M. de Brevan was to have it that
same day, there was not a moment to lose. Already it was too late for
the mail; and she would have to send it by a commissionaire.

She rang the bell, therefore, for Clarissa, her confidante, for the
purpose of sending it to the Rue Laffitte. But, instead of Clarissa, one
of the housemaids appeared, and said,--

"Your own maid is not in the house. Mrs. Brian has sent her to Circus
Street. If I can do any thing for you"--

"No, I thank you!" replied Henrietta.

It seemed, then, that she counted for nothing any more in the house.
She was not allowed to eat in her rooms; she was turned out of her own
rooms; and the maid, long attached to her service, was taken from her.
And here she was forced to submit to such humiliations without a chance
of rebelling.

But time was passing; and every minute made it more difficult to let M.
de Brevan have her letter in time for the mail.

"Well," said Henrietta to herself, "I will carry it myself."

And although she had, perhaps, in all her life not been more than twice
alone in the street, she put on her bonnet, wrapped herself up in a
cloak, and went down swiftly.

The concierge, a large man, very proud of his richly laced livery,
was sitting before the little pavilion in which he lived, smoking, and
reading his paper.

"Open the gates!" said Henrietta.

But the man, without taking