orking
with incomparable zeal. The truth is, she knew not how to conceal
the blushes on her cheeks, and the trembling of her hands. She had
something like a cloud before her eyes; and she drove her needle at
random. She scarcely preserved enough presence of mind to reply to
Mme. Favoral, who, not noticing any thing, spoke to her from time to
time.

Indeed, the meaning of this scene was too clear to escape her.

"They have had an understanding," she thought, "and it is for me
alone that they are speaking."

Meantime, Marius de Tregars was going on:

"I should lie, my old friend, were I to say that I was indifferent
to our ruin. Philosopher though one may be, it is not without some
pangs that one passes from a sumptuous hotel to a gloomy garret.
But what grieved me most of all was that I saw myself compelled
to give up the labors which had been the joy of my life, and upon
which I had founded the most magnificent hopes. A positive vocation,
stimulated further by the accidents of my education, had led me to
the study of physical sciences. For several years, I had applied all
I have of intelligence and energy to certain investigations in
electricity. To convert electricity into an incomparable
motive-power which would supersede steam,--such was the object I
pursued without pause. Already, as you know, although quite young,
I had obtained results which had attracted some attention in the
scientific world. I thought I could see the last of a problem, the
solution of which would change the face of the globe. Ruin was the
death of my hopes, the total loss of the fruits of my labors; for
my experiments were costly, and it required money, much money, to
purchase the products which were indispensable to me, and to
construct the machines which I contrived.

"And I was about being compelled to earn my daily bread.

"I was on the verge of despair, when I met a man whom I had formerly
seen at my father's, and who had seemed to take some interest in my
researches, a speculator named Marcolet. But it is not at the bourse
that he operates. Industry is the field of his labors. Ever on the
lookout for those obstinate inventors who are starving to death in
their garrets, he appears to them at the hour of supreme crisis: he
pities them, encourages them, consoles them, helps them, and almost
always succeeds in becoming the owner of their discovery. Sometimes
he makes a mistake; and then all he has to do is to put a few