uptcy.

"I have to thank you, my dear sir, for reminding me of that affair,"
replied Derville. "My philanthropy will not carry me beyond twenty-five
louis; I have, I fear, already been the dupe of my patriotism."

As Derville finished the sentence, he saw on his desk the papers his
head clerk had laid out for him. His eye was struck by the appearance
of the stamps--long, square, and triangular, in red and blue ink, which
distinguished a letter that had come through the Prussian, Austrian,
Bavarian, and French post-offices.

"Ah ha!" said he with a laugh, "here is the last act of the comedy; now
we shall see if I have been taken in!"

He took up the letter and opened it; but he could not read it; it was
written in German.

"Boucard, go yourself and have this letter translated, and bring it back
immediately," said Derville, half opening his study door, and giving the
letter to the head clerk.

The notary at Berlin, to whom the lawyer had written, informed him that
the documents he had been requested to forward would arrive within a
few days of this note announcing them. They were, he said, all perfectly
regular and duly witnessed, and legally stamped to serve as evidence
in law. He also informed him that almost all the witnesses to the facts
recorded under these affidavits were still to be found at Eylau, in
Prussia, and that the woman to whom M. le Comte Chabert owed his life
was still living in a suburb of Heilsberg.

"This looks like business," cried Derville, when Boucard had given
him the substance of the letter. "But look here, my boy," he went on,
addressing the notary, "I shall want some information which ought to
exist in your office. Was it not that old rascal Roguin--?"

"We will say that unfortunate, that ill-used Roguin," interrupted
Alexandre Crottat with a laugh.

"Well, was it not that ill-used man who has just carried off eight
hundred thousand francs of his clients' money, and reduced several
families to despair, who effected the settlement of Chabert's estate? I
fancy I have seen that in the documents in our case of Ferraud."

"Yes," said Crottat. "It was when I was third clerk; I copied the papers
and studied them thoroughly. Rose Chapotel, wife and widow of Hyacinthe,
called Chabert, Count of the Empire, grand officer of the Legion of
Honor. They had married without settlement; thus, they held all the
property in common. To the best of my recollections, the personalty was
about six hundred