d'Escorval looked on with eyes dilated with terror.

She seemed to doubt her own sanity, and incessantly passed her hand across her forehead, thickly beaded with cold sweat.
"What a night!" she murmured.

"What a night!" "I must remind you, Madame," said the priest, sympathizingly, but firmly, "that reason and duty alike forbid you thus to yield to despair! Wife, where is your energy?
Christian, what has become of your confidence in a just and beneficial God ?" "Oh! I have courage, Monsieur," faltered the wretched woman.

"I am brave!" The abbe led her to a large arm-chair, where he forced her to seat herself, and in a gentler tone, he resumed: "Besides, why should you despair, Madame?
Your son, certainly, is with you in safety.

Your husband has not compromised himself; he has done nothing which I myself have not done." And briefly, but with rare precision, he explained the part which he and the baron had played during this unfortunate evening.
But this recital, instead of reassuring the baroness, seemed to increase her anxiety.
"I understand you," she interrupted, "and I believe you.