I must follow.' 'No, for that is not all!' he replied, interrupting me sternly, while his grasp on my arm grew tighter and his eyes flashed as they looked into mine.

'You have not heard all.

They have gone with one who called you an impostor, and a thief, and a beggar, and that to your mother's face--and killed her! Killed her as surely as if he had taken a sword to her, M.de Marsac! Will you, after that, leave her for them ?' He spoke plainly.

And yet, God forgive me, it was some time before I understood him: before I took in the meaning of his words, or could transfer my thoughts from the absent to my mother lying on the bed before me.

When I did do so, and turned to her, and saw her still face and thin hair straggling over the coarse pillow, then, indeed, the sight overcame me.