First, the writer of the anonymous letter; then the Duchess; then Caroline Schimmel; and, finally, Jean, to whom he must confide all.

With these thoughts ringing through his brain, Norbert carefully effaced the last traces of the duel, and then bent his steps towards his wife's chamber.
He had expected to find her still unconscious on the spot where he had left her lying.

Marie was seated in an armchair by the side of the fire; her face was terribly pale, and her eyes sparkling with the inward flame that consumed her.
"My honor has been vindicated; the Marquis de Croisenois is no more; I have slain your lover, madame." Marie did not start; she had evidently prepared herself for this blow.
Her face assumed a more proud and disdainful expression, and the light in her dark eyes grew brighter and brighter.
"You are wrong," said she, "M.

de Croisenois was not my lover." "You need no longer take the pains to lie; I ask nothing now." Marie's utter calmness jarred inexpressibly upon Norbert's exasperated frame of mind.

He would have given much to change this mood of hers, which he could not at all understand.