The unhappy boy was looking for it everywhere, when the door silently opened, and Jean appeared on the threshold.

The expression upon his young master's face so startled the faithful old man that he nearly dropped the lighted candle that he carried in his hand.
"Why are you here, Master Norbert ?" asked he in a voice that trembled with emotion.
"I was looking for----I wanted to find----," faltered Norbert.
Jean's suspicions at once became certainties; he walked up to his young master, and whispered in his ear,-- "You are looking for the Duke's bottle of wine, are you not?
It is quite safe; for I have taken it to my room.

To-morrow the contents shall be emptied away, and there will be no proof existing." Jean spoke in such a low voice that Norbert guessed rather than heard his words, and yet it seemed that the accusing whisper resounded like thunder through the Chateau, filling the old house from cellar to roof-tree.
"Be quiet," said he, laying his hand on the old man's lips, and gazing around him with wild and affrighted glances.
A more complete confession could hardly have been made.
"Fear nothing, Master Norbert," answered Jean; "we are quite alone.

I know that there are words which should never be even breathed; and if I have ventured to speak, it was because it was my duty to warn you, and to inculcate on you the necessity of caution." Norbert was filled with horror when he saw that the old man believed him to be really guilty.
"Jean," cried he, "you are wrong in your suspicions.

I tell you that my father never tasted that wine.