Truth [Vérité]

Indeed she was not a bad woman; it merely happened that she had no faith, no passion, apart from the prosperity of that humble stationery business. She had already reflected that if the secular school should gain the day, it would merely be necessary for her to retire into the background and allow Madame Alexandre to direct the shop. Nevertheless, this was hardly a pleasant prospect, given her business instincts and her fondness for domineering over others. So she strove to lighten the catastrophe as far as possible.

'You might content yourself with utilising the slip, without producing my son's copybook,' said she. 'Besides, it has just occurred to me that you might arrange a story and say, for instance, that I happened to find the slip and gave it to you. That would show us in a suitable rôle, and we could then openly pass over to your side, with the certainty that you would be victorious.'

In spite of his emotion Marc could not refrain from smiling. 'It is, I think, madame, easiest and most honourable to tell the truth,' said he. 'Your rôle will nevertheless remain praiseworthy.'

At this she seemed to feel somewhat reassured. 'Really,' she replied, 'you think so? Of course I ask nothing better than that the truth should become known if we do not have to suffer from it.'

Marc had complaisantly taken the copybook and the slip from his pocket in order to show her exactly what he was carrying away. And she was telling him that she fully recognised both book and slip when, all at once, her son Victor came in from some escapade, accompanied by his friend Polydor Souquet. While twisting about and laughing over some prank known to themselves alone, the two young fellows glanced at the copy-slip, and Polydor at once expressed the liveliest surprise.

'Hallo!' he exclaimed, 'the paper!'

But when Marc quickly raised his head, struck as he was by that exclamation, and divining that a little more of the truth lurked behind it, the youth reassumed his usual sleepy, hypocritical expression and tried to recall his words.

'What paper? Do you know it, then?' Marc asked him.

'I? No.... I said the paper because—because it is a paper.'

Marc could draw nothing further from him. As for Victor, he continued to sneer as if he were amused to find that old affair cropping up once more. Ah! yes, the copy-slip which he had brought home from school one day long ago, and which that little fool Sébastien had made such a fuss about! But Madame Edouard still felt ashamed, and when Marc withdrew she accompanied him outside to beg him to do all he could to spare them worry. She had just thought of General Jarousse, their cousin, who would certainly not be pleased if the affair were revived. He had formerly done them the great honour to call on them and explain that when one's country might suffer from the truth being made known it was infinitely preferable and far more glorious to tell a lie. And if General Jarousse should be angered, whatever would she do with her son Victor, who relied on his relative's protection to become a general in his turn?

That evening Marc was to dine at Madame Duparque's, whither he still repaired at times, as he was unwilling that Geneviève should always go alone. Polydor's exclamation still haunted him, for he felt that the truth lurked behind it; and it so happened that when he reached the ladies' house, with Geneviève and Louise, he caught sight of the young fellow whispering eagerly to his aunt Pélagie in the kitchen. Moreover, the ladies' greeting was so frigid that Marc divined in it some threat. During the last few years Madame Berthereau, Geneviève's mother, had been declining visibly, ever in an ailing state, full also of a kind of despairing sadness amid her resignation. But Madame Duparque, the grandmother, though she was now seventy-one, remained combative, terrible, implacable in her faith. In order that Marc might fully understand for what exceptional reasons she thought it right to receive him, she never invited anybody else when he dined at her house. By this course she hoped also to make him understand that his position was that of a pariah, and that it was impossible to ask honest folk to meet him.

That evening, then, as on previous occasions, silence and embarrassment reigned during the meal, and by the hostile demeanour of the others, and particularly by the brusqueness of Pélagie, who served at table, Marc became fully convinced that some storm was about to burst on him. Until the dessert was served, however, Madame Duparque restrained herself like a bourgeoise intent on playing her part as mistress of the house correctly. At last, when Pélagie came in with some apples and pears, she said to her: 'You may keep your nephew to dinner, I give you permission.'

The old servant in her scolding, aggressive voice replied: 'Ah! the poor boy needs to recruit himself after the violence that was done him this afternoon.'

At this Marc suddenly understood everything. The ladies had been made acquainted with his discovery of the copy-slip by Polydor, who, for some reason which remained obscure, had hastened to tell everything to his aunt.

'Oh, oh!' said Marc, who could not help laughing, 'who was it that wanted to do violence to Polydor? Was it I, by chance, when the dear boy ventured to bamboozle me so pleasantly by feigning stupidity at Mesdames Milhommes' this afternoon?'

Madame Duparque, however, would not allow such a serious matter to be treated in that ironical fashion. She proceeded to unbosom herself without any show of anger, but in that rigid, cutting manner of hers which suffered no reply. Was it possible that the husband of her dear Geneviève still thought of reviving the abominable affair of that man Simon, that vile assassin, who had been so justly condemned, who deserved no pity whatever, and who ought indeed to have been guillotined? True, there was a monstrous legend of his innocence which evil-minded folk hoped to make use of in order to shake religion and hand France over to the Jews. And now, after obstinately searching among all that filth, Marc pretended that he had found the proof, the famous new fact, which had been announced so many times already. A fine proof indeed, a strip of paper, which had come nobody knew whence nor how, the invention of a pack of children who either lied or were mistaken!

'Grandmother,' Marc quietly answered, 'it was agreed that we should not speak of those matters any more. I have not ventured to make the slightest allusion to them; it is you who begin again. But what good can a dispute do? My conviction is absolute.'

'And you know the real culprit, and you intend to denounce him to justice?' asked the old lady, quite beside herself.

'Certainly.'

At this Pélagie, who was beginning to clear away, could not restrain herself. 'In any case it isn't Brother Gorgias, I can answer for that!' she suddenly cried.

Marc, enlightened by these words, turned towards her. 'Why do you say that?' he asked.

'Because on the evening of the crime Brother Gorgias accompanied my nephew Polydor to his father's, on the road to Jonville, and got back to the school before eleven o'clock. Polydor and other witnesses testified to that at the trial.'

Marc was still gazing fixedly at the old woman, but his mind was busy at work. That which he had long suspected was becoming a moral certainty. He could picture the Brother accompanying Polydor, then returning homeward, pausing before Zéphirin's open window, and talking to the boy. At last he climbed over the low window bar, the better perhaps to see the pictures which the lad had set out on his table. Then, however, came the horrid impulse, abominable madness... and, the child strangled, the murderer fled by the window, which he still left wide open. It was from his own pocket that he had taken that copy of Le Petit Beaumontais to use it as a gag, never noticing in his perturbation that the copy-slip was with the newspaper. And on the morrow, when the crime was discovered, it was Father Philibin, who, finding himself unable to destroy the slip, as Mignot had seen it, had been obliged to content himself with tearing away the corner on which the stamp was impressed, thus at all events removing all positive proof of the place whence the slip had come.

Slowly and gravely Marc answered Pélagie: 'Brother Gorgias is the culprit, everything proves it, and I swear it is so!'

Indignant protests arose around the table. Madame Duparque was stifling with indignation. Madame Berthereau, whose mournful eyes went from her daughter to her son-in-law, whose rupture she sorely dreaded, made a gesture of supreme despair. And while little Louise, who paid great attention to her father's words, remained there quietly, never stirring, Geneviève sprang to her feet and quitted the table, saying:

'You would do better to hold your tongue! It will soon be quite impossible for me to remain near you: you will end by making me hate you!'

Later that same evening, when Louise had gone to sleep and the husband and the wife also lay in bed, there came a moment of profound silence in their dark room. Since dinner neither had spoken to the other. But Marc was always the first to try to make friends, for he could not bear the suffering which their quarrels brought him. Now, however, when he gently sought to embrace Geneviève, she nervously pushed him away, quivering as if with repulsion.

'No: let me be!'

Hurt by her manner, he did not insist. And the silence fell heavily again. At last she resumed: 'There is one thing I have not yet told you.... I believe that I am enceinte.'

At this, full of happy emotion, her husband drew near to her again, anxious to press her to his heart. 'Oh! my dear, dear wife, what good news! Now we shall indeed belong to each other once more.'

But she freed herself from his clasp with even more impatience than before, as if his presence near her brought her real suffering. 'No, no, let me be,' she repeated; 'I am not well. I sha'n't be able to sleep; it fidgets me to feel you stirring near me.... It will be better to have two beds if things go on like this.'

Not another word passed between them. They lapsed into silence, speaking neither of the Simon affair nor of the tidings which Geneviève had so abruptly announced. Only the sound of their heavy breathing was to be heard in the dark and lifeless room. Neither was asleep, but neither could penetrate the other's anxious, painful thoughts; it was as if they inhabited two different worlds, parted by a distance of many thousand leagues. And vague sobs seemed to come from far away, from the very depths of the black and dolorous night, bewailing the death of their love.

IV

After a few days' reflection Marc made up his mind and requested David to meet him one evening at the Lehmanns' in the Rue du Trou.

For nearly ten years the Lehmanns had been living in their dim and damp little house, amid public execration. When, as sometimes happened, bands of clericals and anti-Semites came down and threatened the shop, they hastily put up the shutters and continued working by the smoky light of two lamps. All their Maillebois customers, even their co-religionists, having forsaken them, they were dependent on the piece-work they did for Paris clothiers dealing in ready-made goods. And that hard and ill-paid work kept old Lehmann and his mournful wife bent on their board for fourteen hours a day, and yielded scarcely enough money to provide food for themselves, Rachel, and her children, all of whom were huddled there in dismal distress, without a joy or a hope in life. Even now, after so many years, passing pedestrians spat on their doorstep to show how fully they loathed and hated that filthy den, whither, so the legend ran, Simon the murderer had brought Zéphirin's blood, while it was still warm, to use it in some vile deed of witchcraft. And nowadays to that abode of intense wretchedness and deep, cloistered grief came Simon's letters, briefer and more infrequent than formerly, yet still and ever telling the tale of the innocent man's long agony.

Those letters alone had the power of stirring Rachel into life, of drawing her from the torpor and resignation in which she spent most of her days. Her once beautiful countenance was now but a ruin, ravaged by her tears. She lived only for her children: Sarah, whom she still kept beside her, fearing to expose her to the insults of the malicious, and Joseph, whom Marc defended at the school. The dreadful story of their father's fate had long been hidden from them, but it had been necessary to tell them the truth at last, partly in order to spare them much painful doubt and cogitation. Nowadays, whenever a letter arrived from the penal settlement yonder, it was read in their presence; and those bitter trials inculcated virility of nature in them, and helped to ripen their budding minds. After each perusal their mother took them in her arms, repeating that nowhere under the skies was there a more honest, a more noble, a loftier-minded man than their father. She swore to them that he was innocent, she told them of the awful martyrdom he endured, she prophesied to them that he would some day be freed, rehabilitated, and acclaimed; and she asked them to love and revere him when that day should dawn, to encompass him with a worship whose sweetness might enable him to forget his many years of torture.

And yet would the unhappy man live until that day of truth and justice? It was a miracle that he had not succumbed already, among the brutes who crucified him. To survive, he had needed an extraordinary amount of moral energy, the frigid power of resistance, the well-balanced logical temperament with which nature had fortunately endowed him. Still, his last letters gave cause for increasing anxiety, he was evidently at the end of his strength, quite overcome. And Rachel's fears reached such a point that, without pausing to consult anybody, she, usually so languid, repaired one morning to La Désirade to see Baron Nathan, who was then staying there with the Sanglebœufs. She took with her the last letter she had received from her husband in order to show it to the Baron, meaning to beg him—triumphant Jew that he was, one of the gold-kings of the world—to exert his great influence in order to obtain a little pity for the poor, wretched, crucified Jew who was suffering yonder. And she came home in tears, shuddering, as if she had just left some dazzling and fearsome place. She could hardly remember what had happened. The Baron, the bloated renegade, had received her with a stern countenance, as if angered by her audacity. Perhaps it was his daughter, a white-faced, frigid lady, whom she had found with him. She could not tell exactly how they had got rid of her, but it was with words of refusal, such as might have been addressed to a beggar. Then she had found herself outside again, half-blinded by the wealth accumulated at that splendid abode of La Désirade, with its sumptuous reception-rooms, its running waters, and its white statues. And since that fruitless attempt she had relapsed into the mournful, waiting attitude of former days, ever garbed in black, like a living statue of mutely protesting grief in the midst of persecution.

The only person on whom Marc relied in that home of wretchedness and suffering was David, whose mind was so clear, whose heart was so upright and so firm. Ever since the condemnation of Simon Marc had seen him striving, evincing neither impatience, nor weakness, nor despair, despite all the difficulties of his task. Indeed, David's faith remained entire; he was convinced of his brother's innocence, and felt certain that he would some day prove it. He had understood at the outset that he would need some money to achieve his task, and he had arranged his life accordingly. He outwardly resumed the direction of the sand and gravel pits, which he had leased from Baron Nathan, in such wise that everybody believed that he conducted the business personally; but in reality the chief responsibility fell upon his foreman, who was devoted to him. And the profits, being handled prudently, sufficed for David's other work, his real mission, the investigations which he carried on so discreetly. Some people, who believed him to be a miser, accused him of earning large sums of money, and yet giving no help to his sister-in-law, who shared the wretched home of the Lehmanns, where incessant toil led only to a life of privations. At one moment also an attempt was made to dispossess David of his sand and gravel pits, the Sanglebœufs threatening him with an action-at-law, which was evidently prompted by Father Crabot. The Jesuit, indeed, was conscious of the stealthy, underhand efforts which that silent but active man was making, and would have liked to drive him from the district, or at least to cripple his resources. But David fortunately held a thirty years' lease from Baron Nathan, and thus he was still able to carry on the business which ensured him the money he needed.

His principal efforts had been long concentrated on the illegal communication which President Gragnon was said to have made to the jurors in their retiring room, when the proceedings in Simon's trial were over. After interminable inquiries David had collected enough information to picture the scene in its broad lines: the jurors, assailed by certain scruples, had sent for the presiding judge in order to question him about the penalties their verdict might entail; and the judge, in order to silence their scruples, had shown them an old letter of Simon's, which had been placed in his hands a moment previously. This letter, an insignificant note to a friend, acquired importance from the fact that it was followed by a postscript, signed with a paraph identical with the one which figured on the incriminating copy-slip. This singular document, produced at the last moment without the knowledge of the prisoner or his counsel, had assuredly led to the verdict of 'Guilty.' But how was David to establish all this? How could he induce one of the jurors to testify to the facts, the revelation of which would have brought about an immediate revision of the proceedings, particularly if—as David felt convinced—the postscriptum of the letter and its initialling were forgeries? He had long endeavoured to act, through others, on the foreman of the jury, Architect Jacquin, a devout and very upright Catholic; and he believed that he had lately disturbed that man's conscience by acquainting him with the illegality of the judge's communication under the circumstances. If, in addition, he could prove that the postscriptum and the paraph had been forged, Jacquin would speak out.

When Marc repaired to the Rue du Trou to keep the appointment he had made with David, he found the little shop shut, the house quite dark and lifeless. The family had prudently taken refuge in the back parlour, where Lehmann and his wife were working by lamplight; and it was there that the stirring scene took place in the presence of the quivering Rachel and her children, whose eyes were all ablaze.

Before speaking out, however, Marc wished to ascertain what point David had now reached in his investigations.

'Oh! things are moving, but still very, very slowly,' the other answered. 'Jacquin is one of those fair-minded Christians who worship a Deity of love and equity. At one moment I felt alarmed, for I discovered that Father Crabot was bringing the greatest pressure to bear on him through every possible intermediary. But I am now easy on that point—Jacquin will act only as his conscience may direct.... The difficulty is to get at the document in order that it may be examined by experts.'

'But did not Gragnon destroy it?' Marc inquired.

'It seems not. Having shown it to the jurors he did not dare to do so, but simply placed it with the papers in the case, among which it must still be. At least, such is the conviction of Delbos, based on certain information he has obtained. Thus the question is to exhume it from among the records, and it is not easy to devise a plausible motive for doing so.... Nevertheless, we are making progress.' And after a pause David added: 'And you, my friend, have you any good news?'

'Yes, good and great news.'

Then Marc slowly recounted all that had happened: Sébastien's illness, Madame Alexandre's despair, followed by her remorse and terror, which had prompted her to hand him the long-sought duplicate of the copy-slip, on which duplicate one found both the stamp of the Brothers' school and a paraph which undoubtedly represented Brother Gorgias's initials. 'Here it is,' said Marc. 'There, you see, is the stamp, in the very corner which was torn away from the copy found near little Zéphirin's body. We fancied that it might have been bitten off by the victim, but Father Philibin at least had time to tear it off; on that point the recollections of Mignot, my assistant, are precise.... Now, look at the paraph. It is identical with the other which figured at the trial, but it is more legible, and one can fully distinguish Brother Gorgias's initials,[1] that is an F and a G interlaced, which the experts, Masters Badoche and Trabut, with extraordinary aberration, persisted in declaring to be an L and an S, otherwise your brother's initials.... My conviction is now absolute: the culprit is Brother Gorgias, and none other.'

With passionate eagerness they all stared at the narrow yellow strip of paper produced by Marc, and scrutinised it in the pale lamplight. The old Lehmanns quitted their sewing and thrust their faces forward as if reviving to life. Rachel had emerged from her torpor, and stood there quivering, while the two children, Joseph and Sarah, their eyes aflame, pushed one another in order that they might see the better. Finally David, amid the deep silence of that mourning home, took the paper from Marc and examined it.

'Yes, yes,' he said, 'my conviction is the same as yours. What was suspected has now become certain. Brother Gorgias is the guilty man!'

A long discussion followed; all the facts were recalled in succession, and united in one sheaf. They threw light on each other, and all tended to the same conclusion. Apart from the material proofs which were beginning to come in, there was a moral certainty, the demonstration as it were of a mathematical problem, which reasoning sufficed to solve. No doubt obscurity still hung around a few points, such as the presence of the copy-slip in the Brother's pocket, and the fate of the corner on which the stamp had been impressed. But all the rest seemed certain: Gorgias returning home on the night of the crime, chance bringing him before Zéphirin's open and lighted window, temptation, and afterwards murder; then, on the morrow, chance likewise bringing Father Philibin and Brother Fulgence on the scene in such wise that they became mixed up in the tragedy and were forced to act in order to save one of their fellows. And how plainly did the mutilation of the copy-slip designate the culprit, whose name was virtually proclaimed also by the fierce campaign which had ensued, the great efforts which the Church had made in order to shield him, and cause an innocent man to be sentenced in his stead. Moreover, each day now brought fresh light, and before long the whole huge edifice of falsehood would crumble.

'So that is the end of our wretchedness!' exclaimed old Lehmann, becoming quite gay. 'It will only be necessary to show that paper and Simon will be restored to us.'

The two children were already dancing with delight, repeating in blissful accents: 'Oh! papa will come back! papa will come back!'

But David and Marc remained grave. They knew how difficult and dangerous the situation still was. Questions of the greatest weight and gravity had to be settled: how were they to make use of that newly-discovered document, what course was to be followed in applying for a revision of the trial? Thus Marc answered softly: 'One must think it over, one must wait a little longer.'

At this Rachel, relapsing into tears, stammered amid her sobs: 'Wait! wait for what? For the poor man to die yonder, amid the torture of which he complains?'

Once more the dark little house sank into mourning. All felt that their unhappiness was not yet over. After their keen momentary delight came frightful anxiety as to what the morrow might bring forth.

'Delbos alone can guide us,' said David by way of conclusion. 'If you are willing, Marc, we will go to see him on Thursday.'

'Quite so: call for me on Thursday.'

In ten years Advocate Delbos had risen to a remarkable position at Maillebois. The Simon affair, that compromising case, the brief in which had been prudently declined by all his colleagues and bravely accepted by himself, had decided his future. At that time he had been merely a peasant's son, imbued with some democratic instincts and gifted with eloquence. But, while studying the affair and gradually becoming the impassioned defender of the truth, he had found himself in presence of all the bourgeois forces coalescing in favour of falsehood and the maintenance of every social iniquity. And this had ended by making him a militant Socialist, one who felt convinced that the salvation of the country could come solely from the masses. By degrees the whole revolutionary party of the town had grouped itself around him, and at the last elections he had forced a second ballot on the radical Lemarrois, who had been deputy for twenty years. And if Delbos still suffered in his immediate interests from the circumstance that he had defended a Jew charged with every crime, he was gradually rising to a lofty position by the firmness of his faith and the quiet valour of his actions, going forward to victory with gay and virile confidence.

As soon as Marc had shown him the copy-slip obtained from Madame Alexandre, the advocate raised a loud cry of delight: 'At last we hold them!' And turning towards David he added: 'This gives us a second new fact. The first is the letter—a forgery, no doubt—which was illegally communicated to the jury.... We must try to find it among the papers of the case.... And the second is this copy-slip, bearing the stamp of the Brothers' school, and a paraph which is evidently that of Brother Gorgias. It will, I think, be easier and more effective to use this second proof.'

'Then what do you advise me to do?' asked David. 'My idea is to write a letter to the Minister of Justice on behalf of my sister-in-law, a letter formally denouncing Brother Gorgias as the perpetrator of the crime, and applying for the revision of my brother's case.'

Delbos had become thoughtful again. 'That would undoubtedly be the correct course,' said he, 'but it is a delicate matter, and we must not act too hastily.... Let us return for a moment to the illegal communication of that letter, which it will be so difficult for us to prove as long as we cannot induce Architect Jacquin to relieve his conscience. You remember Father Philibin's evidence—his vague allusion to a paper signed by your brother with a flourish, similar to that on the incriminating copy-slip—a paper about which he would give no precise information—being bound, said he, by confessional secrecy? Well, I am convinced that he was then alluding to the very letter which was placed in Judge Gragnon's hands at the last moment, for which reason, like you, I suspect it to be forged. But these are only suppositions, theories; and we need proofs. Now, if we drop that matter, and, for the time at all events, content ourselves with this duplicate copy of the writing slip, on which the school stamp appears, and on which the initialling is much plainer, we still find ourselves face to face with some puzzling, obscure points. Without lingering too much over the question how it happened that such a slip was in the Brother's pocket at the moment of the crime—a point which it is rather difficult to explain—I am very worried by the disappearance of the corner on which the school stamp must have been impressed; and I should like to find that corner before acting, for I can foresee all sorts of objections which will be raised in opposition to us, in order to throw the affair into a muddle.'

Marc looked at him in astonishment. 'What! find that corner? It would be a wonderful chance if we should do so! We even admitted that it might have been torn away by the victim's teeth.'

'Oh! that is not credible,' Delbos answered. 'Besides, in that case the fragment would have been found on the floor. Nothing was found, so the corner was intentionally torn off. Besides, we here detect the intervention of Father Philibin, for, as you have told me, your assistant Mignot remembers that at his first glance the copy-slip appeared to him to be intact, and that he felt surprised when, after losing sight of it for a moment, he saw it still in Father Philibin's hands and mutilated. So there is no doubt on the point; the corner was torn away by Father Philibin. Throughout the campaign it was he, always he who turned up at decisive moments to save the culprit! And this is why I should like to have complete proof—that is to say, the little fragment of paper which he carried away with him.'

At this David in his turn expressed his surprise: 'You think that he kept it?'

'Certainly I think so. At all events he may have kept it. Philibin is a taciturn man, extremely dexterous, however coarse and heavy he may look. He must have preserved that fragment as a weapon for his own defence, as a means of keeping a hold over his accomplices. I nowadays suspect that, influenced by some motive which remains obscure, he was the great artisan of the iniquity. Perhaps he was merely guided by a spirit of fidelity towards his chief, Father Crabot; perhaps there has been some skeleton between them since that suspicious affair of the donation of Valmarie; perhaps too Philibin was actuated simply by militant faith and a desire to promote the triumph of the Church. At all events he's a terrible fellow, a man of determination and action, by the side of whom that noisy, empty Brother Fulgence is merely a vain fool.'

Marc had begun to ponder. 'Father Philibin, Father Philibin.... Yes, I was altogether mistaken about him. Even after the trial I still thought him a worthy man, a man of upright nature, even if warped by his surroundings.... Yes, yes, he was the great culprit, the artisan of forgery and falsehood.'

But David again turned to Delbos: 'Suppose,' said he, 'that Philibin should have kept the corner which he tore from the slip, you surely don't expect that he will give it to you, if you ask him for it—do you?'

'Oh! no,' the advocate answered with a laugh. 'But before attempting anything decisive I should like to reflect, and ascertain if there is no means of securing the irrefutable proof. Moreover, a demand for the revision of a case is a very serious matter, and nothing ought to be left to chance.... Let me complete our case if I can; give me a few days—two or three weeks if necessary—and then we will act.'

On the morrow Marc understood by his wife's manner that her grandmother had spoken out and that the Congregations, from Father Crabot to the humblest of the Ignorantines, were duly warned. The affair suddenly burst into life again, there came increasing agitation and alarm. Informed as they were of the discovery of the duplicate copy-slip, conscious that the innocent man's family were now on the road to the truth, hourly expecting to see Brother Gorgias denounced, the guilty ones, Brother Fulgence, Father Philibin, and Father Crabot, returned to the fray, striving to hide their former crime by committing fresh ones. They divined that the masterpiece of iniquity which they had reared so laboriously, and defended so fiercely, was now in great peril, and, yielding to that fatality whereby one lie inevitably leads to endless others, they were ready for the worst deeds in order to save their work from destruction. Besides, it was no mere question of protecting themselves, the salvation of the Church would depend on the battle. If the infamous structure of falsehood should collapse, would not the Congregations be buried beneath it? The Brothers' school would be ruined, closed, while the secular school triumphed; the Capuchins' business would be seriously damaged, customers would desert them, their shrine of St. Antony of Padua would be reduced to paltry profits; the college of Valmarie likewise would be threatened, the Jesuits would be forced to quit the region which they now educated under various disguises; and all religious influence would decline, the breach in the flanks of the Church would be enlarged, and free thought would clear the highway to the future. How desperate therefore was the resistance, how fiercely did the whole clerical army arise in order that it might not be compelled to cede aught of the wretched region of error and dolour, which, for ages, it had steeped in night!

Before Brother Gorgias was even denounced, his superiors felt it necessary to defend him, to cover him at all costs, to forestall the threatened attack, by concocting a story which might prove his innocence. At the first moment, however, there was terrible confusion; the Brother was seen hurrying wildly, on his long thin legs, along the streets of Maillebois and the roads of the neighbourhood. With his eagle beak set between his projecting cheek-bones, his deep black eyes, with their thick brows, and his grimacing mouth, he resembled a fierce, scoffing bird of prey. In the course of one day he was seen on the road to Valmarie, then quitting the residence of Philis, the Mayor of Maillebois, then alighting from a train which had brought him from Beaumont. Moreover, both in the town and the surrounding country many cassocks and frocks were encountered hurrying hither and thither, thus testifying to a perfect panic. It was only on the morrow that the meaning of the agitation was made evident by an article in Le Petit Beaumontais, announcing in violent language that the whole Simon affair was to be revived by the friends of the ignoble Jew, who were about to agitate the region by denouncing a worthy member of one of the religious Orders, the holiest of men.

Brother Gorgias was not yet named, but from that moment a fresh article appeared every day, and by degrees the version of the affair which the Brother's superiors had concocted was set out in opposition to the version which, it was foreseen, would be given by David, though the latter had revealed it to nobody. However, the desire of the clericals was to wreck it beforehand. Everything was flatly denied. It was impossible that Brother Gorgias could have paused before Zéphirin's window on the night of the crime, for witnesses had proved that he had already returned to the school at half-past ten o'clock. Besides, the initialling on the copy-slip was not his, for the experts had fully recognised Simon's handwriting. And everything could be easily explained. Simon, having procured a writing slip, had imitated the Brother's paraph, which he had found in one of Zéphirin's copybooks. Then, as he knew that the slips were stamped at the Brothers' school, he had torn off one corner with diabolical cunning, in order to create a belief in some precaution taken by the murderer; his infernal object being to cast the responsibility of his own crime on some servant of God, and thereby gratify the hatred of the Church which possessed him—-Jew that he was, fated to everlasting damnation. And this extravagant story, repeated every day, soon became the credo of the readers whom the newspaper debased and poisoned with its falsehoods.

It should be mentioned, however, that at the first moment there was a little uncertainty and hesitation, for other explanations had been circulated, and Brother Gorgias himself appeared to have made some curious statements. Formerly hidden away in the background, now suddenly thrust into full light, this Brother Gorgias was an extraordinary character. The Countess de Quédeville, the former owner of Valmarie, had endeavoured to transform his father, Jean Plumet, a poacher, into a kind of gamekeeper. He, the son, had never known his mother, a hussy who rambled about the woods, for she had disappeared soon after his birth. Then his father had been shot one night by an old fellow poacher, and the boy, at that time twelve years old, had remained at Valmarie, protected by the Countess, and becoming the playfellow of her grandson Gaston, with the exact circumstances of whose death, while walking out with Father Philibin, he was doubtless well acquainted, as well as with all that had ensued when the last of the Quédevilles died and bequeathed the estate to Father Crabot. The two Jesuits had never ceased to take an interest in him, and it was thanks to them that he had become an Ignorantine, in spite, it was said, of serious circumstances which tended to prevent it. For these reasons certain evil-minded folk suspected the existence of some corpse between the two Jesuit fathers and their compromising inferior.

At the same time Brother Gorgias was cited as an admirable member of his cloth, one truly imbued with the Holy Spirit. He possessed faith, that sombre, savage faith which pictures man as a weakling, a prey to perpetual sin, ruled by an absolute master, a Deity of wrath and punishment. That Deity alone reigned; it was for the Church to visit His wrath upon the masses, whose duty it became to bow their heads in servile submission until the day of resurrection dawned amid the delights of the heavenly kingdom. He, Brother Gorgias, often sinned himself, but he invariably confessed his transgression with a vehement show of repentance, striking his breast with both fists, and humbling himself in the mud. Then he rose again, absolved, at rest, displaying the provoking serenity of a pure conscience. He had paid his debt, and he would owe nothing more until the weakness of his flesh should cast him into sin again. As a lad he had roamed the woods, growing up amid poaching and thieving, and hiding himself away with the little hussies of the district. Later, after joining the Ignorantines, he had displayed the keenest appetites, showing himself a big eater, a hard drinker, with inclinations towards lubricity and violence. But, as he said in that strangely-compounded, humble, scoffing, threatening way of his to Fathers Philibin and Crabot, whenever they reproached him for some too serious prank: did not everybody sin? did not everybody need forgiveness? Half amusing, half alarming them, he won their pardon, so sincere and stupendous did his remorse appear—remorse which sometimes impelled him to fast for a week at a stretch, and to wear hair-cloths, studded with small sharp nails, next to his skin. It was indeed on this account that he had been always well noted by his superiors, who recognised that he possessed the genuine religious spirit—the spirit which, when his monkish vices ran riot, atoned for them with the avenging flagellation of penitence.

Now, on the revival of the Simon case, Brother Gorgias made the mistake of saying too much in the course of his first confidential chats with the writers of Le Petit Beaumontais. No doubt his superiors had not yet expressly imposed their own version on him, and he was too intelligent to be blind to its exceeding absurdity. As another copy of the writing slip, one bearing his paraph, had been discovered, it must have seemed to him ridiculous to deny that this paraph was his writing. All the experts in the world would never prevent full light from being thrown on that point. Thus he gave some inkling of a version of his own, one which was more reasonable than that of his superiors, and in which a part of the truth appeared. For instance, he allowed it to be supposed that he had indeed halted for a moment outside Zéphirin's open window on the night of the crime, that he had engaged in a friendly chat with the little hunchback, and that he had scolded him on seeing on his table a copy-slip which he had taken from the school without permission. Next, however, had come falsehood. He, Gorgias, had gone off, the child had closed his window, then Simon must have come and have committed the horrid crime, Satan suddenly inspiring him to make use of the copy-slip, after which he had opened the window afresh, in order to let it appear that the murderer had fled that way.

But, although this version of the affair was at the first moment given by the newspaper, which declared that it emanated from a most reliable source, it was on the morrow contradicted energetically, even by Brother Gorgias himself, who repaired expressly to the newspaper office to enter his protest. He then swore on the gospel that he had gone straight home on the evening of the crime, and that the initialling on the copy-slip was a forgery in Simon's handwriting, even as the experts had demonstrated. As a matter of fact he was compelled to accept the concoction of his superiors in order that he might be backed up and saved by them. He grumbled over it, and shrugged his shoulders impatiently, for it seemed to him an extremely stupid version; but at the same time he bowed to the decision of the others, even though he foresaw that their system of defence must eventually crumble to pieces.

At this moment Brother Gorgias, with his scoffing impudence and his heroic mendacity, was really superb. But, then, was not the Deity behind him? Was he not lying in order to save Holy Church, knowing too that absolution would wash away his sin? He even dreamt of the palms of martyrdom; each pious act of infamy that he perpetrated would entitle him to another joy in heaven! From that moment, then, he became merely a docile instrument in the hands of Brother Fulgence, behind whom Father Philibin was secretly acting under the discreet orders of Father Crabot. Their tactics were to deny everything, even what was self-evident, for fear lest the smallest breach in the sacred wall of the Congregations should prove the beginning of inevitable ruin; and although their absurd version of the affair might seem idiotic to people possessed of logical minds, it would none the less long remain the only truth accepted by the mass of the faithful, with whom they could presume to do anything, knowing as they did their boundless, fathomless credulity.

The clericals, then, having assumed the offensive without waiting for Gorgias to be denounced, Brother Fulgence in particular displayed the most intemperate zeal. At times of great emotion, his father, the mad doctor who had died in an asylum, seemed to revive in him. With his brain all fogged, unhinged by vanity and ambition, he yielded to the first impulse that came to him, ever dreaming of doing some mighty service to the Church, which would raise him to the head of his Order. Thus, in the earlier stages of the Simon affair, he had lost the little common-sense which he had previously shown, for he had hoped that the case would yield him the glory he coveted; and now that it was revived he once more became delirious. He was constantly to be seen hurrying along the streets of Maillebois, little, dark, and lean, with the folds of his gown flying about him as if a gale were carrying him away. Whenever he entered into conversation he defended his school with passionate eagerness, calling on heaven to witness the angelic purity of his assistants. As for the abominable rumours which had been circulated long ago respecting some Brothers who had been so horribly compromised that it had been necessary to conjure them away with the greatest speed—all those infamous tales were inventions of the devil.

In this respect, perhaps, however contrary to the truth his vehement declarations might be, Brother Fulgence, in the first instance, made them in all good faith, for he lived very much in another world, far from mere reason. But he soon found himself caught beneath the millstone of falsehood; it became necessary that he should lie knowingly and deliberately, and he did so at last with a kind of devout rage, for the very love of God. Was he not, himself, chaste? Had he not always wrestled against temptation? That was so; and he therefore made it his duty to guarantee the absolute chastity of his entire Order; he answered for the Brothers who stumbled by the way, he denied to laymen the right of judging them, for the laymen belonged merely to the flock, they knew nought of the temple. If, then, Brother Gorgias had sinned, he owed account of it to God only, not to man. As a member of a religious Order he had ceased to be liable to human justice. In this way, consumed by his craving to thrust himself forward, Brother Fulgence went on and on, impelled by skilful and discreet hands which piled all responsibilities upon his shoulders.

It was not difficult to divine that Father Philibin stood behind him in the gloom—Father Philibin, who, in his turn, was the instrument of Father Crabot. But how supple and how powerful a one, retaining his personality even amidst his obedience! He willingly exaggerated the characteristics of his peasant origin, affecting the heavy bon-homie of some rough-hewed son of the soil; yet he was full of the shrewdest craft, endowed with the patience needed for long enterprises, which he conducted with wonderful dexterity. He was always striving to attain some mysterious object, but he made no stir, he showed no personal ambition; the only joy he coveted was that of seeing his work prosper. Supposing him to be possessed of faith, it must have been a desire to serve his superiors and the Church that impelled him to fight on like an unknown unscrupulous soldier. As Prefect of the Studies at Valmarie he there kept a watch over everything, busied himself with everything; for, however massive his build, he was very active. Mingling with the pupils of the college, playing with them, watching them, studying them, diving to the very depths of their souls, ascertaining everything he could about their relatives and their friends, he possessed the master's all-seeing eye, the mind which stripped the brains and hearts of others.

At times, it was said, he shut himself up with Father Crabot, the Rector, who affected to direct the establishment from on high, never attending personally to the education of the boys; and to him Father Philibin communicated his notes, his reports, his many documents containing the most complete and secret particulars about each pupil. It was asserted that Father Crabot, who prudently made it a principle to keep no papers whatever, did not approve of Philibin's practice of collecting and cataloguing documents. Yet, in recognition of his great services, he let him do so, regarding himself meantime as the directing hand, the superior mind which made use of the other. Indeed, did he not reign from his austere little cell over all the fine folk of the department? Did not the ladies whom he confessed, the families whose children were educated at Valmarie, belong to him by virtue of the might of his sacred ministry? He flattered himself that it was he who wove and disposed the huge net in which he hoped to capture one and all, when in reality it was more frequently Father Philibin who covertly prepared the various campaigns and ensured victory. In the Simon case, in particular, the latter seemed to have been the hidden artisan who recoiled from no task, however dark and base it might be, the politic man whom nothing could disgust, who had remained the friend of that vicious but well-informed youth, Georges Plumet,—nowadays the terrible Brother Gorgias,—following him through life, protecting him because he was as dangerous as useful, and doing all that could be done to extricate him from that frightful affair, the murder of little Zéphirin, in order no doubt that he, Philibin himself, might not come to grief in it, in the company of his superior, Father Crabot, that glory of the Church.

Now, once again, Maillebois became impassioned, though as yet there were only rumours of the criminal devices which the Jews were preparing in order to set the devoted Brother Gorgias, that holy man, revered by the entire district, in the place of that infamous scoundrel Simon. Extraordinary efforts were made to induce the school children's parents—even those whose children attended the secular school—to condemn the revival of the affair. People talked as if the streets had been mined by some hidden band of scoundrels, the enemies of God and France, who had resolved to blow up the town as soon as a certain signal should reach them from abroad. At a sitting of the Municipal Council, Mayor Philis ventured to allude to a vague danger threatening the locality, and denounced the Jews who were secretly piling up millions for the diabolical work. Then, becoming more precise, he condemned the impious doings of the schoolmaster, that Marc Froment, of whom he had hitherto failed to rid the town. But he was still watching him, and this time he hoped that he would compel the Academy Inspector to show exemplary severity.

The successive versions which Le Petit Beaumontais had given of Marc's share in the revival of the affair had cast confusion into the minds of many folk. There was certainly a question of a document found at the house of Mesdames Milhomme, the stationers; but some people spoke also of another abominable forgery perpetrated by Simon, and others of a crushing document which proved the complicity of Father Crabot. The only certain thing was that General Jarousse had paid another visit to his cousin, Madame Edouard, that poor relation whose existence he so willingly forgot. One morning he had been seen arriving and rushing into the little shop, whence he had emerged half an hour later, looking extremely red. And the result of his tempestuous intervention was that Madame Alexandre, and her son Sébastien, now convalescent, started on the morrow for the South of France, while Madame Edouard continued to manage the shop to the complete satisfaction of the clerical customers. She ascribed the absence of her sister-in-law to the latter's maternal anxiety, for only a sojourn in a warm climate would restore Sébastien to health; but as a matter of fact she was quite ready to recall Madame Alexandre in the interests of their business, should the secular school prove victorious in the coming contest.

Amid the rumbling of the great storm which was rising, Marc endeavoured to discharge his duties as schoolmaster with all correctitude. The affair was now in David's hands, and in that respect he, Marc, merely had to wait until he could assist him with his evidence. Thus never had he devoted himself more entirely to his pupils, striving to inspire them with reason and kindliness, for his active share in the reparation of one of the most monstrous iniquities of the age had filled him with greater fervour than ever for the cause of human solidarity. With Geneviève he showed himself very affectionate, endeavouring to avoid all subjects on which they disagreed, attentive only, it seemed, to those little trifles which are yet of great importance in one's daily life. But whenever his wife returned from a visit to her relations he divined that she was nervous, impatient, more and more exasperated with him, her mind being full of stories which she had heard from his enemies. Thus he could not always avoid quarrels, which gradually became more and more venomous and deadly.

One evening hostilities broke out on the subject of that unhappy man Férou. Tragic tidings had reached Marc during the day: a sergeant, to whom Férou had behaved rebelliously, had shot him dead with a revolver. Marc, on going to see the widow, had found her in her wretched home, weeping and begging death to take her also, together with her younger daughters, even as it had compassionately taken the eldest one already. Marc felt that Férou's frightful fate was the logical dénouement of his career: the poor schoolmaster, scorned, embittered to the point of rebellion, driven from his post, deserting in order that he might not have to pay to the barracks the debt which he had already paid in part to the school, then conquered by hunger, forcibly incorporated in the army when he returned to succour his despairing wife and children, and ending like a mad dog, yonder, under the flaming sky, amid the torturing life of a disciplinary company. At the same time, in presence of the sobbing wife and her stupefied daughters, in presence of those poor ragged waifs whom the iniquity of the social system cast into the last agony, Marc's brotherly and humane nature was stirred to furious protest. Even in the evening he had not calmed down, and forgot himself so far as to speak of the affair to Geneviève, while she was still moving about their bedroom before withdrawing to a small adjoining chamber, where, of recent times, she had slept by herself.

'Do you know the news?' said he. 'A sergeant has blown poor Férou's brains out, in some mutiny, in Algeria.'

'Ah!'

'Yes, I saw Madame Férou this afternoon; she is quite out of her mind.... It was really deliberate, premeditated murder. I don't know if General Jarousse, who showed himself so harsh in Férou's case, will sleep at ease to-night. In any case some of the blood of that poor madman, who was turned into a wild beast, will cling to his hands.'

'It would be very foolish of the general not to sleep!' Geneviève quickly retorted, interpreting Marc's words as an attack on her principles.

He made a gesture of mingled sorrow and indignation. But, recollecting the position, he regretted that he had named the general, for the latter was one of Father Crabot's dearest penitents, and at one moment there had been some thought of using him for a military coup d'état. A Bonapartist by repute, with a decorative, corpulent figure, he was very severe with his men, though jovial at bottom, and fond of the table and wenches. Of course there was no harm in that; but, after some negotiations, the clericals found that he was decidedly too big a fool for their purpose; and so he remained a mere possible makeshift for their party, though they still treated him with some consideration.

'When we first knew the Férou family at Le Moreux,' Marc gently resumed, 'they were already so poor, so burdened with work and worries in their wretched school, that I cannot think of that unhappy man, that master, tracked and destroyed like a wolf, without a feeling of anguish and compassion.'

At this Geneviève, thoroughly upset, her earlier displeasure turning into a kind of nervous exasperation, burst into tears. 'Yes, yes! I understand you perfectly—I am a heartless creature, eh? You began by thinking me a fool, and now you believe I have an evil heart. How is it possible for us to continue loving one another if you treat me as though I were a stupid and malicious woman?'

Astonished and grieved at having provoked such an outburst Marc wished to pacify his wife. But she became quite wild. 'No, no! it is all over between us. As you hate me more and more each day, it is best that we should separate at once, without waiting till unworthy things happen!'

Then she rushed into the little room where she now slept, and locked the door with no gentle hand. He, when he saw it thus shut upon him, remained in despair, with tears welling to his eyes. Hitherto that door had always been left open, and, though the husband and wife had no longer shared the same bed, they had remained in a degree together, able to converse with one another. But now came total separation: henceforth they would live as strangers.

On the following evenings Geneviève in the same manner locked herself in her room. Then, having acquired that habit, she never showed herself to Marc until she was fully dressed. As the time approached for the birth of the child she expected, she displayed increasing repugnance for the slightest caress, the merest touch, even, on the part of her husband. He had ascribed this at first to her state of health; but he became surprised as her repulsion developed more and more into hatred, for it seemed to him that the advent of another child ought to have drawn them more closely together. And his anxiety augmented; for if, on the one hand, he was aware that as long as man and woman are united by love no rupture is possible, for the bitterest quarrels evaporate amid their kisses, on the other he knew that, as soon as virtual divorce is agreed upon, the slightest conflict may prove deadly, beyond possibility of reconciliation; indeed, it often happens when homes are seen collapsing in a seemingly inexplicable manner, that everything can be traced back to the severance of the carnal bond, the tie of passion. As long as Geneviève had hung about his neck Marc had not feared the attempts which were made to take her from him. He knew that she was his, he knew that no power in the world could conquer love. But if she ceased to regard him with love and passion, would not the fierce efforts of his enemies at last wrest her from him? And, as day by day he saw her become colder and colder, his heart was wrung by increasing, intolerable anxiety.

At one moment some little enlightenment came to him with respect to the change in his wife's manner. He learnt that she had quitted Abbé Quandieu to take as her confessor Father Théodose, the Superior of the Capuchins, who stage-managed so cleverly the miracles of St. Antony of Padua. The reason given for this change was the discomfort, the unappeased hungry state in which she was left by the ministrations of the priest of St. Martin's. He was now too lukewarm for her ardent faith; whereas handsome Father Théodose, whose fervour was so lofty, would nourish her with the wholemeal bread of mysticism, which she needed to satisfy her. In reality, it was Father Crabot, now sovereign lord at Madame Duparque's house, who had decided on this change, doubtless in order to hasten victory after proceeding with such artful slowness.

It never occurred to Marc to suspect Geneviève of any base intrigue with the Capuchin, that superbly-built man, Christlike in features but of dark complexion, whose large glowing eyes and frizzy beard sent his penitents into raptures. Marc knew his wife to be possessed of too much loyalty and too much dignity, both of mind and body—a dignity that had never forsaken her even in moments of the most passionate rapture. But without carrying matters as far as that, was it not admissible that the growing influence of Father Théodose was in part the domination of a handsome man over a woman who was still young—a man, too, godlike in appearance, and godlike claiming obedience? After her pious conversations with Father Théodose, after the long hours she spent in the confessional, Geneviève returned to her husband quivering, distracted, such as he had never seen her when she retuned from her visits to Abbé Quandieu. In her intercourse with her new confessor she was certainly forming some mystical passion, finding some new food for her craving nature. Perhaps, too, the monk availed himself of her perturbed state of health to terrorise her. Indeed, was not the father of the child she bore one of the damned? She repeatedly spoke of that child in a despairing way, as if seized with a kind of terror, like one of those mothers who dread lest they should give birth to a monster. And if that happily should not come to pass, how would she protect the child from surrounding sin, whither might she carry her babe to save it from the contamination of its father's sacrilegious home? All this threw a little light on Geneviève's rupture with Marc—a rupture in which there might well be remorse at the thought that her child was also the child of an unbeliever; then a vow that she would never more be the mother of that unbeliever's children; and, finally, a perversion and exasperation of love, which dreamt of finding satisfaction henceforth in the au-delà of desire. Yet how much still remained obscure, and how cruelly did Marc suffer as he saw himself forsaken by that adored wife, whom the Church was wrenching from his arms, in order that by torturing him it might annihilate him and his work of human liberation!

One day, on returning home after one of her long conferences with Father Théodose, Geneviève, who looked both excited and exhausted, said to Louise, who at that moment came in from school: 'To-morrow at five o'clock you will have to go to confession at the Capuchins'. If you do not confess, you will no longer be received at the Catechism class.'

But Marc resolutely intervened. While allowing Louise to follow the Catechism class, he had hitherto strongly opposed her attendance at confession. 'Louise will not go to the Capuchins',' he said, firmly. 'You know, my dear, that I have given way on every other point, but I will not allow the child to go to confession.'

'Why not?' exclaimed Geneviève, still restraining herself.

'I cannot repeat my reasons before the child. But you know them, and I will not allow my daughter's mind to be soiled, under the pretext of absolving her of trivial faults, which her parents alone need know and correct.'

An explanation, indeed, had taken place between Marc and Geneviève on this subject. In his opinion it was most loathsome and abominable that a little girl should be initiated to the passions of the flesh by a man who, by his very vow of chastity, might be led to every curiosity and every sexual aberration. For ten priests who might be prudent, it was sufficient there should be one of unbalanced mind, and then confession became filth, to which risk Marc refused to expose his daughter Louise. Besides, in that disturbing promiscuity, that secret colloquy amid the mystical, enervating atmosphere and gloom of a chapel, there was not merely the possibility of demoralisation for a girl only twelve years old,—an anxious age, when the senses begin to quicken,—there was also a seizure of her mind and person; for whatever she might become later, girl, wife, and mother, she would always remain the initiate of that minister, who by his very questions had violated her modesty, and thereby affianced her to his jealous Deity. From that time forward, indeed, woman, by her avowals, belonged to her confessor, became his trembling, obedient thing, ever ready to do his behests, to serve, in his hands, as an instrument of investigation and enthralment.

'If our daughter should be guilty of any fault,' Marc resumed, 'she shall confess it to you or me, whenever she feels a need to do so. That will be more logical and cleaner.'

Geneviève shrugged her shoulders, like one who deemed that solution to be both blasphemous and grotesque. 'I won't discuss the matter any further with you,' she said. 'But just tell me this—if you prevent Louise from going to confession, how will she be able to go to her first Communion?'

'Her first Communion? But is it not settled that she will wait till her twentieth birthday in order to decide that question herself? I have let her go to the Catechism class, even as she goes to her cours of history and sciences—that is, in order that she may form an opinion and decide later on.'

At this Geneviève's anger mastered her. She turned towards her daughter: 'And you, Louise, what do you think; what do you desire?'

The child, whose usually gay face had become quite grave, had listened to her father and mother in silence. Whenever such quarrels arose, she endeavoured to remain neutral from a fear of embittering matters. Her intelligent eyes glanced from one to the other of her parents as if begging that they would not make themselves unhappy on her account, for she was grieved indeed to find that she was so constantly the cause of their disputes. But, though she showed great deference and affection for her mother, the latter felt that she inclined towards her father, whom indeed she worshipped, and whose firm sense and passion for truth and equity she had inherited.

For a moment Louise remained as if undecided, looking at her parents in her usual affectionate way. Then she gently said: 'What I think, what I wish, mamma? Why, I should much like it to be whatever you and papa might agree upon. But does papa's desire seem to you so very unreasonable? Why not wait a little?'

The mother, quite beside herself, refused to listen any further. 'That is not an answer, my girl,' she cried. 'Remain with your father since you can no longer show me either respect or obedience! You will end, between you, by driving me from the house!'

Then she rushed away and shut herself up in her little room, as she always did nowadays whenever she encountered the slightest opposition. This was her method of ending their quarrels, and on each occasion she seemed to draw farther and farther away from her husband and her child, to set more and more space between herself and the dearly-loved family fireside of other days.

Her belief that attempts were being made to influence her daughter in order that the child might cast off her authority was strengthened by a fresh incident. After long and skilful manœuvring, Mademoiselle Rouzaire had at last secured the post of first assistant teacher at Beaumont, which post she had coveted for years. Inspector Le Barazer had yielded in the matter to the pressing applications of the clerical deputies and senators, at the head of whom Count Hector de Sanglebœuf marched with the noisy bustling gait of a great captain. But to compensate politically for this step, Le Barazer, with his usual maliciousness, had caused the vacant post at Maillebois to be assigned to Mademoiselle Mazeline, the schoolmistress at Jonville, whose good sense Marc so greatly admired. Perhaps, also, the Academy Inspector, who still covertly supported Marc, had desired to place a friend beside him, one whose object would be the same as his own, who would not try to thwart him at every step, as Mademoiselle Rouzaire had done. At all events, when Mayor Philis, in the name of the Municipal Council, complained to Le Barazer of this appointment, which, said he, would place the little girls of Maillebois in the hands of an unbelieving woman, the Academy Inspector affected great astonishment. What! had he not acted in accordance with Count Hector de Sanglebœuf's pressing application? Was it his fault if, owing to promotions among the school staff, a most meritorious person, of whom no parents had ever complained, had become entitled in due order to the post at Maillebois?

As a matter of fact, Mademoiselle Mazeline's début in the town proved very successful. People were struck by her gay serenity, the maternal manner in which from the very first day she gained the affection of her pupils. All gentleness and zeal, she directed her efforts in such wise that her daughters, as she called them, might become worthy women, wives, and mothers. But she did not take them to Mass, and she suppressed processions, prayers, and Catechism lessons. Before long, therefore, a few other mothers, who belonged to the clerical faction, like Geneviève, began to protest. Indeed, though she had no cause to congratulate herself on her intercourse with Mademoiselle Rouzaire, whose intrigues had disturbed her home, she now seemed to regret her, and spoke of the new schoolmistress as a most suspicious character, who was capable of the blackest enterprises.

'You hear me, Louise,' she said one day; 'if Mademoiselle Mazeline should say anything wrong to you, you must tell me. I won't allow my daughter's soul to be stolen from me!'

Marc could not refrain from intervening. 'Mademoiselle Mazeline stealing souls!' said he; 'that's foolish! When we were at Jonville you used to admire her, as I did. No woman has a loftier mind or a more tender heart.'

'Oh! naturally you back her up,' Geneviève replied; 'you are well fitted to understand each other. Go and join her, hand our daughter over to her, since I am no longer of any account!'

Then, once again, Geneviève hastened to her room, where little Louise had to join her, weep with her, and entreat her for hours before she could be induced to attend to the home again.

All at once some almost incredible news reached Maillebois, throwing the town into no little emotion. Advocate Delbos, who had gone to Paris and addressed himself to some of the Government departments, laying before the officials the famous duplicate copy-slip furnished by Madame Alexandre, had prevailed on them—by what high influence nobody knew—to order a perquisition in Father Philibin's rooms at Valmarie. The extraordinary part of the affair was the lightning-like speed with which this perquisition was made, the Commissary of Police arriving at the College quite unexpectedly, then at once examining the collection of documents formed by the Prefect of the Studies, and, in the second portfolio he opened, discovering an envelope, already yellow with age, which contained the fragment of the copy-slip torn off so long ago. There was no question of denying its authenticity, for when placed in position at the corner of the mutilated slip it fitted exactly.

It was added that Father Philibin, whom Father Crabot—utterly upset by the affair—immediately interrogated, had made a frank confession, explaining his conduct by a kind of instinctive impulse, his hand having acted before his mind had time to think, so great had been his anxiety on seeing the stamp of the Brother's school upon the copy-slip, when he found the latter in Zéphirin's room. If he had remained silent afterwards, this was because a careful study of the affair had convinced him that Simon was indeed the culprit, and had intentionally made use of what was evidently a gross forgery in order to injure religion. Thus Father Philibin gloried in his act, for by tearing off that corner and afterwards preserving silence, he had behaved like a hero who set Holy Church high above the justice of men. Would not a vulgar accomplice have destroyed the fragment? As the reverend Father had preserved it, could one not understand that it had been his intention to re-establish all the facts whenever it might become advisable to do so? Such was the language held by some of his partisans, but there were folk who attributed the preservation of the fragment to his mania for keeping even the smallest scraps of paper, and who thought also that he had wished to remain in possession of a weapon which might prove useful against others.

It was said that Father Crabot, who for his part destroyed even the cards which visitors left for him, was exasperated with his colleague, and that in his surprise and fury at the first moment he had cried: 'What! I gave him orders to burn everything, and he kept that!' In any case, on the evening of the day when the discovery was made by the Commissary, Father Philibin, against whom as yet no warrant had been issued, disappeared. When pious souls anxiously inquired what had become of him, they were told that Father Poirier, the Provincial of Beaumont, had decided to send him to a convent in Italy to observe a retreat; and there, as if engulfed, he was at once buried in eternal silence.

The revision of Simon's case now appeared to be inevitable. Delbos sent for David and Marc, in order to decide in what form the necessary application to the Minister of Justice should be made. The discovery of the long-missing corner of the copy-slip would alone suffice for the sentence of the Court of Beaumont to be quashed, and the advocate was of opinion that they ought to content themselves with this discovery, and, for the time at all events, leave on one side the illegal communication which Judge Gragnon had made to the jurors. Moreover, the circumstances of that communication, now difficult of proof, would be brought to light during the new investigations which must ensue. Meantime, as the truth in the matter of the copy-slip was manifest, as the report of the handwriting experts was entirely upset, the origin of the stamped and initialled slip constituting such a damaging element in the case that Father Philibin had practised dissimulation and falsehood to conceal it, the advocate considered it best to assail Brother Gorgias without more ado. When Marc and David quitted Delbos that decision had been adopted; and on the morrow David addressed to the Minister a letter in which he formally accused Brother Gorgias of having committed a heinous offence on little Zéphirin, and murdered him, for which crimes his, David's, brother Simon had been in penal servitude for ten years.