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Yes, I renounce you, who are my all the only person on earth whom I love. Your most cruel enemies have not calumniated you more foully than I " He paused an instant, then he added: "I have said openly, before numerous witnesses, that I would never set foot in a house that had been given you by Chanlouineau." "Jean! you, my brother! said that?" "I said it.
A terrible cry, followed by inarticulate moans, interrupted the marquis. The suffering which Maurice endured was too great for his strength and his reason. He was about to spring forward and cry: "It was I who addressed those words to Chanlouineau. I alone am guilty; my father is innocent!"
The despair of the poor peasant women had been reawakened, and their sobs and moans filled the immense hall. The retired officers had grown even more pale and gloomy; and tears streamed down the wrinkled cheeks of several. "That one is a man!" they were thinking. The abbe leaned over and whispered in the ear of Maurice: "Evidently Chanlouineau has some plan. He intends to save your father.
Footsteps approached; the heavy bolts were drawn back, the door opened, and Marie-Anne entered, accompanied by Corporal Bavois. "Monsieur de Courtornieu promised me that we should be left alone!" exclaimed Chanlouineau. "Therefore, I go at once," replied the old soldier. "But I have orders to return for mademoiselle in half an hour."
He offered to assist M. Lacheneur in making up his accounts; and once it happened about the middle of February seeing Chanlouineau worrying over the composition of a letter, he actually offered to act as his amanuensis. "The d d letter is not for me, but for an uncle of mine who is about to marry off his daughter," said Chanlouineau.
Involuntarily Marie-Anne drew away her hand and stepped back. This outburst of passion, at such a moment, seemed at once unspeakably sad and frightful. "Have I, then, offended you?" said Chanlouineau, sadly. "Forgive one who is about to die! You cannot refuse to listen to the voice of one, who after tomorrow, will have vanished from earth forever.
Delirium peopled his brain with phantoms; and the name of Marie-Anne, Martial de Sairmeuse and Chanlouineau dropped so incoherently from his lips that it was impossible to read his thoughts. How long that night seemed to M. d'Escorval and his wife, those only know who have counted each second beside the sick-bed of some loved one.
Standing at the window of his cell, Chanlouineau concentrated all his faculties in a superhuman effort of attention. It seemed to him if the baron regained his liberty, he would be warned of it by some sign. Those whom he had saved owed him, he thought, this slight token of gratitude. A little after two o'clock he heard sounds that made him tremble.
If I aid him in his preparations, if I share his hopes and his dangers, it will be impossible for him to refuse me the hand of his daughter. Whatever he may desire to undertake, I can surely be of greater assistance than Chanlouineau." From that moment Maurice thought only of doing everything possible to hasten his convalescence.
It chanced that three lawyers, retained by the friends of several of the prisoners, were in the hall. They were the three men that Maurice, on his entrance, had noticed conversing near the door of the chapel. The duke was informed of this fact. He turned to them, and motioned them to approach; then, pointing to Chanlouineau: "Will you undertake this culprit's defence?" he demanded.
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