“Is that really all?” asked Bordin when Laurence had related the events of the drama just as the present narrative has given them up to the present time.

“Yes,” she answered.

Profound silence reigned for several minutes in the salon of the Chargeboeuf mansion where this scene took place,—­one of the most important which occur in life.  All cases are judged by the counsellors engaged in them, just as the death or life or a patient is foreseen by a physician, before the final struggle which the one sustains against nature, the other against law.  Laurence, Monsieur and Madame d’Hauteserre, and the marquis sat with their eyes fixed on the swarthy and deeply pitted face of the old lawyer, who was now to pronounce the words of life or death.  Monsieur d’Hauteserre wiped the sweat from his brow.  Laurence looked at the younger man and noted his saddened face.

“Well, my dear Bordin?” said the marquis at last, holding out his snuffbox, from which the old lawyer took a pinch in an absent-minded way.

Bordin rubbed the calf of his leg, covered with thick stockings of black raw silk, for he always wore black cloth breeches and a coat made somewhat in the shape of those which are now termed a la Francaise.  He cast his shrewd eyes upon his clients with an anxious expression, the effect of which was icy.

“Must I analyze all that?” he said; “am I to speak frankly?”

“Yes; go on, monsieur,” said Laurence.

“All that you have innocently done can be converted into proof against you,” said the old lawyer.  “We cannot save your friends; we can only reduce the penalty.  The sale which you induced Michu to make of his property will be taken as evident proof of your criminal intentions against the senator.  You sent your servants to Troyes so that you might be alone; that is all the more plausible because it is actually true.  The elder d’Hauteserre made an unfortunate speech to Beauvisage, which will be your ruin.  You yourself, mademoiselle, made another in your own courtyard, which proves that you have long shown ill-will to the possessor of Gondreville.  Besides, you were at the gate of the rond-point, apparently on the watch, about the time when the abduction took place; if they have not arrested you, it is solely because they fear to bring a sentimental element into the affair.”

“The case cannot be successfully defended,” said Monsieur de Grandville.

“The less so,” continued Bordin, “because we cannot tell the whole truth.  Michu and the Messieurs de Simeuse and d’Hauteserre must hold to the assertion that you merely went for an excursion into the forest and returned to Cinq-Cygne for luncheon.  Allowing that we can show you were in the house at three o’clock (the exact hour at which the attack was made), who are our witnesses?  Marthe, the wife of one of the accused, the Durieus, and Catherine, your own servants, and Monsieur and Madame d’Hauteserre,