had an exasperating feeling that she would get the better of him still; he would not have believed it possible that he could so utterly fail to be touched by the sight of a woman (criminal or other) in so tight a place.  Madame de Bellegarde gave a glance at her son which seemed tantamount to an injunction to be silent and leave her to her own devices.  The marquis stood beside her, with his hands behind him, looking at Newman.

“What paper is this you speak of?” asked the old lady, with an imitation of tranquillity which would have been applauded in a veteran actress.

“Exactly what I have told you,” said Newman.  “A paper written by your husband after you had left him for dead, and during the couple of hours before you returned.  You see he had the time; you shouldn’t have stayed away so long.  It declares distinctly his wife’s murderous intent.”

“I should like to see it,” Madame de Bellegarde observed.

“I thought you might,” said Newman, “and I have taken a copy.”  And he drew from his waistcoat pocket a small, folded sheet.

“Give it to my son,” said Madame de Bellegarde.  Newman handed it to the marquis, whose mother, glancing at him, said simply, “Look at it.”  M. de Bellegarde’s eyes had a pale eagerness which it was useless for him to try to dissimulate; he took the paper in his light-gloved fingers and opened it.  There was a silence, during which he read it.  He had more than time to read it, but still he said nothing; he stood staring at it.  “Where is the original?” asked Madame de Bellegarde, in a voice which was really a consummate negation of impatience.

“In a very safe place.  Of course I can’t show you that,” said Newman.  “You might want to take hold of it,” he added with conscious quaintness.  “But that’s a very correct copy—­except, of course, the handwriting.  I am keeping the original to show some one else.”

M. de Bellegarde at last looked up, and his eyes were still very eager.  “To whom do you mean to show it?”

“Well, I’m thinking of beginning with the duchess,” said Newman; “that stout lady I saw at your ball.  She asked me to come and see her, you know.  I thought at the moment I shouldn’t have much to say to her; but my little document will give us something to talk about.”

“You had better keep it, my son,” said Madame de Bellegarde.

“By all means,” said Newman; “keep it and show it to your mother when you get home.”

“And after showing it to the duchess?”—­asked the marquis, folding the paper and putting it away.

“Well, I’ll take up the dukes,” said Newman.  “Then the counts and the barons—­all the people you had the cruelty to introduce me to in a character of which you meant immediately to deprive me.  I have made out a list.”

For a moment neither Madame de Bellegarde nor her son said a word; the old lady sat with her eyes upon the ground; M. de Bellegarde’s blanched pupils were fixed upon her face.  Then, looking at Newman, “Is that all you have to say?” she asked.