Within eighteen months the Colonel had made him a scene, had told him sour truths, and shaken his finger at him.  That power of his, Madame, was not the power that enables a man to hold his level.  Even with the companions of his leisure, his ascendancy faded.  I recollect seeing him once, at the corner of the Place du Gouvernement, in the centre of a group of them, raging almost tearfully, while they laughed at him.  The horrible laughter of those outcasts, edged like a saw, cruel and vile!  And he was purple with fury, shaking like a man in an ague, and helpless against them.  I was young in those days and not incapable of generous impulses; I recollect that as I passed I jostled one of those creatures out of the path, and then turned and waited for the remonstrance which he decided not to make.”

The Comtesse nodded at the fire, like one well pleased.  The little Colonel gave her another of his shrewd glances and went on.

“As you see, Madame, it is not possible to describe to you the steps by which Bertin sank.  The end came within two years of the duel.  One knew—­somehow—­that it was at hand.  There were things dropped in talk, things overheard and pieced together—­a whole atmosphere of scandal, in which there came and went little items of plain fact.  The trouble was with regimental funds; again I will spare Madame the details; but certain of them which should have passed through Bertin’s hands had not arrived at their destination.  Clerks from a bank came to work upon the accounts; strange, cool young men, who hunted figures through ledgers as a ferret traces a rat under a floor.  You must understand that for the regiment it was a monstrous matter, an affair to hide sedulously; it touched our intimate honor.  There was a meeting of the rest of us to consider the thing; finally, it was I that was deputed to go forthwith to Bertin and persuade him to leave the city, to vanish, to do his part to save our credit.  And that evening, as soon as it was dark enough to be convenient, I went.”

“There was still that light in the impasse by which my poor friend Vaucher had seen Madame Bertin weeping; but from the windows of the house there came none.  It was shuttered like a fort.  It was not till I had knocked many times upon the door that there came any response.  At last I heard bolts being withdrawn—­bolt after bolt, as if the place had been a prison or a treasury; and Madame Bertin herself stood in the entry.  The one lamp in the impasse showed her my uniform, and she breathed like one who had been running.”

“I saluted her and inquired for Bertin.”

“‘Captain Bertin?’ she repeated after me.  ‘I do not know—­I fear——­’”

“‘My business with him is urgent,’ I told her, and at that she whitened.  ‘And unofficial,’ I added, therefore.”

“At that she stood aside for me to enter.  I aided her to fasten the door again, and she led me up the stairs to a small room, divided by large doors from an inner chamber.”