I felt, however, that I still had a clue to him, through the organ at Saint-Louis, and the following Sunday after high mass I posted myself as before at the door of the organ loft, determined not to let go of the sphinx until I had made him speak.  But here again, disappointment!  Monsieur Jacques Bricheteau’s place was taken by a pupil.  The same thing happened on the three following Sundays.  On the fourth, I accosted the pupil and asked him if the master were ill.

“No, monsieur,” he replied.  “Monsieur Bricheteau has asked for leave of absence.  He will be absent for some time; I believe on business.”

“Where, then, can I write to him?”

“I don’t rightly know; but I think you had better address your letter to his house; not far from here, quai de Bethune.”

“But he has moved; didn’t you know it?”

“No, indeed; where does he live now?”

This was poor luck; to ask information of a man who asked it of me when I questioned him.  As if to put be quite beside myself while I was making these inquiries, I saw that damned dwarf in the distance evidently laughing at me.

Happily for my patience and my curiosity, which, under the pressure of all this opposition was growing terrible, a certain amount of light was given me.  A few days after my last discomfiture, a letter reached me bearing the post-mark Stockholm, Sweden; which address did not surprise me because, while in Rome, I had been honored by the friendship of Thorwaldsen, the great Swedish sculptor, and I had often met in his studio many of his compatriots.  Probably, therefore, this letter conveyed an order from one of them, sent through Thorwaldsen.  But, on opening the letter what was my amazement, and my emotion, in presence of its opening words:—­

  Monsieur my Son,—­

The letter was long.  I had no patience to read it until I knew the name I bore.  I turned to the signature; again my disappointment was complete—­there was no name!

  Monsieur my Son,

said my anonymous father,—­

I do not regret that by your passionate insistence on knowing the secret of your birth, you have forced the person who has watched over you from childhood to come here to confer with me as to the course your vehement and dangerous curiosity requires us to pursue.

For some time past, I have entertained a thought which I bring to maturity to-day; the execution of which could have been more satisfactorily settled by word of mouth than it can now be by correspondence.

Immediately after your birth, which cost your mother’s life, being forced to expatriate myself, I made in a foreign country a noble fortune, and I occupy in the ministry of that country an eminent position.  I foresee the moment when, free to restore to you my name, I shall also be able to secure to you the inheritance of my titles and the position to which I have attained.