My friend stopped talking abruptly, and rising, took from his writing-table an old paper, unfolded it, kissed it and then continued:  “This is the will of my beloved mother: 

   “’I, the undersigned, Anne Catherine-Genevieve-Mathilde de
   Croixluce, the legitimate wife of Leopold-Joseph Gontran de Councils
   sound in body and mind, here express my last wishes.

“I first of all ask God, and then my dear son Rene to pardon me for the act I am about to commit.  I believe that my child’s heart is great enough to understand me, and to forgive me.  I have suffered my whole life long.  I was married out of calculation, then despised, misunderstood, oppressed and constantly deceived by my husband.

   “’I forgive him, but I owe him nothing.

“’My elder sons never loved me, never petted me, scarcely treated me as a mother, but during my whole life I did my duty towards them, and I owe them nothing more after my death.  The ties of blood cannot exist without daily and constant affection.  An ungrateful son is less than, a stranger; he is a culprit, for he has no right to be indifferent towards his mother.

“’I have always trembled before men, before their unjust laws, their inhuman customs, their shameful prejudices.  Before God, I have no longer any fear.  Dead, I fling aside disgraceful hypocrisy; I dare to speak my thoughts, and to avow and to sign the secret of my heart.

   “’I therefore leave that part of my fortune of which the law allows
   me to dispose, in trust to my dear lover, Pierre-Germer-Simon de
   Bourneval, to revert afterwards to our dear son Rene.

   “’(This bequest is specified more precisely in a deed drawn
   up by a notary.)

“’And I declare before the Supreme Judge who hears me, that I should have cursed heaven and my own existence, if I had not found the deep, devoted, tender, unshaken affection of my lover; if I had not felt in his arms that the Creator made His creatures to love, sustain and console each other, and to weep together in the hours of sadness.

“’Monsieur de Courcils is the father of my two eldest sons; Rene, alone, owes his life to Monsieur de Bourneval.  I pray the Master of men and of their destinies, to place father and son above social prejudices, to make them love each other until they die, and to love me also in my coffin.

   “’These are my last thoughts, and my last wish.

   “‘Mathilde de Croixluce.’”

“Monsieur de Courcils had risen and he cried: 

“‘It is the will of a madwoman.’

“Then Monsieur de Bourneval stepped forward and said in a loud, penetrating voice:  ’I, Simon de Bourneval, solemnly declare that this writing contains nothing but the strict truth, and I am ready to prove it by letters which I possess.’