“Then do you know what I did?  Listen.  I had seen the gardener prepare pellets for killing stray dogs.  He would crush a bottle into small pieces with a stone and put the ground glass into a ball of meat.

“I stole a small medicine bottle from mother’s room.  I ground it fine with a hammer and hid the glass in my pocket.  It was a glistening powder.  The next day, when you had made your little cakes; I opened them with a knife and inserted the glass.  He ate three.  I ate one myself.  I threw the six others into the pond.  The two swans died three days later.  You remember?  Oh, don’t speak!  Listen, listen.  I, I alone did not die.  But I have always been ill.  Listen—­he died—­you know—­listen—­that was not the worst.  It was afterward, later—­always—­the most terrible—­listen.

“My life, all my life—­such torture!  I said to myself:  ’I will never leave my sister.  And on my deathbed I will tell her all.’  And now I have told.  And I have always thought of this moment—­the moment when all would be told.  Now it has come.  It is terrible—­oh!—­sister—­

“I have always thought, morning and evening, day and night:  ’I shall have to tell her some day!’ I waited.  The horror of it!  It is done.  Say nothing.  Now I am afraid—­I am afraid!  Oh!  Supposing I should see him again, by and by, when I am dead!  See him again!  Only to think of it!  I dare not—­yet I must.  I am going to die.  I want you to forgive me.  I insist on it.  I cannot meet him without your forgiveness.  Oh, tell her to forgive me, Father!  Tell her.  I implore you!  I cannot die without it.”

She was silent and lay back, gasping for breath, still plucking at the sheets with her fingers.

Suzanne had hidden her face in her hands and did not move.  She was thinking of him whom she had loved so long.  What a life of happiness they might have had together!  She saw him again in the dim and distant past-that past forever lost.  Beloved dead! how the thought of them rends the heart!  Oh! that kiss, his only kiss!  She had retained the memory of it in her soul.  And, after that, nothing, nothing more throughout her whole existence!

The priest rose suddenly and in a firm, compelling voice said: 

“Mademoiselle Suzanne, your sister is dying!”

Then Suzanne, raising her tear-stained face, put her arms round her sister, and kissing her fervently, exclaimed: 

“I forgive you, I forgive you, little one!”

COCO

Throughout the whole countryside the Lucas farn, was known as “the Manor.”  No one knew why.  The peasants doubtless attached to this word, “Manor,” a meaning of wealth and of splendor, for this farm was undoubtedly the largest, richest and the best managed in the whole neighborhood.

The immense court, surrounded by five rows of magnificent trees, which sheltered the delicate apple trees from the harsh wind of the plain, inclosed in its confines long brick buildings used for storing fodder and grain, beautiful stables built of hard stone and made to accommodate thirty horses, and a red brick residence which looked like a little chateau.