“Ah! well,” interrupted Mademoiselle d’Arlange, in a voice filled with emotion, “I assert, I repeat, that justice is deceived.  Yes,” she persisted, in answer to the magistrate’s gesture of denial, “yes, he is innocent.  I am sure of it; and I would proclaim it, even were the whole world to join with you in accusing him.  Do you not see that I know him better even than he can know himself, that my faith in him is absolute, as is my faith in God, that I would doubt myself before doubting him?”

The investigating magistrate attempted timidly to make an objection; Claire quickly interrupted him.

“Must I then, sir,” said she, “in order to convince you, forget that I am a young girl, and that I am not talking to my mother, but to a man!  For his sake I will do so.  It is four years, sir, since we first loved each other.  Since that time, I have not kept a single one of my thoughts from him, nor has he hid one of his from me.  For four years, there has never been a secret between us; he lived in me, as I lived in him.  I alone can say how worthy he is to be loved; I alone know all that grandeur of soul, nobleness of thought, generosity of feelings, out of which you have so easily made an assassin.  And I have seen him, oh! so unhappy, while all the world envied his lot.  He is, like me, alone in the world; his father never loved him.  Sustained one by the other, we have passed through many unhappy days; and it is at the very moment our trials are ending that he has become a criminal?  Why? tell me, why?”

“Neither the name nor the fortune of the Count de Commarin would descend to him, mademoiselle; and the knowledge of it came upon him with a sudden shock.  One old woman alone was able to prove this.  To maintain his position, he killed her.”

“What infamy,” cried the young girl, “what a shameful, wicked, calumny!  I know, sir, that story of fallen greatness; he himself told me of it.  It is true, that for three days this misfortune unmanned him; but, if he was dismayed, it was on my account more than his own.  He was distressed at thinking that perhaps I should be grieved, when he confessed to me that he could no longer give me all that his love dreamed of.  I grieved?  Ah! what to me are that great name, that immense wealth?  I owe to them the only unhappiness I have ever known.  Was it, then, for such things that I loved him?  It was thus that I replied to him; and he, so sad, immediately recovered his gaiety.  He thanked me, saying, ’You love me; the rest is of no consequence.’  I chided him, then, for having doubted me; and after that, you pretend that he cowardly assassinated an old woman?  You would not dare repeat it.”

Mademoiselle d’Arlange ceased speaking, a smile of victory on her lips.  That smile meant, “At last I have attained my end:  you are conquered; what can you reply to all that I have said?”

The investigating magistrate did not long leave this smiling illusion to the unhappy child.  He did not perceive how cruel and offensive was his persistence.  Always the same predominant idea!  In persuading Claire, he would justify his own conduct to himself.