“And then?”

“And then, sir, I returned the correspondence to the young man, and asked for a delay of eight days; not to think over it myself—­there was no need of that,—­but because I judged an interview with you indispensable.  Now, therefore, I beseech you, tell me whether this substitution really did take place.

“Certainly it did,” replied the count violently, “yes, certainly.  You know that it did, for you have read what I wrote to Madame Gerdy, your mother.”

Albert had foreseen, had expected this reply; but it crushed him nevertheless.

There are misfortunes so great, that one must constantly think of them to believe in their existence.  This flinching, however, lasted but an instant.

“Pardon me, sir,” he replied.  “I was almost convinced; but I had not received a formal assurance of it.  All the letters that I read spoke distinctly of your purpose, detailed your plan minutely; but not one pointed to, or in any way confirmed, the execution of your project.”

The count gazed at his son with a look of intense surprise.  He recollected distinctly all the letters; and he could remember, that, in writing to Valerie, he had over and over again rejoiced at their success, thanking her for having acted in accordance with his wishes.

“You did not go to the end of them, then, viscount,” he said, “you did not read them all?”

“Every line, sir, and with an attention that you may well understand.  The last letter shown me simply announced to Madame Gerdy the arrival of Claudine Lerouge, the nurse who was charged with accomplishing the substitution.  I know nothing beyond that.”

“These proofs amount to nothing,” muttered the count.  “A man may form a plan, cherish it for a long time, and at the last moment abandon it; it often happens so.”

He reproached himself for having answered so hastily.  Albert had had only serious suspicions, and he had changed them to certainty.  What stupidity!

“There can be no possible doubt,” he said to himself; “Valerie has destroyed the most conclusive letters, those which appeared to her the most dangerous, those I wrote after the substitution.  But why has she preserved these others, compromising enough in themselves? and why, after having preserved them, has she let them go out of her possession?”

Without moving, Albert awaited a word from the count.  What would it be?  No doubt, the old nobleman was at that moment deciding what he should do.

“Perhaps she is dead!” said M. de Commarin aloud.

And at the thought that Valerie was dead, without his having again seen her, he started painfully.  His heart, after more than twenty years of voluntary separation, still suffered, so deeply rooted was this first love of his youth.  He had cursed her; at this moment he pardoned her.  True, she had deceived him; but did he not owe to her the only years of happiness he had ever known?  Had she not formed all the poetry of his youth?  Had he experienced, since leaving her, one single hour of joy or forgetfulness?  In his present frame of mind, his heart retained only happy memories, like a vase which, once filled with precious perfumes, retains the odour until it is destroyed.