“I beseech you, my friend—­”

“Yes, yes, I do wrong.  You also have your griefs.

“But we are all selfish, you know.  However, it was not of that that I came to speak.  Tell me—­I know not whether a report I hear is correct.  Pardon me if I mistake, for you know I never would dream of offending you; but they say that you have been left in very bad circumstances.  If this is indeed so, my friend—­”

“It is not,” interrupted Camors, abruptly.

“Well, if it were—­I do not intend keeping my little house.  Why should I, now?  My little son can wait while I work for him.  Then, after selling my house, I shall have two hundred thousand francs.  Half of this is yours—­return it when you can!”

“I thank you, my unselfish friend,” replied Camors, much moved, “but I need nothing.  My affairs are disordered, it is true; but I shall still remain richer than you.”

“Yes, but with your tastes—­”

“Well?”

“At all events, you know where to find me.  I may count upon you—­may I not?”

“You may.”

“Adieu, my friend!  I can do you no good now; but I shall see you again—­shall I not?”

“Yes—­another time.”

Lescande departed, and the young Count remained immovable, with his features convulsed and his eyes fixed on vacancy.

This moment decided his whole future.

Sometimes a man feels a sudden, unaccountable impulse to smother in himself all human love and sympathy.

In the presence of this unhappy man, so unworthily treated, so broken-spirited, so confiding, Camors—­if there be any truth in old spiritual laws—­should have seen himself guilty of an atrocious act, which should have condemned him to a remorse almost unbearable.

But if it were true that the human herd was but the product of material forces in nature, producing, haphazard, strong beings and weak ones—­lambs and lions—­he had played only the lion’s part in destroying his companion.  He said to himself, with his father’s letter beneath his eyes, that this was the fact; and the reflection calmed him.

The more he thought, that day and the next, in depth of the retreat in which he had buried himself, the more was he persuaded that this doctrine was that very truth which he had sought, and which his father had bequeathed to him as the whole rule of his life.  His cold and barren heart opened with a voluptuous pleasure under this new flame that filled and warmed it.

From this moment he possessed a faith—­a principle of action—­a plan of life—­all that he needed; and was no longer oppressed by doubts, agitation, and remorse.  This doctrine, if not the most elevated, was at least above the level of the most of mankind.  It satisfied his pride and justified his scorn.

To preserve his self-esteem, it was only necessary for him to preserve his honor, to do nothing low, as his father had said; and he determined never to do anything which, in his eyes, partook of that character.  Moreover, were there not men he himself had met thoroughly steeped in materialism, who were yet regarded as the most honorable men of their day?