Henrietta was overcome, and had sunk into a chair.

“But that is simply infamous,” she stammered out in an almost inaudible tone.  “Nobody will believe such atrocious libels.”

Pale and deeply grieved, Papa Ravinet and his sister exchanged looks of distress.  Evidently the poor girl did not at all realize the terrible nature of the circumstances.  And yet, seeing her thus crushed, they did not dare to enlighten her.  At last the old dealer, knowing but too well that uncertainty is more agonizing than the most painful reality, said,—­

“Your father is fearfully calumniated.  But I have tried to inform myself.  Two facts are but too certain.  Count Ville-Handry is ruined; and the shares of the company of which he is the president have fallen to five dollars, because”—­

His voice changed, and he added in a very low tone,—­

“Because it is believed that the capital of the company has been appropriated to other purposes, and lost in speculations on ’Change.”

The poor old dealer was suffering intensely, and showed it.

“Ah, madam, perfectly as I am convinced of Count Ville-Handry’s uprightness and integrity, I also know that he was utterly ignorant of business.  What did he understand of these speculations into which he was drawn?  Nothing.  It is a difficult and often a dangerous thing to manage large capitals.  They have no doubt deceived him, cheated him, misled him, and driven him at last to the verge of bankruptcy.”

“Who?”

Papa Ravinet trembled on his chair, and, raising his hands to the ceiling, exclaimed,—­

“Who?  You ask who?  Why, those who had an interest in it, the wretches by whom he was surrounded,—­Sarah, Sir Thorn”—­

Henrietta shook her head and said,—­

“I do not think the Countess Sarah looked with a favorable eye upon the formation of this company.”

And, when objection was made, she went on,—­

“Besides, what interest could she have in ruining my father?  Evidently none.  To ruin him was to ruin herself, since she was absolute mistress of her fortune, and free to dispose of it as she chose.”

Proud of the accuracy of her decision, she was looking triumphantly at the old dealer.  The latter saw now that he must strike a decisive blow; and his sister encouraged him by a gesture.  He said,—­

“Pray, listen to me, madam.  So far I have only repeated to you the report on ’Change.  I told you:  They say the capital of the Pennsylvania Petroleum Company has been swallowed up by unlucky speculations on ’Change.  But I do not believe these reports.  I am, on the contrary, convinced, I am quite sure even, that these millions were not lost on ’Change, because they never were used for the purpose of speculating.”

“Still”—­

“Still they have disappeared, none the less; and your father is probably the last man in the world to tell us how and where they have disappeared.  But I know it; and, when the question is raised how to recover these enormous sums, I shall cry out, ’Search Sarah Brandon, Countess Ville-Handry; search M. Thomas Elgin and Mrs. Brian; search Maxime de Brevan,’ the wretched tool of these wicked women!”