Daniel could hardly trust his ears.

“Our enemies?” he asked, emphasizing the word “our.”

“Yes:  I mean our enemies,—­Sarah Brandon, Countess Ville-Handry, Maxime de Brevan, Thomas Elgin, and Mrs. Brian.”

“You hate them?”

“If I hate them!  I tell you for five years I have lived only on the hope of being able to avenge myself on them.  Yes, it is five years now, that, lost in the crowd, I have followed them with the perseverance of an Indian,—­five years that I have patiently, incessantly, inch by inch, undermined the ground beneath their steps.  And they suspect nothing.  I doubt whether they are aware of my existence.  No, not even—­What would it be to them, besides?  They have pushed me so far down into the mud, that they cannot imagine my ever rising again up to their level.  They triumph with impunity; they boast of their unpunished wickedness, and think they are strong, and safe from all attacks, because they have the prestige and the power of gold.  And yet their hour is coming.  I, the wretched man, who have been compelled to hide, and to live on my daily labor,—­I have attained my end.  Every thing is ready; and I have only to touch the proud fabric of their crimes to make it come down upon them, and crush them all under the ruins.  Ah! if I could see them only suffer one-fourth of what they have made me suffer, I should die content.”

Papa Ravinet seemed to have grown a foot; his hatred convulsed his placid face; his voice trembled with rage; and his yellow eyes shone with ill-subdued passion.

Daniel wondered, and asked himself what the people who had sworn to ruin him and Henrietta could have done to this man, who looked so inoffensive with his bright-flowered waistcoat and his coat with the high collar.

“But who are you, sir?” he asked.

“Who am I?” exclaimed the man,—­“who am I?”

But he paused; and, after waiting a little while, he sunk his head, and said,—­

“I am Anthony Ravinet, dealer in curiosities.”

The clipper was in the meantime making way rapidly.  Already the white country houses appeared on the high bluffs amid the pine-groves; and the outlines of the Castle of If were clearly penned on the deep blue of the sky.

“But we are getting near,” exclaimed Papa Ravinet; “and I must get back into my boat.  I did not come out so far, that they might see me enter on board ‘The Saint Louis.’”

And when Daniel offered him his state-room, where he might remain in concealment, he replied,—­

“No, no!  We shall have time enough to come to an understanding about what is to be done in Paris; and I must go back by rail to-night; I came down for the sole purpose of telling you this.  Miss Henrietta is at my sister’s house; but you must take care not to come there.  Neither Sarah nor Brevan know what has become of her; they think she has thrown herself into the river; and this conviction is our safety and our strength.  As they will most assuredly have you watched, the slightest imprudence might betray us.”