monsieur; I sent him a challenge: if M. de Saint-Aignan accepts it, I will maintain it; if he does not take it up, I will leave things as they are.”

“And La Valliere?”

“You cannot, I know, have seriously thought that I should dream of revenging myself upon a woman!” replied Raoul, with a smile so sad that a tear started even to the eyes of his father, who had so many times in the course of his life bowed beneath his own sorrows and those of others.

He held out his hand to Raoul, which the latter seized most eagerly.

“And so, monsieur le comte, you are quite satisfied that the misfortune is one beyond all remedy?” inquired the young man.

“Poor boy!”