Dear woman! She would not have gone to bed so quietly, nor have fallen asleep so comfortably, if she had suspected the truth.  
What gave her such perfect peace was the certainty she had, that Henrietta had left the house bareheaded, with wretched, worn-out shoes on her feet, with nothing but one petticoat, and her thin alpaca dress on her body. Now, she was quite sure, that in such a state of destitution¹, and in this cold December night, the poor young girl would soon be weary wandering through the streets of Paris, and would be irresistibly² drawn³ to the waters of the Seine.
 
But it was by no means so. When Henrietta was alone, after the departure of Papa Ravinet, she had only become confirmed in her determination to trust in him blindly: she had even forborne to think it over, as she had, humanly speaking, no other choice on earth. Thus, after having received Mrs. Chevassat’s visit, and after having played the part assigned to her by the old dealer⁴, she rose, and, although quite exhausted⁵ yet, took her place at the window to watch for the proper time. Four o’clock struck; and, as it was growing dark, the concierge⁶ came out, with a light in his hand, and went up the big staircase to light the lamps.
 
“Now is the time!” she said to herself.
 
And casting a last look at this wretched room, where she had suffered so much, and wept so much, and where she had expected to die, she slipped out. The back stairs were quite dark, and thus she was not recognized by two persons whom she met. The court was deserted⁷, and the concierge’s room locked. She crossed the hall, and at one bound was in the street. Some forty paces to the left she could see the place where Papa Ravinet was waiting for her in his cab. She ran there, got in; and the driver, who had received his instructions, whipped his horses as soon as he heard the door shut.
 
“And now, sir,” she began, “where do you take me?”
 
By the light of the gas in the stores, which from time to time lighted up the interior of the carriage, she could see the features of her neighbor. He looked at her with manifest satisfaction; and a smile of friendly malice⁸ played upon his lips.
 
“Ah!” he replied, “that is a great secret. But you will know soon, for the man drives well.”
 
The poor horses went, indeed, as fast as if the dollar which the driver had received had infused the noble blood of the fastest racer into their veins⁹. They drove down the whole long street at a furious rate, turned to the right, and, after many more turns, stopped at last before a house of modest appearance. Lightly and promptly¹⁰, like a sheriff’s clerk, Papa Ravinet jumped out; and, having aided Henrietta to alight, he offered her his arm, and drew her into the house, saying,—
 
“You will see what a surprise I have in store for you.”
 
In the third story the old man stopped; and, drawing a key from his pocket, he opened the door which faced the staircase. And, before she had time to consider, Henrietta found herself gently pushed into a small sitting-room¹¹, where a middle-aged¹² lady was embroidering¹³ at a frame by the light of a large copper¹⁴ lamp.
 
“Dear sister,” said Papa Ravinet, still in the door, “here is the young lady of whom I spoke¹⁵ to you, and who does us the honor to accept our hospitality.”
 
Slowly the elderly lady put her needle into the canvas, pushed back the frame, and rose.
 
She seemed to be about fifty years old, and must have been beautiful formerly¹⁶. But age and sorrow had blanched¹⁷ her hair, and furrowed¹⁸ her face; and the habit of silence and meditation¹⁹ seemed to have sealed her lips forever. Her stern countenance²⁰, nevertheless, expressed kindliness²¹. She was dressed in black; and her costume betrayed a lady from a provincial²² town.
 
“You are welcome, madam,” she said in a grave voice. “You will find in our modest home that peace and that sympathy which you need.”
 
In the meantime, Papa Ravinet had come forward; and, bowing to Henrietta, he said,—
 
“I beg to present to you Mrs. Bertolle, my dearly beloved sister Mary, a widow, and a saint, who has devoted²³ herself to her brother, and who has sacrificed to him every thing,—her fortune, her peace, and her life.”
 
Ah! there was no mistaking the look with which the old man caressed²⁴ the old lady: he worshipped her. But she interrupted him, as if embarrassed by his praise, saying,—
 
“You have told me so late, Anthony, that I have not been able to attend to all of your orders. But the young lady’s room is ready, and if you choose”—
 
“Yes, we must show her the way.”
 
The old lady having taken the lamp, after removing the screen, opened a door which led from the parlor²⁵ directly into a small, modestly furnished room, which shone with exquisite²⁶ tidiness, and which exhaled²⁷ that fresh odor of lavender so dear to all housekeepers²⁸ from the country. The mirrors and the furniture all glistened²⁹ alike in the bright fire on the hearth³⁰; and the curtains were as white as snow.
 
At one glance the old dealer had taken in every thing; and, after a smile of gratitude³¹ addressed to his sister, he said to Henrietta,—
 
“This is your room, madam.”
 
The poor girl, all overcome, sought in vain for words to express her gratitude. The old lady did not give her time. She showed her, spread out on the bed, petticoats, white linen³², stockings, a warm dressing- wrapper of gray flannel³³ with blue flowers, and at the foot a pair of slippers³⁴.
 
“This will answer for a change to-night, madam,” she said. “I have provided what was most pressing; to-morrow we will see about the rest.”
 
Big tears, tears of happiness and gratitude, this time, rolled down Henrietta’s pale cheeks. Oh, indeed! this was a surprise, and a delicious one, which the ingenious foresight³⁵ of her new friend had prepared for her.
 
“Ah, you are so kind!” she said, giving her hands to brother and sister—“you are so kind! How can I ever repay what you are doing for me?”
 
Then overcoming her emotion, and turning to Papa Ravinet, she added,—
 
“But pray, who are you, sir,—you who thus come to succor³⁶, a poor young girl who is an utter stranger to you, doubling the value of your assistance by your great delicacy³⁷?”
 
The old lady replied in his place,—“My brother, madam, is an unfortunate man, who has paid for a moment’s forgetfulness of duty, with his happiness, his prospects³⁸, and his very life. Do not question him. Let him be for you what he is for all of us,—Anthony Ravinet, dealer in curiosities.”
 
The voice of the old lady betrayed such great sorrow, silently endured, that Henrietta looked ashamed, regretting her indiscretion. But the old man at once said,—
 
“What I may say to you madam, is, that you owe me no gratitude,—no, none whatever. What I do, my own interest commands me to do; and I deserve no credit for it. Why do you speak of gratitude? It is I who shall forever be under obligations to you for the immense service which you render me.”
 
He seemed to be inspired by his own words; his figure straightened up; his eyes flashed fire; and he was on the point of letting, perhaps, some secret escape him, when his sister interrupted him, saying reproachfully,—
 
“Anthony, Anthony!”
 
He stopped at once. Then he resumed,—
 
“You are right; you are right! I forget myself here; and I ought to be already back in Water Street. It is of the utmost importance that that woman Chevassat should not miss me a moment to-night.”
 
He was about to leave them, when the old lady held him back, and said,—
 
“You ought to go back, I know; only be careful! It is a miracle that M. de Brevan has never met you and recognized you, during the year he has been coming to the house in which you live. If such a misfortune should happen now, our enemies might once more escape us. After the young lady’s desperate act, he would not fail to recognize the man who has saved her. What can you do to avoid meeting him?”
 
“I have thought of that danger,” he replied. “When I go back, I shall tell the two Chevassats a little story, which will frighten them, so that they will advise Brevan never to appear there, except at night, as he formerly did.”
 
Thereupon he bowed to Henrietta, and went away with the words,—
 
“To-morrow we will consult with each other.”
 
The shipwrecked man who is saved at the last moment, when, strength and spirits being alike exhausted, he feels himself sinking into the abyss, cannot, upon feeling once more firm ground under his feet, experience a sense of greater happiness than Henrietta did that night. For the delicious sensation had become deeper and intenser by the evening spent in company with Papa Ravinet’s sister.
 
The widow, free from embarrassment³⁹ as from affectation, possessed⁴⁰ a quiet dignity which appeared in certain words and ways she had, and which made Henrietta guess the principal events of her life. Ruined all of a sudden,—she did not say how,—some months after the death of her husband, she, who had been accustomed to all the comforts of opulence⁴¹ had seen herself reduced to poverty, and all its privations. This had happened about five years ago. Since then she had imposed upon herself the strictest economy, although she never neglected her appearance. She had but one servant, who came every morning to clean up the house; she herself did all the other work, washing and ironing her own linen, cooking only twice a week, and eating cold meat on the other days, as much to save money as to save time.
 
For her time had its value. She worked on her frame patterns for embroideries⁴², for which a fashionable store paid her very good prices. There were days in summer when she earned three francs.
 
The blow had been a severe one; she did not conceal⁴³ it. Gradually, however, she had become reconciled to it, and taken up this habit of economizing⁴⁴ with unflinching severity, and down to the smallest details. At present, she felt in these very privations a kind of secret satisfaction which results from the sense of having accomplished⁴⁵ a duty,—a satisfaction all the greater, the harder the duty is.
 
What duty, she did not say.
 
“That lady is a noble creature among many!” said Henrietta to herself that night, when she retired⁴⁶ after a modest repast.
 
Still she could not get over the mystery which surrounded the lives of these two personages, whom fate, relenting at last, had placed in her way. What was the mystery in the past of this brother and sister? For there was one; and, so far from trying to conceal it, they had begged Henrietta not to inquire into it. And how was their past connected with her own past? How could their future depend in any way on her own future?
 
But fatigue⁴⁷ soon made an end to her meditations⁴⁸, and confused her ideas; and, for the first time in two years, she fell asleep with a sense of perfect security; she slept peacefully, without starting at the slightest noise, without being troubled by silence, without wondering whether her enemies were watching her, without suspecting the very walls of her room.
 
When she awoke next morning, calm and refreshed, it was broad daylight, nearly ten o’clock; and a pale ray of the sun was playing over the polished furniture. When she opened her eyes, she saw the dealer’s sister standing⁴⁹ at the foot of her bed, like a good genius who had been watching over her slumbers⁵⁰.
 
“Oh, how lazy I am!” she exclaimed with the hearty⁵¹ laugh of a child; for she felt quite at home in this little bedroom, where she had only spent a night; she felt as much at home here as in her father’s palace when her mother was still alive; and it seemed to her as if she had lived here many a year.
 
“My brother was here about half an hour ago to talk with you,” said the old lady; “but we did not like to wake you. You needed repose⁵² so much! He will be back in the evening, and dine with us.”
 
The bright smile which had lighted up Henrietta’s face went out instantly. Absorbed in the happiness of the moment, she had forgotten every thing; and these few words brought her back to the reality of her position, and recalled to her the sufferings of the past and the uncertainty⁵³ of the future.
 
The good widow in the meantime assisted her in getting up; and they spent the day together in the little parlor, busily cutting out and making up a black silk dress for which Papa Ravinet had brought the material in the morning, and which was to take the place of Henrietta’s miserable⁵⁴, worn-out, alpaca dress. When the young girl had first seen the silk, she had remembered all the kind widow had told her of their excessive economy, and with difficulty only succeeded in checking her tears.
 
“Why should you go to such an expense?” she had said very sadly. “Would not a woollen dress have done quite as well? The hospitality which you offer me must in itself be quite a heavy charge upon you. I should never forgive myself for becoming a source of still greater privations to such very kind friends.”
 
But the old lady shook her head, and replied,—
 
“Don’t be afraid, child. We have money enough.”
 
They had just lighted the lamp, when they heard a key in the outer door; and a moment later Papa Ravinet appeared. He was very red; and, although it was freezing outdoors, he was streaming with perspiration⁵⁵.
 
“I am exhausted,” he said, sinking into, an armchair, and wiping his forehead with his broad checkered⁵⁶ handkerchief. “You cannot imagine how I have been running about to-day! I wanted to take an omnibus to come home, but they were all full.”
 
Henrietta jumped up, and exclaimed,—
 
“You have been to see my father?”
 
“No, madam. A week ago already, Count Ville-Handry left his palace.”
 
A mad thought, the hope that her father might have separated from his wife, crossed Henrietta’s mind.
 
“And the countess,” she asked,—“the Countess Sarah?”
 
“She has gone with her husband. They live in Peletier Street, in a modest apartment just above the office of the Pennsylvania Petroleum⁵⁷ Company. Sir Thorn and Mrs. Brian are there also. They have only kept two servants,—Ernest, the count’s valet, and a certain Clarissa.”
 
The name of the vile⁵⁸ creature whose treachery had been one of the principal causes of Henrietta’s misfortunes did not strike her ear.
 
“How could my father ever be induced to leave his home?” she asked.
 
“He sold it, madam, ten days ago.”
 
“Great God! My father must be ruined!”
 
The old man bowed his head.
 
“Yes!”
 
Thus were the sad presentiments⁵⁹ realized which she had felt when first she had heard Count Ville-Handry speak of the Pennsylvania Petroleum Company. But never, oh, never! would she have imagined so sudden a downfall.
 
“My father ruined!” she repeated, as if she were unable to realize the precise meaning of these words.
 
“And only a year ago he had more than a hundred thousand dollars a year. Six millions swallowed up in twelve months!—six millions!”
 
And as the enormous amount seemed to be out of all proportion to the shortness of time, she said,—
 
“It cannot be. You must be mistaken, sir; they have misled you.”
 
A smile of bitter irony⁶⁰ passed over the old dealer’s lips. He replied, as if much puzzled by Henrietta’s doubts,—
 
“What, madam, you do not see yet? Alas⁶¹! what I tell you is but too true; and, if you want proofs”—
 
He drew a newspaper from his pocket and handed it to Henrietta, pointing out to her on the first page an article marked with a red pencil.
 
“There!” he said.
 
It was one of those financial sheets which arise every now and then, and which profess⁶² to teach the art of becoming rich in a very short time, without running any risk. This paper bore a title calculated to reassure⁶³ its readers. It was called “Prudence⁶⁴.” Henrietta read aloud,—
 
“We shall never tire repeating to our subscribers the words which form our motto and our heading, ‘Prudence, prudence! Do not trust new enterprises!’
 
“Out of a hundred enterprises which appear in the market, it may safely be said that sixty are nothing but the simplest kind of wells, into which the capital of foolhardy speculators is sunk almost instantly. Out of the remaining forty, twenty-five may be looked upon as suspicious enterprises, partaking too much of gambling⁶⁵ speculations⁶⁶. Among the last fifteen even, a careful choice must be made before we find out the few that present safe guarantees.”
 
The young girl paused, not understanding a word of all this stuff. But the old man said,—
 
“That is only the honey of the preface, the sweet syrup⁶⁷ intended to conceal the bitterness of the medicine that is to follow. Go on, and you will understand.”
 
She continued to read,—
 
“A recent event, we ought to say a recent disaster, has just confirmed our doctrines⁶⁸, and justifies⁶⁹ but too clearly our admonition to be careful.
 
“A company which started into existence last year with amazing suddenness, which filled the whole world with its flaming advertisements, crowding the newspapers, and decorating the street-corners,—a company which was most surely to enrich its stockholders, is already no longer able to pay the interest on its paid-up capital.
 
“As to the capital itself—but we will not anticipate events.
 
“All of our readers will have understood that we are speaking of the Franco-American Society of Pennsylvania Oil-Wells, which for the last eight days has been the subject of universal excitement.
 
“On ‘Change the shares of a hundred dollars are quoted at 4-to-5.”
 
Blinding tears prevented Henrietta from going on. “Great God!” she exclaimed. “O God!” Then, mastering her weakness, she began once more to read,—
 
“And yet if ever any company seemed to offer all the material and moral guarantees which we can desire before risking our carefully saved earnings⁷⁰, this company presented them.
 
“It had at its head a man who in his day was looked up to as a statesman endowed with rare administrative⁷¹ talents, and whose reputation as a man of sterling⁷² integrity seemed to lie above all suspicion.
 
“Need we say that this was the ‘high and mighty⁷³ Count Ville-Handry’?
 
“Hence they did not spare this great and noble name, but proclaimed it aloud on the housetops. It was the Count Ville-Handry here, and the Count Ville-Handry there. He was to bestow⁷⁴ upon the country a new branch of industry. He was to change vile petroleum into precious gold.
 
“It was especially brought into notice that the noble count’s personal fortune was nearly equal to the whole capital of the new company,—ten millions. Hence he was risking his own money rather than the money of others.
 
“It is now a year since these dazzling promises were made. What remains⁷⁵ of them all? Shares, worth five dollars yesterday, worth, perhaps, nothing at all to-morrow, and a more than doubtful capital.
 
“Who could have expected in our day a new edition of Law’s Mississippi Scheme?”
 
The paper fell from the hands of the poor girl. She had turned as pale as death, and was staggering so, that Papa Ravinet’s sister took her in her arms to support her.
 
“Horrible,” she murmured; “this is horrible!” Still she had not yet read all. The old man picked up the paper, and read from another article, below the lines which carried poison in every word, the following comments:—
 
“Two delegates of the stockholders of the Pennsylvania Petroleum Company were to sail this morning from Brest for New York.
 
“These gentlemen have been sen............