It struck midnight; but the poor people in the little parlor¹ in the Hotel du Louvre hardly thought of sleep. How could they have become aware of the flight of time, as long as all their faculties² were bent³ upon the immense interests that were at stake? On the struggle which they were about to undertake depended Count Ville-Handry’s life and honor, and the happiness and whole future life of Daniel and Henrietta.  
And Papa Ravinet and his sister had said,—“As for us, even more than that depends upon it.” The old dealer⁴, therefore, drew up an easy- chair, sat down, and began in a somewhat husky voice,—
 
“The Countess Sarah is not Sarah Brandon, and is not an American. Her real name, by which she was known up to her sixteenth year, is Ernestine Bergot; and she was born in Paris, in the suburb of Saint Martin, just on the line of the corporation. To tell you in detail what the first years of Sarah were like would be difficult indeed. There are things of that kind which do not bear being mentioned. Her childhood might be her excuse, if she could be excused at all.
 
“Her mother was one of those unfortunate women of whom Paris devours⁵ every year several thousands; who come from the provinces in wooden shoes, and are seen, six months later, dressed in all the fashion; and who live a short, gay life, which invariably ends in the hospital.
 
“Her mother was neither better nor worse than the rest. When her daughter came, she had neither the sense to part with her, nor the courage—perhaps (who knows?) she had not the means—to mend her ways. Thus the little one grew up by God’s mercy, but at the Devil’s bidding, living by chance, now stuffed with sweet things, and now half-killed by blows, fed by the charity of neighbors, while her mother remained for weeks absent from her lodgings⁶.
 
“Four years old, she wandered through the neighborhood dressed in fragments of silk or velvet⁷, with a faded ribbon in her hair, but with bare feet in her torn shoes, hoarse⁸, and shivering with severe colds,—very much after the fashion of lost dogs, who rove around open-air cooking-shops,—and looking in the gutters⁹ for cents with which to buy fried potatoes or spoilt fruit.
 
“At a later time she extended the circle of her excursions, and wandered all over Paris, in company of other children like herself, stopping on the boulevards, before the brilliant shops or performing jugglers, trying to learn how to steal from open stalls, and at night asking in a plaintive¹¹ voice for alms in behalf of her poor sick father. When twelve years old she was as thin as a plank¹², and as green as a June apple, with sharp elbows and long red hands. But she had beautiful light hair, teeth like a young dog’s, and large, impudent¹³ eyes. Merely upon seeing her go along, her head high with an air of saucy¹⁴ indifference¹⁵, coquettish under her rags, and walking with elastic¹⁶ steps, you would have guessed in her the young Parisian girl, the sister of the poor ‘gamin,’ a thousand times more wicked than her brothers, and far more dangerous to society. She was as depraved as the worst of sinners, fearing neither God nor the Devil, nor man, nor anything.
 
“However, she did fear the police.
 
“For from them she derived¹⁸ the only notions of morality she ever possessed¹⁹; otherwise, it would have been love’s labor²⁰ lost to talk to her of virtue²¹ or of duty. These words would have conveyed no meaning to her imagination; she knew no more about them than about the abstract ideas which they represent.
 
“One day, however, her mother, who had virtually made a servant of her, had a praiseworthy inspiration. Finding that she had some money, she dressed her anew from head to foot, bought her a kind of outfit²², and bound her as an apprentice²³ to a dressmaker.
 
“But it came too late.
 
“Every kind of restraint was naturally intolerable to such a vagabond nature. The order and the regularity²⁴ of the house in which she lived were a horror to her. To sit still all day long, a needle in her hand, appeared to her harder than death itself. The very comforts around her embarrassed her, and she felt as a savage²⁵ would feel in tight boots. At the end of the first week, therefore, she ran away from the dressmaker, stealing a hundred francs. As long as these lasted, she roved over Paris. When they were spent, and she was hungry, she came back to her mother.
 
“But her mother had moved away, and no one knew what had become of her. She was inquired after, but never found. Any other person would have been in despair. Not she. The same day she entered as waiter in a cheap coffee-house. Turned out there, she found employment in a low restaurant, where she had to wash up the dishes and plates. Sent away here, also, she became a servant in two or three other places of still lower character; then, at last, utterly²⁶ disgusted, she determined²⁷ to do nothing at all.
 
“She was sinking into the gutter¹⁰, she was on the point of being lost before she had reached womanhood, like fruit which spoils before it is ripe, when a man turned up who was fated to arm her for life’s Struggle, and to change the vulgar thief into the accomplished²⁸ monster of perversity²⁹ whom you know.”
 
Here Papa Ravinet suddenly paused, and, looking at Daniel, said,—
 
“You must not believe, M. Champcey, that these details are imaginary. I have spent five years of my life in tracing out Sarah’s early life,—five years, during which I have been going from door to door, ever in search of information. A dealer in second-hand³⁰ goods enters everywhere without exciting suspicion. And then I have witnesses to prove everything I have told you so far,—witnesses whom I shall summon, and who will speak whenever the necessity arises to establish the identity of the Countess Sarah.”
 
Daniel made no reply.
 
Like Henrietta, even like Mrs. Bertolle, at this moment he was completely fascinated by the old gentleman’s manner and tone. The latter, after having rested for a few minutes, went on,—
 
“The man who picked up Sarah was an old German artist, painter and musician both, of rare genius, but a maniac³¹, as they called him. At all events, he was a good, an excellent man.
 
“One winter morning, as he was at work in his studio, he was struck by the strange ring in a woman’s voice, which recited in the court-yard below a popular song. He went to the window, and beckoned³² the singer to come up. It was Sarah; and she came. The good German used often to speak of the deep compassion³³ which seized him as he saw this tall girl of fourteen come into his studio,—a child, stained by vice³⁴ already, thin like hunger itself, and shivering in her thin calico dress. But he was at the same time almost dazzled by the rich promises of beauty in her face, the pure notes of her superb voice, which had withstood so far, and the surprising intelligence beaming in her features.
 
“He guessed what there was in her; he saw her, in his mind’s eye, such as she was to be at twenty.
 
“Then he asked her how she had come to be reduced to such misery³⁵, who she was, where her parents lived, and what they did for a living. When she had told him that she stood quite alone, and was dependent on no one, he said to her,—
 
“‘Well, if you will stay with me, I will adopt you; you shall be my daughter; and I will make you an eminent³⁶ artist.’
 
“The studio was warm, and it was bitterly cold outside. Sarah had no roof over her head, and had eaten nothing for twenty-four hours. She accepted.
 
“She accepted, be it understood, not doubting, in her perversity, but that this kind old man had other intentions besides those he mentioned in offering her a home. She was mistaken. He recognized in her marvellous talents, and thought of nothing but of making of her a true marvel³⁷, which should astonish the world. He devoted³⁸ himself heart and soul to his new favorite, with all the enthusiastic ardor³⁹ of an artist, and all the jealous passion of an amateur.
 
“It was a hard task, however, which he had undertaken. Sarah could not even read. She knew nothing, except sin.
 
“How the old German went to work to keep this untamable vagabond at home, how he made her bend to his will, and submit to his lessons, no one will ever be able to tell. It was long a problem for me also. Some of the neighbors told me that he treated her harshly, beating her often brutally⁴⁰; but neither threats nor blows were apt to make an impression on Sarah Brandon. A friend of the old man’s thought he had guessed the riddle⁴¹: he thought the old artist had succeeded in arousing Sarah’s pride. He had kindled⁴² in her a boundless⁴³ ambition and the most passionate⁴⁴ covetousness⁴⁵. He intoxicated⁴⁷ her with fairylike hopes.
 
“‘Follow my counsels,’ he used to say to her, ‘and at twenty you will be a queen,—a queen of beauty, of wit, and of genius. Study, and the day will come when you will travel through Europe, a renowned⁴⁸ artist, welcomed in every capital, feted everywhere, honored, and glorified⁴⁹. Work, and wealth will come with fame,—immense, boundless wealth, surpassing all your dreams. You will have the finest carriages, the most magnificent diamonds; you will draw from inexhaustible purses; the whole world will be at your feet; and the women will turn pale with envy and jealousy⁵⁰ when they see you. Among men there will be none so noble, none so great, none so rich, but he will beg for one of your looks; and they will fight for one of your smiles. Only work and study!’
 
“At all events, Sarah did work, and studied with a steady perseverance⁵¹ which spoke⁵² of her faith in the promises of her old master, and of the influence he had obtained over her through her vanity. At first she had been deterred⁵³ by the extreme difficulties which beset⁵⁴ so late a beginning; but her amazing natural gifts had soon begun to show themselves, and in a short time her progress was almost miraculous⁵⁵.
 
“It is true that her innate⁵⁶ sagacity had made her soon find out how ignorant she was of the world. She saw that society did not exclusively consist, as she had heretofore imagined, of people like those she had known. She felt, for instance, what she had never suspected before, that her unfortunate mother, with all her friends and companions, were only the rare exceptions, laid under the ban by the immense majority.
 
“At last she actually learned to know the tree of good fruit, after having for so many years known only the tree of forbidden fruit. She listened with eager curiosity to all the old artist had to tell her. And he knew much; for the eccentric old man had travelled for a long time over the world, and observed man on every step of the social ladder. He had been a favorite artist at the court of Vienna; he had had several of his operas brought out in Italy; and he had been admitted to the best society in Paris. At night, therefore, while sipping⁵⁷ his coffee, his feet on the andirons, and his long pipe in his mouth, he would soon forget himself amid the recollections of his youth. He described to her the splendor⁵⁸ of courts, the beauty of women, the magnificence of their toilets, and the intrigues⁶⁰ which he had seen going on around him. He spoke to her of the men whose portraits he had painted, of the manners and the jealousies⁶¹ behind the stage, and of the great singers who had sung in his operas.
 
“Thus it came about, that, two years later, no one would have recognized the lean, wretched-looking vagabond of the suburbs in this fresh, rosy⁶³ girl, with the lustrous⁶⁴ eyes and the modest mien⁶⁵, whom they called in the house the ‘pretty artist in the fifth story.’
 
“And yet the change was only on the surface.
 
“Sarah was already too thoroughly⁶⁶ corrupted⁶⁷, when the good German picked her up, to be capable of being entirely⁶⁹ changed. He thought he had infused his own rough honesty into her veins⁷⁰: he had only taught her a new vice,—hypocrisy⁷¹.
 
“The soul remained corrupt⁶⁸; and all the charms with which it was outwardly adorned⁷³ became only so many base allurements⁷⁴, like those beautiful flowers which unfold their splendor on the surface of bottomless swamps, and thus lead those whom they attract to miserable⁷⁵ death.
 
“At that time, however, Sarah did not yet possess that marvellous self-control which became one of her great charms hereafter; and at the end of two years she could endure this peaceful atmosphere no longer; she grew homesick after sin.
 
“As she was already a very fair musician, and her voice, trained by a great master, possessed amazing power, she urged her old teacher to procure⁷⁶ her an engagement at one of the theatres. He refused in a manner which made it clear to her that he would never change his mind on that subject. He wanted to secure to his pupil one of those debuts⁷⁷ which are an apotheosis⁷⁸; and he had decided⁷⁹, as he told her, that she should not appear in public till she had reached the full perfection of her voice and her talent,—certainly not before her nineteenth or twentieth year.
 
“That meant she should wait three or four years longer,—a century!
 
“In former days Sarah would not have hesitated a moment; she would have run away.
 
“But education had changed her ideas. She was quite able now to reflect and to calculate. She asked herself where she could go, alone, without money, without friends, and what she should do, and what would become of her.
 
“She knew what destitution⁸⁰ meant, and she was afraid of it now.
 
“When she thought of the life her mother had led,—a long series of nights spent in orgies, and of days without bread; that life of distress⁸¹ and disgrace, when she depended on the whims⁸² of a good-for-nothing, or the suspicions of a police constable,—Sarah felt the cold perspiration⁸³ break out on her temples.
 
“She wanted her liberty; but she did not want it without money. Vice attracted her irresistibly⁸⁴; but it was gorgeous vice, seated in a carriage, and bespattering with mud the poor, honest women who had to walk on foot, while it was envied by the crowd, and worshipped by the foolish. She remained, therefore, and studied hard.
 
“Perhaps, in spite of everything, in spite of herself and her execrable instincts, Sarah might have become a great artist, if the old German had not been taken from her by a terrible accident.
 
“One fine afternoon in April, in the beginning of spring, he was smoking his pipe at the window, when he heard a noise in the street, and leaned over to see.
 
“The bar broke,—he tried in vain to hold on to the window-frame,—and the next moment he fell from the fifth story to the ground, and was killed instantly.
 
“I have held in my own hands the police report of the accident. It states that the fall was unavoidable; and that, if no such calamity⁸⁵ had occurred before, this was due to the simple fact, that, during the bad weather, nobody had thought of looking out of the window. The castings of the little railing in front were found to be broken in two places, and so long ago, that a thick layer of rust⁸⁶ had filled up the cracks. The wooden part had become perfectly⁸⁷ loose, as the mortar⁸⁸ that originally had kept it in place had been apparently⁸⁹ eaten away by the winter frosts.”
 
Daniel and Henrietta had turned very pale. It was evident that the same terrible suspicion had flashed upon their mind.
 
“Ah! it was Sarah’s work,” they exclaimed simultaneously⁹⁰. “It was Sarah who had broken the bar, and loosened the wooden rods; she had, no doubt, been watching for months to see her benefactor⁹¹ fall and kill himself.”
 
Papa Ravinet shook his head.
 
“I do not say that,” he said; “and, at all events, it would be impossible to prove it at this time,—I mean, to prove it against her denial. It is certain that no one suspected Sarah. She seemed to be in despair; and everybody pitied her sincerely. Was she not ruined by this misfortune?
 
“The old artist had left no will. His relatives, of whom several lived in Paris, rushed to his rooms; and their first act was to dismiss Sarah, after having searched her trunks, and after giving her to understand that she ought to be very grateful if she was allowed to take away all she said she owed to the munificence⁹² of her late patron.
 
“Still the inheritance was by no means what the heirs had expected. Knowing that the deceased had had ample means, and how simply he had always lived, they expected to find in his bureau considerable savings⁹³. There was nothing. A single bond for less than two thousand dollars, and a small sum in cash, were all that was found.
 
“Ah! I have long endeavored to find out what had become of the various bonds and the ready money of the old artist; for everybody who had known him agreed that there must be some. Do you know what I discovered by dint⁹⁴ of indefatigable⁹⁵ investigations⁹⁶? I procured⁹⁷ leave to examine the books of the savings-bank in which he invested his earnings⁹⁸ for the year of his death; and I found there, that on the 17th of April, that is, five days before the poor German’s fall, a certain Ernestine Bergot had deposited a sum of fifteen hundred francs.”
 
“Ah, you see!” exclaimed Daniel. “Weary of the simple life with the old man, she murdered him in order to get hold of his money.”
 
But the old gentleman continued, as if he had heard nothing,—
 
“What Sarah did during the three first months of her freedom, I cannot tell. If she went and rented furnished lodgings, she did it under a false name. A clerk in the mayor’s office, who is a great lover of curiosities, and for whom I have procured many a good bargain, had all the lists of lodging-houses for the four months from April to July carefully examined; but no Ernestine Bergot could be found.
 
“I am quite sure, however, that she thought of the stage. One of the former secretaries of the Lyric¹⁰⁰ Theatre told me he recollected¹⁰¹ distinctly a certain Ernestine, beautiful beyond description, who, came several times, and requested a trial. She was, however, refused, simply because her pretensions¹⁰² were almost ridiculous. And this was quite natural; for her head was still full of all the ambitious dreams of the old artist.
 
“The first positive trace I find of Sarah in that year appears towards the end of summer. She was then living in a fashionable street with a young painter full of talent, and very rich, called Planix. Did she really love him? The friends of the unfortunate young man were sure she did not. But he—he worshipped her; he loved her passionately¹⁰³, madly, and was so absurdly jealous, that he became desperate if she stayed out an hour longer than he expected. Hence she often complained of his love, which restrained her cherished liberty; and still she bore it patiently till fate threw in her way Maxime de Brevan.”
 
At the name of the wretch⁶² who had been so bent upon ruining them both, and who had been so nearly successful, Henrietta and Daniel trembled, and looked at each other. But Papa Ravinet did not give them, time to ask any questions, and continued, as calmly as if he had been reading a report,—
 
“It was several years before this, that Justin Chevassat, released from the galleys¹⁰⁴, had made a nobleman of himself, and claimed before all the world to be Maxime de Brevan. We need not be surprised, in this age of ours, where impudence¹⁰⁵ takes the place of everything else, that he should have promptly¹⁰⁶ succeeded in making his way into high life, and in being admitted to many houses which were considered more or less exclusive. In a society which seems to have adopted for its motto the words ‘Toleration and Discretion,’ and where, consequently, anybody is admitted without question, Justin Chevassat very naturally had a great success. He had carefully prepared his way, like those adventurers who never appear abroad without having their passports in much better order than most honest travellers. He had learned prudence¹⁰⁷ by experience; for his antecedents were stormy enough, though less so than Sarah’s.
 
“Justin’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Chevassat, now concierges¹⁰⁸ of No. 23 Water Street, were, some thirty-eight or forty years ago, living in the upper part of the suburb of Saint Honore. They had a very modest little shop, partly restaurant, partly bar: their customers were generally the servants of the neighborhood. They were people of easy principles and loose morals,—as there are so many in our day,—honest enough as long as there is nothing to be gained by being otherwise. As their trade prospered¹¹⁰, they were not dishonest; and, when any of their customers forgot their portemonnaies at the shop, they always returned them. The husband was twenty-four, and the wife nineteen years old, when, to their great joy, a son was born. There was rejoicing in the shop; and the child was christened Justin, in honor of his godfather, who was no less a personage than the valet of the Marquis de Brevan.
 
“But to have a son is a small matter. To bring him up till he is seven or eight years old, is nothing. The difficulty is to give him an education which shall secure him a position in the world. This thought now began to occupy the minds of his parents incessantly¹¹¹. These stupid people, who had a business which supported them handsomely, and enabled them, in the course of time, to amass¹¹² a small fortune, did not see that the best thing they could have done would have been to enlarge it, and to leave it to their son. But no. They vowed¹¹³ they would sacrifice all their savings, and deprive themselves even of the necessaries of life, in order that their Justin might become a ‘gentleman.’
 
“And what a gentleman! The mother dreamed of him as a rich broker¹¹⁴, or, at the very least, a notary’s first clerk. The father preferred seeing him a government official, holding one of those much-coveted¹¹⁵ places, which give the owner, after twenty-five years’ service, a title, and an income of some six or seven hundred dollars.
 
“The result of all these speculations¹¹⁶ was, that, at the age of nine, Master Justin was sent to a high school. He conducted himself there just badly enough to be perpetually on the brink¹¹⁷ of being sent away, without ever being really expelled. This made but little impression upon the two Chevassats. They had become so accustomed to look upon their son as a superior being, that it never entered their mind to think he was not the first, the best, and the most remarkable¹¹⁸ pupil of the establishment. If Justin’s reports were bad,—and they were always bad,—they accused the teachers of partiality. If he gained no prize at the end of the year,—and he never got any,—they did not know what to do for him to console him for having been victimized by such cruel injustice¹¹⁹.
 
“The consequences of such a system need hardly be stated.
 
“When Justin was fourteen years old, he despised his parents thoroughly, treated them like servants, and was so much ashamed of them, that he would not allow his mother to come and see him in the parlor of the college to which he had been admitted of late. When he was at home during vacations, he would have cut his right arm off rather than help his father, or pour out a glass of wine for a customer. He even stayed away from the house on the plea that he could not endure the odors from the kitchen.
 
“Thus he reached his seventeenth year. His course was not completed; but, as he was tired of college-life, he declared he would not return there, and he never did return. When his father asked him timidly what he proposed doing, he shrugged¹²⁰ his shoulders as his sole reply. What did he do? Nothing. He idled about Paris.
 
“To dress in the height of fashion; to walk up and down before the most renowned restaurants, with a toothpick in his mouth; to hire a carriage, and drive it himself, having a hired groom¹²¹ in livery by his side,—this was the delight of those days. At night he gambled; and, when he lost, there was the till in his father’s shop.
 
“His parents had rented for him, and comfortably furnished, a nice set of rooms in their house, and tried by all manner of servility to keep him at home, neglecting even their own business in order to be always ready for his orders. But this did not prevent him from being constantly away. He said he could not possibly receive his friends in a house where his name was to be seen on the signboard of such a low establishment.
 
“It was his despair to be the son of a restaurant-keeper, and to be called Chevassat.
 
“But greater grief was to come to him after two years’ idle and expensive life such as has been described.
 
“One fine morning when he needed a couple of hundred dollars, his parents told him, with tears in their eyes, that they had not twenty dollars in the house; that they were at the end of their resources; that the day before a note of theirs had been protested; and that they were at that moment on the brink of bankruptcy¹²². They did not reproach Justin with having spent all their savings; oh, no! On the contrary, they humbly¹²³ asked his pardon, if they were no longer able to provide for his wants. And, with fear and trembling, they at last ventured to suggest, that perhaps it would be well if he should seek some kind of work.
 
“He told them coolly that he would think it over, but that he must have his two hundred dollars. And he got them. His father and mother had still a watch and some jewelry¹²⁴; they pawned¹²⁵ everything and brought him the proceeds.
 
“Still he saw that the till he had considered inexhaustible was really empty, and that henceforth his pockets also would be empty, unless he could devise some means to fill them. He went, therefore, in search of some employment; and his godfather, the valet, found one for him at the house of a banker, who was in want of a reliable young man to be trained for his business, and hereafter to be intrusted with the management of his funds.”
 
Papa Ravinet’s voice changed so perceptibly as he uttered these last words, that Daniel and Henrietta, with one impulse, asked him,—
 
“Is anything the matter, sir?”
 
He did not make any reply; but his sister, Mrs. Bertolle, said,—
 
“No, there is nothing the matter with my brother;” and she looked at him with a nod of encouragement.
 
“I am all right,” he said, like an echo. Then, making a great effort, he continued,—
 
“Justin Chevassat was at twenty precisely¹²⁷ what you know him to be as Maxime de Brevan,—a profound dissembler, a fierce egotist devoured¹²⁸ by vanity, in fine, a man of ardent¹²⁹ passions, and capable of anything to satisfy his desires.
 
“The hope of getting rich at once by some great stroke was already so deeply rooted in his mind, that it gave him the strength to change his habits and manner of life from one day to another, and to keep up the deceit with a perseverance unheard of at his age. This lazy, profligate¹³⁰ gambler rose with the day, worked ten hours a day, and became the model of all clerks. He had resolved to win the favor of his patron, and to be trusted. He succeeded in doing it by the most consummate¹³¹ hypocrisy. So that, only two years after he had first been admitted into the house, he had already been promoted to a place which conferred upon him the keeping of all the valuables of the firm.
 
“This o............