It was something
terrible, wasn't it?"
"Terrible, indeed. But what I was speaking of happened a long
time ago--twenty-five or twenty-six years ago, at the very least.
I was still in my own part of the country--at Besancon. No one
knows the exact truth about the affair."
"What! not even you?"
"Oh! I--that's an entirely different thing. When I entered the
count's service, six years later, there was still an old gardener
who knew the whole story, and who told it to me, making me swear
that I would never betray his confidence."
Lavish of details as she had been in telling her own story, it was
evident that she was determined to exercise a prudent reserve in
everything connected with the De Chalusse family; and M. Fortunat
inwardly cursed this, to him, most unseasonable discretion. But
he was experienced in these examinations, and he had at his
command little tricks for loosening tongues, which even an
investigating magistrate might have envied. Without seeming to
attach the slightest importance to Madame Vantrasson's narrative,
he rose with a startled air, like a man who suddenly realizes that
he has forgotten himself. "Zounds!" he exclaimed, "we sit here
gossiping, and it's growing late. I really can't wait for your
husband. If I remain here any longer, I shall miss the last
omnibus; and I live on the other side of the river, near the
Luxembourg."
"But our agreement, monsieur?"
"We will draw that up at some future time.
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