“Be there at set of sun this evening.” “No, no, I could not; I dare not. I could never do that--but I often walk there--Jacques.” “And this evening?” He was trembling again in his eagerness. Her eyes said yes, the pressure of her tell-tale fingers confirmed it, and the sigh she gave sent him into an ecstasy. “I believe you do but play with poor me,” she whispered. “I swear on my soul I am in earnest. I love you, Lucette, I----” “Hush, not now, not now;” and she snatched her hand quickly from him as if in great confusion and picked up her spinning wheel. “I shall count the minutes till the sun sets--_now_, Jacques,” she cried with a bright laughing smile, and passed into the house. “Blind kittens are we, Master Rat?” she said to herself as she went to her apartment. “If I do not know all you have to tell me of this villainy against Gabrielle before the dusk is dark, may I never know a rogue when I see one.” And then her fears on Gabrielle’s account having been excited, her quick wits busied themselves with all manner of fanciful conjectures as to what the vaguely shadowed danger could be; and her impatience could scarce be held in check until the time arrived for her meeting with Dauban. Meanwhile the interview between Gabrielle and her uncle had taken place and he had brought her news which for the moment had both deeply interested and greatly excited her. The Baron de Proballe was a man whose aim in life had been to fill to the brim the cup of self-indulgent pleasures. Handsome, rich, unscrupulous and talented, he was endowed with most of the vices except cowardice, and while yet a young man he had soon made himself a reputation as a profligate among profligates until his excesses had ruined him. His fortune declined as his reputation grew, and for some years he had been driven to live upon his wits, which meant trading upon his skill as a gambler until a particularly disgraceful scandal had driven him from Paris, bankrupt in pocket and much broken in health, to seek refuge with his young kinswoman at Morvaix. There his evil fame was unknown, and Gabrielle had welcomed him for her dead mother’s sake; and in the small provincial city he had passed two hateful years, brooding upon the pleasures which were now denied to him and devising means to rehabilitate his shattered fortunes and recover some of his lost health. Outwardly he had hitherto shown himself a model of a courteous gentleman and had lived almost an exemplary life in Morvaix, having put away from him with iron firmness the dissolute habits and evil practices of the old life in Paris. The desire for them burnt as strongly as ever in his blood, and his sole object in resisting it so strenuously was the hope of regaining such health, fortune and position as would enable him once more to indulge them freely.