Vandenesse saw that his wife was turning pale beneath her mask. Florine’s apartment revealed more about the intimacy of the actress and Nathan than any ideal mistress would wish to know. The eye of a woman can take in the truth of such things in a second, and the countess saw vestiges of Nathan which proved to her the certainty of what Vandenesse had said. Florine returned with the portfolio. “How am I to open it?” she said. The actress rang the bell and sent into the kitchen for the cook’s knife. When it came she brandished it in the air, crying out in ironical tones:-- “With this they cut the necks of ‘poulets.’” The words, which made the countess shiver, explained to her, even better than her husband had done the night before, the depths of the abyss into which she had so nearly fallen. “What a fool I am!” said Florine; “his razor will do better.” She fetched one of Nathan’s razors from his dressing-table, and slit the leather cover of the portfolio, through which Marie’s letters dropped. Florine snatched one up hap-hazard, and looked it over. “Yes, she must be a well-bred woman. It looks to me as if there were no mistakes in spelling here.” The count gathered up the letters hastily and gave them to his wife, who took them to a table as if to see that they were all there. “Now,” said Vandenesse to Florine, “will you let me have those letters for these?” showing her five bank-bills of ten thousand francs each. “They’ll replace the sums you have paid for him.” “Ah!” cried Florine, “didn’t I kill myself body and soul in the provinces to get him money,--I, who’d have cut my hand off to serve him? But that’s men! damn your soul for them and they’ll march over you rough-shod! He shall pay me for this!” Madame de Vandenesse was disappearing with the letters. “Hi! stop, stop, my fine mask!” cried Florine; “leave me one to confound him with.” “Not possible,” said Vandenesse. “Why not?” “That mask is your ex-rival; but you needn’t fear her now.” “Well, she might have had the grace to say thank you,” cried Florine. “But you have the fifty thousand francs instead,” said Vandenesse, bowing to her. It is extremely rare for young men, when driven to suicide, to attempt it a second time if the first fails. When it doesn’t cure life, it cures all desire for voluntary death. Raoul felt no disposition to try it again when he found himself in a more painful position than that from which he had just been rescued. He tried to see the countess and explain to her the nature of his love, which now shone more vividly in his soul than ever. But the first time they met in society, Madame de Vandenesse gave him that fixed and contemptuous look which at once and forever puts an impassable gulf between a man and a woman. In spite of his natural assurance, Nathan never dared, during the rest of the winter, either to speak to the countess or even approach her.