"Don't be alarmed, Mary," he said, with a smile, at the consternation in her face. "You won't often see me do this, and I can assure you that spirit-drinking is not an habitual vice with me, but I really wanted it then. They are still fighting fiercely from Porte St. Martin down to the Place de la Bastille. I believe all resistance has been crushed out on the south side of the river, and in a couple of days the whole thing will be over." "Fancy a week of fighting. It is awful to think of, Cuthbert. How many do you suppose will be killed altogether?" "I have not the least idea, and I don't suppose it will ever be known; but if the resistance is as desperate for the next two days as it has been for the last three, I should say fully 20,000 will have fallen, besides those taken with arms in their hands, tried, and shot. I hear there are two general court-martials sitting permanently, and that seven or eight hundred prisoners are shot every day. Then there are some eighteen or twenty thousand at Versailles, but as these will not be tried until the fighting is over, and men's blood cooled down somewhat, no doubt much greater leniency will be shown." "There is a terrible cloud of smoke over Paris, still." "Yes, fresh fires are constantly breaking out. The Louvre is safe, and the firemen have checked the spread of the flames at the public buildings, but there are streets where every house is alight for a distance of a quarter of a mile; and yet, except at these spots, the damage is less than you would expect considering how fierce a battle has been raging. There are streets where scarce a bullet mark is to be seen on the walls or a broken pane of glass in a window, while at points where barricades have been defended, the scene of ruin is terrible." Two days later a strange stillness succeeded the din and uproar that had for a week gone on without cessation night and day. Paris was conquered, the Commune was stamped out, its chiefs dead or fugitives, its rank and file slaughtered, or prisoners awaiting trial. France breathed again. It had been saved from a danger infinitely more terrible than a German occupation. In a short time the hotels were opened and visitors began to pour into Paris to gaze at the work of destruction wrought by the orgie of the Commune. One day Cuthbert, who was now installed in his own lodging, went up to Passy. "I hear that the English Church is to be open to-morrow, Mary. I called on the clergyman to-day and told him that I should probably require his services next week." "Cuthbert!" Mary exclaimed in surprise, "you cannot mean----" and a flush of color completed the sentence. "Yes, that is just what I do mean, Mary. You have kept me waiting three years and I am not going to wait a day longer." "I have given up much of my belief in women's rights, Cuthbert, but there are some I still maintain, and one of these is that a woman has a right to be consulted in a matter of this kind."