A longer silence than before succeeded. At length another change swept over the face, and the words, "Free--free--I am free!" burst from the lips; then they murmured, "Treasure untold! wondrous wealth!--diamonds--pearls--rubies--ingots of gold! The mad abbe's dream was reality!" Again the countenance darkened. "Fourteen years in a dungeon for no crime!--a father dead of starvation!--a bride the bride of the fiend who has done all this--and he a peer of France--and his friends a millionaire of Paris and the Procureur du Roi! Vengeance--vengeance--vengeance!" There was a pause, and the dreamer exultingly continued, "It is done! The peer of France is a disgraced suicide! The Procureur du Roi is a madman! The banker is a bankrupt!" The dreamer again paused, and his countenance once more changed. "Alas! alas! man is not God! 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord!' The innocent suffer with the guilty. To avenge a wrong has been sacrificed a life, and only misery has been the recompense! No more--no more--no more of this! Man and man's happiness be henceforth the aim! To that be devoted wealth untold!" The lips ceased to move. Gradually the high excitement of the features passed away and was succeeded by an expression of sadness and love. "Haydee--gone--gone to a better world. Mercedes--Mercedes--oh! does she love me yet? The long lost idol of my heart!--the adored angel of my life!--come! come! come!" As the dreamer spoke, he spread wide his arms; when his eyes opened, and his long slumbering senses returned, Mercedes, his own Mercedes, was, indeed, clasped to his breast. "Mercedes! Mercedes?" he faintly whispered. "Ah! it was no dream, for you are, indeed, beside me and mine--mine forever!" "Thine--thine--forever!" was the reply, and she clasped his feeble form to her heart as she would have clasped that of a child. CHAPTER XVI. A NOTABLE FETE. On the night of Monday, February 21st, 1848, all Paris was at the house of M. Gaultier de Rumilly, in the Avenue des Champs Elysees. M. Gaultier de Rumilly was well known as one of the leaders of the extreme left, though the confidential friend of M. Odillon Barrot, and the fete was perfectly understood to be a political reunion, rather than a social one. All the accompaniments of the most splendid society events of the season were in requisition. Even the brilliant balls given by the opulent citizens of New York were eclipsed in luxury and splendor. There was the streaming of lamps and chandeliers, the swell of enchanting music, the whirl of the fascinating polka, redowa or mazurka, while throngs of richly attired and lovely women were constantly enhancing the magnificence of the scene by their arrival. The brilliancy of the occasion was also richly diversified by the presence of an unusually large number of officers of the Municipal and National Guards in full uniform, as well as of several belonging to the Line or the regiments of Algeria.