An expression of pity appeared on the countenance of the stranger, as his eyes fell on the two nuns, after having surveyed their wretched apartment. He was the first to break the strange silence that had hitherto prevailed, by addressing the two poor creatures before him in such tones of kindness as were best adapted to the nervous terror under which they were evidently suffering. "Citizens!" he began, "I do not come to you as an enemy." He stopped for a moment, and then continued: "If any misfortune has befallen you, rest assured that I am not the cause of it. My only object here is to ask a great favor of you." The nuns still kept silence. "If my presence causes you any anxiety," he went on, "tell me so at once, and I will depart; but, believe me, I am really devoted to your interests; and if there is any thing in which I can befriend you, you may confide in me without fear. I am, perhaps, the only man in Paris whom the law can not assail, now that the kings of France are no more." There was such a tone of sincerity in these words, as he spoke them, that Sister Agatha (the nun to whom the reader was introduced at the outset of this narrative, and whose manners exhibited all the court refinement of the old school) instinctively pointed to one of the chairs, as if to request the stranger to be seated. His expression showed a mixture of satisfaction and melancholy, as he acknowledged this little attention, of which he did not take advantage until the nuns had first seated themselves. "You have given an asylum here," continued he, "to a venerable priest, who has miraculously escaped from massacre at a Carmelite convent." "Are you the person," asked Sister Agatha, eagerly, "appointed to protect our flight from--?" "I am not the person whom you expected to see," he replied, calmly. "I assure you, sir," interrupted the other nun, anxiously, "that we have no priest here; we have not, indeed." "You had better be a little more careful about appearances on a future occasion," he replied, gently, taking from the table a Latin breviary. "May I ask if you are both in the habit of reading the Latin language?" he inquired, with a slight inflexion of sarcasm in his voice. No answer was returned. Observing the anguish depicted on the countenance of the nuns, the trembling of their limbs, the tears that filled their eyes, the stranger began to fear that he had gone too far. "Compose yourselves," he continued, frankly. "For three days I have been acquainted with the state of distress in which you are living. I know your names, and the name of the venerable priest whom you are concealing. It is--" "Hush! do not speak it," cried Sister Agatha, placing her finger on her lips. "I have now said enough," he went on, "to show that if I had conceived the base design of betraying you, I could have accomplished my object before now."