Marie could not settle well to her employment after this interruption. Henry forgot it in a moment. He grew earnest; he grew eloquent; and, in proportion, he grew loud. Nobody came from below, as he had predicted. Nobody could have wanted anything at the door when Henry was asking so loudly how it was “possible for the people to be attached to a government which, &c.” And now, when he was insisting on the first principle of taxation,—equality,—when he was offering a variety of illustrative cases, all of which resolved themselves into equality or inequality,—his little wife came behind him, and laying her hand on his shoulder, asked him in a whisper whether it was necessary to speak quite so loud. “My love, I beg your pardon. I am afraid I have been half-stunning you. Why did not you speak before? I am very apt to forget the dimensions of our room,” and he started up laughing, and showed that he could touch the ceiling with the extremities of his long fingers;—“I am apt to forget the difference between this chamber and the lofty places where I used to hold forth at college. Was I very boisterous, love?” “O, no: but loud enough to be heard beyond these four walls.” And she glanced towards the door. “If that be all, any one is welcome to hear what I have to say on taxation. It will be all printed to-morrow, you know, my dear.” Marie did know this: but she was not the more willing that her husband should be overheard exclaiming vehemently about equality,—a word held in very bad repute in those days, when, if a lady made inquiries of her linen-draper about the equality of wear of a piece of gingham or calico, the shopman would shake his head at her for a leveller, as soon as she had turned her back. “How,” said M. Verblanc, looking tenderly at his daughter, “how shall I forgive those who have put dread into the heart that was once as light as the morning gossamer? How shall I forgive those who taught my child suspicion?” “O, father, remember the night——” “Yes, Marie; I knew it was the thought of that night that prompted you to caution now.—The night,” he continued to Henry, “when our poor friend La Raye was arrested at our house. We have reason to believe that we had all been watched for hours,—that eyes had peeped from every cranny, and that ears were planted all round us. I myself saw the shadow of a man in ambuscade, when a passing gleam from the court shone into my hall. I took no notice, and rejoined La Raye and my child. He slipped out by a back way, but was immediately taken in the street; and for words spoken that night, coupled with preceding deeds, he suffered.—Well may my Marie have learned dread and suspicion!” “No, father; not well! Nay, Henry, you do not know what warning I had against it;—warning from one who knew not dread, and would not have saved her life by so vile an instrument as suspicion.” Henry bent himself to listen with his whole soul, for now he knew that Marie spoke of her friend, Madame Roland.