"Your father!" repeated the marquis, as if waking from a dream; "your father!" "Pray read it, monsieur!" cried Adamas; "make sure." "No! not yet," said the marquis. "If I am dreaming, I do not desire to be awakened. Let me fancy that this lovely child--Come here, boy, to my arms.--And do you, Adamas, read it if you can! I could never do it!" "I will read it," said Mario; "follow with your eyes." And he read as follows: "Monsieur and dear brother: "Pay no heed to the letter you will receive after this, which I wrote at Genoa, under date of the sixteenth of next month, in anticipation of a long and dangerous journey, during which, as I feared that you would be anxious on my account, I desired to allay your anxiety by a post-dated letter, and thereby prevent your making inquiries for me in that country, where I desired that my absence should not be noticed. "As I have arrived here, thank God! more quickly and with less trouble than I dared hope, and am now out of difficulty and danger, I propose to tell you of my adventures, which I am at last able to do without concealment or reserve, leaving the details, however, for the approaching, eagerly anticipated moment when I shall be with you, accompanied by my beloved and honored wife, and, God willing, by the child of whom she will make me the father in a few days! "It will suffice for you to know to-day, that, having been married secretly last year, in Spain, to a beautiful lady of noble birth, against the will of her parents, I was obliged to leave her on my master's service, and to return to her, with the same secrecy, to rescue her from the tyranny of her parents and take her to France, where we have at last arrived to-day, under favor of our precautions and disguises. "We expect to stop at Pau, whence I shall forward this letter to you, to be followed by another which will announce, if it be God's pleasure, my wife's safe delivery, and in which I shall have the leisure that I have not at this moment, to tell you----" At this point the letter had been interrupted by some unexpected occurrence. It had been folded and carried about in the traveller's pocket, to be finished and sealed at Pau, in all probability, and there entrusted to the carriers who, at that time, conducted the mail service, with more or less despatch, between places of importance. XXV Bois-Doré wept copiously as he listened to this letter, which, being read by Mario, penetrated the more deeply into his heart.