"You have, without knowing it, done a most material service to your mistress." "You love her?" asked Iris abruptly, and casting a piercing glance at him. "I!" said De Brévannes, with the most careless air in the world; "a singular proof of love, truly, to cruelly menace the woman one loves! No, no, I have no love for her; nothing but the most intense friendship could make a man have recourse to such extremities." "I must believe you," said Iris sorrowfully, as she took the book from him. "Adieu, Iris, until to-morrow," said M. de Brévannes; "you will remind Madame de Hansfeld of the interview she has promised me." "She will not fail; but, now I reflect, in Heaven's name, let nothing give her a suspicion that you have read this book, or I am lost!" "Make yourself easy, my dear Iris; I will be as far from knowing that as her most secret thoughts: nothing shall betray my knowledge of it; only promise to bring me this book once more, as it will be of the utmost importance that I should again peruse it after the interview I am to have with your mistress to-morrow. Promise me this." "What! do wrong again?--again abuse her confidence? Ah! now I have no right to complain other injustice to me." "Iris, I entreat you!" "You ask it, and is not that more than a command for me?" In his gratitude, De Brévannes took hold of Iris's hand, and drawing her towards him, would have kissed her brow, but the young girl repulsed him violently and proudly, to his great surprise, as he imagined he should be giving her the utmost pleasure in acting with such condescension. When she reached the Quai, Iris flung into the river the ring she had received as the reward of her treachery. After his attentive perusal of the black book, De Brévannes fell into a deep reverie. He could not doubt but he was beloved by Madame de Hansfeld, who struggled with all her power against the involuntary inclination. Her husband rendered her so miserable, that she went so far as sometimes to desire his death. Although this wish appeared to him somewhat exaggerated, De Brévannes considered all these circumstances as favourable to him, and awaited with intense anxiety the moment of the meeting which Madame de Hansfeld had appointed for the next day in the _Jardin des Plantes._ CHAPTER XXVIII ARNOLD AND BERTHA Madame de Brévannes had frequently met M. de Hansfeld, under the name of Arnold Schneider, at Pierre Raimond's. He had saved the old engraver's life, and nothing could be more natural than his visits to see him. Bertha having resolved on again teaching the piano, in order to supply her father's wants, used to go to his abode three times a-week, and remain there for three hours, giving her lessons in his presence.