“If ever, under the skin of the Abbe Carlos Herrera, any one were to detect the convict I have been, do you know what I would do to avoid compromising Lucien?” Esther awaited the reply with some anxiety. “Well,” he said after a brief pause, “I would die as the Negroes do--without a word. And you, with all your airs will put folks on my traces. What did I require of you?--To be La Torpille again for six months--for six weeks; and to do it to clutch a million. “Lucien will never forget you. Men do not forget the being of whom they are reminded day after day by the joy of awaking rich every morning. Lucien is a better fellow than you are. He began by loving Coralie. She died--good; but he had not enough money to bury her; he did not do as you did just now, he did not faint, though he is a poet; he wrote six rollicking songs, and earned three hundred francs, with which he paid for Coralie’s funeral. I have those songs; I know them by heart. Well, then do you too compose your songs: be cheerful, be wild, be irresistible and--insatiable! You hear me?--Do not let me have to speak again. “Kiss papa. Good-bye.” When, half an hour after, Europe went into her mistress’ room, she found her kneeling in front of a crucifix, in the attitude which the most religious of painters has given to Moses before the burning bush on Horeb, to depict his deep and complete adoration of Jehovah. After saying her prayers, Esther had renounced her better life, the honor she had created for herself, her glory, her virtue, and her love. She rose. “Oh, madame, you will never look like that again!” cried Prudence Servien, struck by her mistress’ sublime beauty. She hastily turned the long mirror so that the poor girl should see herself. Her eyes still had a light as of the soul flying heavenward. The Jewess’ complexion was brilliant. Sparkling with tears unshed in the fervor of prayer, her eyelashes were like leaves after a summer shower, for the last time they shone with the sunshine of pure love. Her lips seemed to preserve an expression as of her last appeal to the angels, whose palm of martyrdom she had no doubt borrowed while placing in their hands her past unspotted life. And she had the majesty which Mary Stuart must have shown at the moment when she bid adieu to her crown, to earth, and to love. “I wish Lucien could have seen me thus!” she said with a smothered sigh. “Now,” she added, in a strident tone, “now for a fling!” Europe stood dumb at hearing the words, as though she had heard an angel blaspheme.