"Coldness and placid endurance of life--perhaps contentment, might have followed; but never happiness." "But for what, you would say?" "Your querulous tyranny--your unmanly cruelty, with the story of which all Paris rings. You have even dared to strike her--to strike her with your clenched hand, and even with your cane. Oh, malediction, my gentle Isabelle! and here, old man, I tell you _you are a coward_!" "A coward--and your Isabelle! ha--we shall see what we shall see," exclaimed d'Escombas, boiling with ungovernable fury, as he swiftly drew his sword, and rushing upon Monjoy before the latter was aware, wounded him severely in the side. This was too much for human endurance. The engineer drew his sword, and locking in, tossed up, or wrenched away the weapon of M. d'Escombas, which glittered in the starlight as the blade went twenty feet into the air. At the same moment the sword of Monjoy pierced the lungs of his adversary, who, as he whirled round in his agony before falling, received it a second time in his back. He fell on his face and expired without a groan, and Monjoy fled, full of horror, leaving his weapon in the street, behind him. All that dreadful night he wandered about the streets, the quays, and bridges of Paris, haunted by what seemed a dream, a nightmare, to endure for ever; and when day dawned he repaired straight to a Commissary (an official similar to our justice of the peace) and declared upon oath "that he had slain M. d'Escombas in the Rue de Tournon; but in a fair duel, sword in hand, in self-defence." The Commissary deplored the circumstance, but accepted the declaration, and perceiving that he was dreadfully agitated, gave him some wine and water. "And now, dear Isabelle," he muttered wildly, "you are free--but by my hand--alas, by _my_ hand!" "How, monsieur," exclaimed the Commissary, sharply, looking up from his desk, and surveying the miserable Monjoy through his spectacles--"what's this you say?" Monjoy remained silent, but grew, if possible, paler. "Hah! _mon Dieu_!" exclaimed the Commissary, changing colour; "I remember now. Is it true that you were a discarded lover of Madame, when she was Mademoiselle du Platel, and a boarder with les dames de Notre Dame de Charité on du réfuge de St. Michel, in the Rue de St. Jacques?" "Yes," moaned Monjoy; "it is too true." "Detain M. Gervais Monjoy in custody; send for a surgeon; bring the body of M. d'Escombas here, and let us have it examined," said the other to his officials. In less than an hour all this was done. "How is this?" exclaimed the surgeon, the Commissary; and all present; "there is a sword wound _in the back_, and the sword is still remaining there!" "He has been murdered!" said the Commissary, sternly. "Dare you say so?" exclaimed Monjoy, with equal fury and indignation. "In my official capacity, I may say anything," replied the commissary, with a grimace--"to La Force with the prisoner!"