“Oh, don’t tell me that!” interrupted the magistrate. “If I had asked what you were doing three months ago, on a certain evening, and at a certain hour, I could understand your hesitation; but this is about Tuesday, and it is now Friday. Moreover, this day, so close, was the last of the carnival; it was Shrove Tuesday. That circumstance ought to help your memory.” “That evening, I went out walking,” murmured Albert. “Now,” continued the magistrate, “where did you dine?” “At home, as usual.” “No, not as usual. At the end of your meal, you asked for a bottle of Bordeaux, of which you drank the whole. You doubtless had need of some extra excitement for your subsequent plans.” “I had no plans,” replied the prisoner with very evident uneasiness. “You make a mistake. Two friends came to seek you. You replied to them, before sitting down to dinner, that you had a very important engagement to keep.” “That was only a polite way of getting rid of them.” “Why?” “Can you not understand, sir? I was resigned, but not comforted. I was learning to get accustomed to the terrible blow. Would not one seek solitude in the great crisis of one’s life?” “The prosecution pretends that you wished to be left alone, that you might go to La Jonchere. During the day, you said, ‘She can not resist me.’ Of whom were you speaking?” “Of some one to whom I had written the evening before, and who had replied to me. I spoke the words, with her letter still in my hands.” “This letter was, then, from a woman?” “Yes.” “What have you done with it?” “I have burnt it.” “This precaution leads one to suppose that you considered the letter compromising.” “Not at all, sir; it treated entirely of private matters.” M. Daburon was sure that this letter came from Mademoiselle d’Arlange. Should he nevertheless ask the question, and again hear pronounced the name of Claire, which always aroused such painful emotions within him? He ventured to do so, leaning over his papers, so that the prisoner could not detect his emotion. “From whom did this letter come?” he asked. “From one whom I can not name.” “Sir,” said the magistrate severely, “I will not conceal from you that your position is greatly compromised. Do not aggravate it by this culpable reticence. You are here to tell everything, sir.” “My own affairs, yes, not those of others.” Albert gave this last answer in a dry tone. He was giddy, flurried, exasperated, by the prying and irritating mode of the examination, which scarcely gave him time to breathe. The magistrate’s questions fell upon him more thickly than the blows of the blacksmith’s hammer upon the red-hot iron which he is anxious to beat into shape before it cools.