Gabrielle maintained her attitude of uncompromising dignity, until the boudoir door clanged to, and, left alone, sank back upon the cushions numbed. The sword had fallen. She had herself severed the last frayed strands. What form would the abbé's vengeance take now that he had wakened to the fact that under no circumstances whatever would she submit herself to his desires? What mattered it, so that the end was swift? The dear ones were safe in distant Paris. No cause to fear for them. Their mother had been careful in signing the second will to add the tell-tale cross. On the whole, she was to be congratulated on the approaching change, for her worldly affairs were in order, there was no motive left for lingering. To one placed as she was, death, as she truly said, would be release. Victor and Camille would grow up under the care of grandmamma, secure from the machinations of their father and the crew by which he was surrounded. Her death would be an advantage to them, for the tale of the two wills and the precautionary declaration would become public property, and a barrier be raised under the scrutiny of public opinion, which would protect the dear ones from her husband. And yet how whimsical the situation was! In the course of charitable wanderings among the poor, she had looked with amaze on creatures lying upon their rotten straw with scarce a rag to cover them, who clung to their wretched existence with a pertinacity that was both weird and ludicrous, considering that it was but a step, and such an easy one, into the peaceful grave. Now she herself was within distance of that step, and could look calmly into the chasm, contemplate the precise spot beneath whose crust she was to sleep for ever. But was it for ever? Ah! If she only knew. She had long ago learned to smile at the mediæval absurdities, invented by naïve, ignorant churchmen, of flames and pitchforks, and demons with red-hot tongs; but now that she stood so near to Death, that she could feel the chill rustle of his garments, she felt herself drawn into the sea of idle and abortive speculation.