"You hear! you hear!" exclaimed the lapidary, raising his clasped hands towards heaven, "and are crimes like this to go unpunished? Shall such a monster escape and not pay a heavy penalty for his wickedness?" "Trust me," said Rodolph, who seemed profoundly meditating on what he heard, "trust me, this man's time and hour will come. But continue your painful narration, my poor girl, and shrink not from telling us even its blackest details." "The struggle between us had now gone on so long that my strength began to fail me. I was conscious of my own inability to resist further, when the porter, who had returned home, rang the bell twice,--the usual signal when letters arrived and required to be fetched from his hands. Fearing that, if I did not obey the summons, the porter would bring the letters himself, M. Ferrand said, 'Go; utter but one word, and to-morrow sees your father in prison. If you endeavour to quit this house, the consequences will fall on him; and, as for you, I will take care no one shall take you into their house, for, without exactly affirming it, I will contrive to make every one think you have robbed me. Then, should any person refer to me for your character, I shall speak of you as an idle, unworthy girl whom I could keep no longer.' "The following day after this scene, spite of the menaces of my master, I ran home to complain to my father of the unkind usage I received, without daring, however, to tell him all. His first desire was for me to quit the house of M. Ferrand without delay. But, then, a prison would close upon my poor parent; added to which, my small earnings had become indispensably necessary to our family since the illness of my mother, and the bad character promised me by M. Ferrand might possibly have prevented me from finding another service for a very long time." "Yes," said Morel, with gloomy bitterness, "we were selfish and cowardly enough to allow our poor child to return to that accursed roof. Oh, I spoke truly when I said, 'Want, want, what mean, what degrading acts do you not force us to commit!'" "Alas, dear father, did you not try by every possible means to procure these thirteen hundred francs? And, that being impossible, there was nothing left but to submit ourselves to our fate." "Go on, go on; your parents have been your executioners, and we are far more guilty than yourself of all the fearful consequences!" exclaimed the lapidary, concealing his face with his hands.