"Very probably," replied the robber: "now perhaps there is not so great a gulf between you and me. If one man rates himself so highly, then certainly to the mind the distance appears immeasureable as between the king and the beggar; but place both naked on a desert island together, then are they brothers and boon companions, provided the one does not devour the other. Thus is it also with the so called souls: when they compose verses, or are in love, then indeed they think themselves miracles enshrined, but let them but fall into despair, become utterly wild and untractable, then all affectation disappears like the rouge from the cheeks of the harlot when she is compelled to wander about in a shower of rain." "Have you never heard my name perchance? I am called Lacoste, I should be surprised if you had not." Edmond became thoughtful. "It occurs to me," said he after a while, "that this name is not totally unknown to me; but I cannot revive my memory." "Aye, good, young soul," continued Lacoste in his peculiar way. "In your green age, I was a gallant spendthrift, a sweet rabbit, that with rosy smiling lips, flattered every one, only tell me, have you ever yet loved passionately?" "Oh silence!" angrily exclaimed Edmond: "who now would speak of that with you?" "A curious discourse that we are holding," said Lacoste coolly; "if you know nothing of it, so much the better for you, but at your age, I was so thoroughly in love and enraptured, that a mere touch from me would have made a thousand men in love, as by the magnet the bar of iron acquires the power of attraction. At that time, the earth, with all its stones, appeared to me transparent, I was so benevolent and affectionate, that I would willingly have given my eye-brows to the nightingales, that they might carry them to their nests, to make a bed for their young brood. And beautiful was my beloved, the blind might almost have been aware of it, she was even still more loving and compassionate than I was. She would indeed have voluntarily taken upon herself all the suffering and sorrows of the whole world, would have even suffered herself to be condemned, could she thereby have released from hell, and make the hungry and sick, rich and healthy." "Even in your wickedness," said Edmond, softened, "you represent this girl as a noble one, who was well worthy of her heavenly origin." "Heavenly," said the former, "to disgust: quite natural. That is just what I mean. To every beggar she would have freely given her all; but to me--she saw my love, my despair, how I only breathed in her looks, how I withered away, and my grief, my inexpressible misery would assuredly have driven me to the grave or to madness.--But that was indifferent to her, more even then indifferent, it was pleasing to her." "But how is such a thing possible?" asked Edmond.