"Yes, I; are you not called Helene de Chaverny? Were you not brought up in the Augustine convent between Nantes and Clisson? Did you not one day receive an order to leave the convent from a mysterious protector who watches over you? Did you not travel with one of the sisters, to whom you gave a hundred louis for her trouble? At Rambouillet, did not a person called Madame Desroches await you? Did she not announce to you a visit from your father? The same evening, did not some one arrive who loved you, and who thought you loved him?" "Yes, yes, monsieur, it is all true," said Helene, astonished that a stranger should thus know the details of her history. "Then the next day," continued the regent, "did not Monsieur de Chanlay, who followed you under the name of De Livry, pay you a visit, which was vainly opposed by Madame Desroches?" "You are right, monsieur, and I see that Gaston has told you all." "Then came the order to leave for Paris. You would have opposed it, but were forced to obey. You were taken to a house in the Faubourg St. Antoine; but there your captivity became insupportable." "You are mistaken, monsieur; it was not the captivity, but the prison." "I do not understand you." "Did not Gaston tell you of his fears, which I laughed at at first, but shared afterward?" "No, tell me what did you fear?" "But if _he_ did not tell you, how shall _I_?" "Is there anything one cannot tell to a friend?" "Did he not tell you that this man whom I at first believed to be my father--?" [Illustration: GASTON ROSE HASTILY, AND MET D'ARGENSON WITH A LAW OFFICER.--Page 514.] "Believed!" "Yes; I swear it, monsieur. Hearing his voice, feeling my hand pressed by his, I had at first no doubt, and it almost needed evidence to bring fear instead of the filial love with which he at first inspired me." "I do not understand you, mademoiselle; how could you fear a man who--to judge by what you tell me--had so much affection for you?" "You do not understand, monsieur; as you say, under a frivolous pretext, I was removed from Rambouillet to Paris, shut in a house in the Faubourg Saint Antoine, which spoke more clearly to my eyes than Gaston's fears had done. Then I thought myself lost--and that this feigned tenderness of a father concealed the wiles of a seducer. I had no friend but Gaston--I wrote to him--he came." "Then," said the regent, filled with joy, "when you left that house it was to escape those wiles, not to follow your lover?" "Oh, monsieur, if I had believed in that father whom I had seen but once, and then surrounded by mysteries, I swear to you that nothing would have led me from the path of duty." "Oh, dear child!" cried the duke, with an accent which made Helene start.