I was nine years old. It was in 1864, in the month of June, at the close of a warm afternoon. I was at my studies in my room as usual, having come in from the Lycée Bonaparte, and the outer shutters were closed. We lived in the Rue Tronchet, in the seventh house on the left, coming from the church. Three highly-polished steps led to the little room, prettily furnished in blue, within whose walls I passed the last happy days of my life. Everything comes back to me. I was seated at my table, dressed in a black overall, and engaged in writing out the tenses of a Latin verb. All of a sudden I heard a cry, followed by a clamour of voices; then rapid steps trod the corridor outside my room. Instinctively I rushed to the door and came against a servant, who was pale, and had a roll of linen in his hand. I understood the use of this afterwards. At the sight of me he exclaimed: "Ah! M. André, what an awful misfortune!" Then, regaining his presence of mind, he said: "Go back into your room--go back at once!" Before I could answer, he caught me up in his arms, placed me on the upper step of my staircase, locked the door of the corridor, and walked rapidly away. "No, no," I cried, flinging myself against the door, "tell me all; I will, I must know." No answer. I shook the lock, I struck the panel with my clenched fists, I dashed my shoulder against the door. Then, sitting upon the lowest step, I listened, in an agony of fear, to the coming and going of people outside, who knew of "the awful misfortune," but what was it they knew? Child as I was, I understood the terrible signification which the servant's exclamation bore under the actual circumstances. Two days previously, my father had gone out after breakfast, according to custom, to the place of business which he had occupied for over four years, in the Rue de la Victoire. He had been thoughtful during breakfast, indeed for some months past he had lost his accustomed cheerfulness. When he rose to go, my mother, myself, and one of the frequenters of our house, M. Jacques Termonde, a fellow student of my father's at the École de Droit, were at table. My father left his seat before breakfast was over, having looked at the clock, and inquired whether it was right. "Are you in such a hurry, Cornélis?" asked Termonde. "Yes," answered my father, "I have an appointment with a client who is ill--a foreigner--I have to call on him at his hotel to procure important papers. He is an odd sort of man, and I shall not be sorry to see something of him at closer quarters. I have taken certain steps on his behalf and I am almost tempted to regret them."