The rumour of the defeat of Reichshoffen, which the Government was keeping secret, was soon spread abroad in Paris by the spectators who had heard it from Belcourt, and the news caused a fearful calm in the gay capital. Belcourt had been congratulated by all the authorities of the theatre on his happy idea, but just as he was preparing to leave the theatre that same night he was seized by a police official and conducted to the Mazas prison on a charge of "having divulged a State secret," a crime always punished at least by hard labour, and, in time of war, by death. * * * * * For more than a month Belcourt had been in Mazas prison, with nothing to look forward to but dishonour or death. He had been questioned over and over again as to how he had discovered the secret, but in vain; nothing could induce him to give any details, for he did not know whether Jeanne would forgive him for having said so much as he had. The next day sentence was to be passed upon him. Successive defeats had embittered the minds of his judges, and it was pretty sure that he had little chance of getting off without paying the full penalty of his _crime_. Belcourt was thinking sadly of his hopeless love for Jeanne, which had caused him to act as he had done in order to save her, when suddenly the door of his cell opened and the porter announced: "Madame the Countess de Morfeuille." It was Jeanne herself, dressed in the deepest mourning. Her beautiful hair had some silvery threads, her face was cold and severe as marble, her beautiful mouth was rigid, her eyes seemed to be gazing at some invisible object, and she had a deathly pallor--such as one sees on the faces of those who have received some mortal wound. It was pathetic to see so fair and so young a girl in such hopeless despair, and Belcourt was deeply touched by it. "You are free, Louis," she said, gently but sadly. "The Empress herself has asked for your release. Thank you so much, my friend, for all you did for me. I came directly I heard of your imprisonment. My husband had only just been brought home and buried at Morfeuille." [Illustration: "'YOU ARE FREE, LOUIS,' SHE SAID."] Very soon after, Jeanne returned to her husband's stately home, that she might visit daily the tomb of him she had so dearly loved, and who had married her on his death bed. When Louis had tried to console her and gently hinted that she was too young to go through the rest of her life alone, she had answered, decidedly:-- "Do not ever speak to me of anyone else. I will live and die the widow of Roger, and will certainly never be anyone else's wife." It was thus that a great artiste was lost to the French stage, but the memory of that _début_ will never be lost to any of those who witnessed it. _Crimes and Criminals._ NO. I.--DYNAMITE AND DYNAMITERS.