"Take heart, my good wife. The danger would be great, but I should know how to escape it. It was even more necessary in my grandfather's and especially in my father's case that they kept in profound secrecy the treasures they possessed; for the governments of Louis XIV, the Regent, and Louis XV, always in want, always at their wits' end for cash, were none too scrupulous in the means they chose to replenish their coffers. We Jews have always been a little beyond the pale of common rights, so that my grandfather or my father, once suspected of being the possessors of a sum amounting to several millions, would have been haled off on _lettres de cachet_, thrown into the cell of some State prison, and kept there till they had bought off their liberty, or, perhaps, their very lives at the price of the treasure which they were suspected of guarding." "Ah, Samuel, I shudder to think that in those days every wickedness was possible. They might even have put your father to the torture." "Thanks be to God, all that is out of the question to-day. And still, anticipating ill chances and exactions, we have always stowed our treasure in safe places and safe hands. Should the mansion be ransacked from cellar to eaves, the wealth of which we are the keepers would escape the search--" Pricking his ear, Samuel checked his speech and listened intently a moment in the direction of the street gate. Then he said aloud to himself: "Who is knocking there? It is not one of our men." "The hour is unearthly," answered Bathsheba, uneasily. "It is past midnight. This lonely street has long since been deserted. May it not be our lookout come to warn us of the approach of some peril?" "No, our lookout would have given the established signal," answered the Jew. "I'll go see what it may be." And taking the lamp, he passed out of the chamber. CHAPTER II. REVOLUTIONARY EFFERVESCENCE. Lamp in hand, Samuel approached the wicket gate. The light he carried revealed to him standing outside a lackey in a livery of orange and green, trimmed with silver lace. The fellow, swaying unsteadily on his feet, and with the air of one half-seas over with drink, knocked again, violently. "Ho, friend!" cried Samuel. "Don't knock so hard! Perhaps you mistake the house." "I--I knock how I please," returned the lackey in a thick voice. "Open the door--right off. I want to come in--gallows-bird!" "Whom do you wish?" "You do not want to open; dog of Jewry! Swine! My master will beat you to death with his stick. He said to me: 'Carry--this letter to Samuel the Jew--and above all--rascal--do not tarry at the inn!' So I want to get in to your dog-kennel, you devil of a Jew!" "May I ask your master's name?" "My master is Monseigneur the Count of Plouernel, colonel in the Guards. You know him well. You have before now lent him money--triple Arab!--according to what my lord's steward says--and at good interest, too." "Have you your master's letter?"