--The one still living? The Lieutenant General of the King´s army? The one that married that charming creature named Lolotte[3]? --The same. --A gallant man, lover of sciences. --And of scholars. For a long time he was working on a general history of war in every century and every nation. --A staggering project. --To complete it he called for the help of some young gentlemen of distinguished merit, like M. de Montucla[5], the author of the History of Mathematics. --Good lord! He had many men of that caliber? --But the one named Gardeil, the hero of the adventure that I am going to tell to you, hardly yielded to him. A common passion for the study of Greek created a bond between Gardeil and I that time, the reciprocity of guidance, a taste for seclusion, and above all the facility with which we saw each other, made blossom into a rather striking intimacy. --So you were still staying at the Estrapade. --He, Sainte-Hyacinthe street, and his lady friend Mademoiselle de La Chaux, Saint-Michel square. I call her by her own name because the poor thing is no more, because her life can only honor it in every well-made mind and award it the admiration, the regret and the tears of those that nature will favor or punish with a small portion of the sensibility of her soul. --Well! Your speech is halting, and I believe you are crying. --I can still see her big dark eyes, soft and twinkling, and the moving sound of her voice resounding in my ears and shaking my heart. Charming creature! Unique creature! You are no more! You have been no more for nearly twenty years; and my heart still tightens at the thought of you. --You loved her? --No. Oh La Chaux! Oh Gardeil! You were each a marvel; you, for a woman´s tenderness; you, for a man´s ingratitude. Mademoiselle de La Chaux was an honest woman. She left her parents to throw herself into the arms of Gardeil. Gardeil had nothing, Mademoiselle de La Chaux enjoyed considerable wealth, and this wealth was entirely sacrificed for Gardeil´s needs and whims. She regretted neither the dissipation of her fortune nor her blackened reputation. Her lover took the place of everything for her. --So Gardeil was a charmer, amiable? --Not at all. A small gruff man, taciturn and caustic; angular face, swarthy complexion; a wholly puny, thin figure; ugly, if a man can be ugly with a face so full of intelligence. --And that was what made this charming woman fall head over heals? --That surprises you? --Still. --You? --Me. --So you have forgotten your adventure with la Deschamps and the profound despair into which you fell when this creature closed her doors to you. --Drop it; continue.