'What is it that you particularly want of me?' asked Megret, with mingled embarrassment and vexation. 'We have both of us so long and so carefully avoided each other, that this unexpected visit may well excite my wonder.'

'I am about to leave Sweden forever,' answered Siquier, in a desponding tone, 'and have come to take my leave of you, and to procure money for my traveling expenses.'

'Money for traveling?' murmured Megret. 'We settled with each other long since, and balanced our accounts. Above all, how came you to form the resolution of leaving Sweden?'

'You know,' answered Siquier, in a low voice and looking carefully about him, 'with what ignominy common report has branded my honor since the king's death. I still hoped that those suspicions would gradually die away, but they continued daily to strengthen and increase, and I learned that my enemies with witty insolence pronounced my once honorable name, Sicaire,[1] thus, by a slight change of sound expressing the accusation with that atrocious word. Two duels followed, and still the rumor continued to spread. Had I fought half the army, it would have been unavailing. Finally my mental sufferings overpowered my physical strength. A raging fever seized me, and...' He ceased.

'And then?' asked Megret, with painful anxiety.

'In the paroxysms,' stammered Siquier, almost inaudibly, 'I am said to have accused myself of Charles's murder, and to have thrown up my windows and begged Sweden's pardon for the crime.'

'What consequence could they attach to such silly phantasies?' asked Megret, turning deadly pale.

'The government,' continued Siquier, 'had me confined in a mad-house, and when I recovered I received my dismission, with an injunction to leave the kingdom.'

'Are you also, like myself, dismissed?' cried Megret, with a ferocious laugh. 'They are right! The lemons have been squeezed, why should they not sweep out the useless peels?'

'It is dreadful to have no means of escaping the gnawing worm in the heart,' said Siquier, 'but, between ourselves, Megret, have we deserved anything better?'