Which? Or, Between Two Women

by Ernest Daudet

"I did all I could to save them," whined Vauquelas.

"You lie! you lie! I tell you, you lie! It was you who betrayed them! I am sure of it. You trembled for your life, for your money. Woe be unto you!"

And Coursegol accompanied those words with a gesture so menacing that Vauquelas, believing his last hour had come, fell on his knees begging for mercy. But Coursegol seemed pitiless.

"Poor children! that death should overtake them just as Providence had united them. Wretch! fool! you were less merciful than destiny."

"Have pity!"

"Had you any pity on them? No! Ah well! you shall die!"

And drawing from his pocket a dagger that he always carried with him, Coursegol raised it above the old man's head.

"But if I promise to save them—"

The hand of Coursegol, raised to strike, fell.

"You will save them! That is only another lie. How can you save them? The prisons of the Republic release their victims only to send them to the guillotine."