"By my eternal salvation, this is the truth. Errington, Webster, Dario, and you, Raoul, are the veritable heirs of the Marquis de Beaugreval, specified in his will. Therefore the fourth diamond is yours. Webster will be delighted to go to Nantes to-morrow to give Maître Delarue a check for three hundred thousand francs and bring you back the diamond. I am sending to Maître Delarue at the same time as the receipt which he signed, the necessary instructions.
"I will confess, Raoul, that I felt a little disappointed yesterday when I discerned the truth—not much—just a few tears. To-day I am quite contented. I had no great liking for that fortune—too many crimes and too many horrors went with it. Some things I should never have been able to forget. And then ... and then money is a prison; and I could not bear to live locked up.
"Raoul, and you, my three new friends, you asked me,—rather by way of a joke, wasn't it?—to choose a sweetheart among those who found themselves at the Manor yesterday. May I answer you in rather the same manner, that my choice is made, that it is only possible for me to devote myself to the youngest of my four boys first, then to the others? Don't be angry with me, my friends. My heart, up to now, is only the heart of a mother; and it only thrills with tenderness, anxiety and love for them. What would they do if I were to leave them? What would become of my poor Montfaucon? They need me and the really healthy life we lead together. Like them I am a nomad, a vagabond. There is no dwelling-place as good as our caravan. Let me go back to the high road.
"And then, after a time we will meet again, shall we? Our cousins the de Chagny will welcome us at Roborey. Come, let us fix a date. Christmas and New Year's Day there—does that please you?
"Good-bye, my friend. My best love to you all, and a few tears.... In robore fortuna. Fortune is in the firm heart.
"I kiss you all.
"Dorothy."
A long silence followed the reading of this letter.
At the end of it Count Octave said:
"Strange creature! When one considers that she had the four diamonds in her pocket, that is to say ten or twelve million francs, and that it would have been so easy for her to say nothing and keep them."