Her letter was as follows:
"DREAD SIR: Tremulously and submissively I approach you. In the name of an unhappy creature I appeal to your compassion. You will be the judge of a lot of wretched men. Be merciful to them. By the grace of heaven I implore you, condemn them not! In the name of God, I implore you not to sign their death warrants. By the terrors of eternity I implore you do not ruin these men, for they are most innocent. N. N."
She durst not subscribe her own name.
And now she waited, she watched for the moment when Leonard quitted his room and, slipping in, laid the petition on the couch where he would be sure to find it. Nobody observed her.
The same day she encountered him, she had in fact sought for such an encounter. It was in the great armoury. Leonard, as soon as he perceived his wife, began humming some mad operatic tune, an opera bouffé air and bawled through the door to the dog-keeper to unleash the hounds.
The pale lady nevertheless approached him, with tottering but determined footsteps, and folding both her trembling hands as if in prayer, stood mutely in front of the door through which Leonard would have to pass, like some dumb spirit from another world. But Leonard merely shrugged his shoulders and passed her by, whistling all the time.
Again, on the following day, the timid petition lay on Leonard's table, written in the same tremulous characters. Henrietta had written it again, and again had crept into his chamber and in whatever part of the house the magnate might now be found, he everywhere encountered this pale tremulous figure who pressing her hands together and without uttering a word gazed at him beseechingly, imploringly—only they two knew why.
On the third day Leonard again found the petition and again encountered Henrietta.
This time he spoke to her.
"My dear Henrietta, have you read 'The Mysteries of Paris?'"