"Yes, I will come in. Stay here, my child, and talk with Georget; but don't talk too loud."
"No, there's no danger of that, monsieur," said Georget; "we understand each other perfectly well simply by looking at each other."
The count entered the room occupied by Roncherolle. A single tallow candle, which was badly in need of snuffing, lighted that room with a dim, uncertain light; it enabled the visitor, however, to distinguish a cheap wall paper, torn or lacking altogether in several places; a window with large cracks, and without curtains, in which one pane was broken, its place being ill supplied by paper; two or three pieces of cheap black walnut furniture; a painted cot, on which was a coarse flock bed and a very thin mattress; on the mantel, a small mirror in a wooden frame, and on the hearth two tiny bits of wood, which were hardly burning.
Everything in that abode indicated poverty and privation; and the cold that one felt there, the wind that one could hear whistling in all directions, heightened the melancholy impression which one was certain to feel at finding an invalid in such a place.
Monsieur de Brévanne noticed and scrutinized everything; then he walked to the bed and gazed at Roncherolle, whose features were more than ever changed by suffering and want, and who, even in his sleep, seemed to be struggling with pain.
"The wretched man!" said the count to himself; "is this what the future seemed to promise him? Endowed with every advantage, possessor of a handsome fortune, this is what his passions have brought him to!—It is all over; I can think no more of the vengeance which I was determined to wreak upon him; heaven has undertaken that duty; and besides, I should not have the courage to deprive Violette of her father; I do not know whether men will blame me, but something tells me that the time has come to forgive."
Roncherolle moved in his sleep, and the count instantly left the room and joined the two young sweet-hearts, who had not found the time long.
"Well, monsieur, you have seen him," said Violette; "is he really the man whom you used to know?"
"Yes, my child; but not a word about my visit!"
"Oh! have no fear, monsieur."