'Do not
misunderstand what I am going to say next. This is no love-
story; and can have no ending such as romancers love to set to
their tales. But I am bound to mention, Mademoiselle, that this
man who had lived almost all his life about inns and eating-
houses and at the gaming-tables met here for the first time for
years a good woman, and learned by the light of her loyalty and
devotion to see what his life had been, and what was the real
nature of the work he was doing. I think--nay, I know,' I
continued, 'that it added a hundredfold to his misery that when
he learned at last the secret he had come to surprise, he learned
it from her lips, and in such a way that, had he felt no shame,
Hell could have been no place for him. But in one thing I hope
she misjudged him. She thought, and had reason to think, that
the moment he knew her secret he went out, not even closing the
door, and used it. But the truth was that while her words were
still in his ears news came to him that others had the secret;
and had he not gone out on the instant and done what he did, and
forestalled them, M.
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