When I come to reflect over the space I have devoted in these memoirs of my life to slight and unimportant circumstances,—the small incidents of a purely personal character,—I feel that I owe my readers an apology for passing rapidly over events of real moment. My excuse, however, is, the events were such as to render my share in them most humble and insignificant. My figure was never a foreground one; and in the great drama that Europe then played, my part was obscure indeed. It is true, I was conversant with stirring themes. I had on many occasions opportunities of meeting with the mighty intelligences that gave the world its destiny for the time; but in no history will there ever be a record of the humble name of Paul Gervois. Such I now found myself called; and the passport delivered to me called me, in addition, “Agent secret.” It is true, I had another, which represented me as travelling for a Dutch commercial house; but the former was the document which, in my interviews with prefects and men in authority, I made use of, and which at once obtained for me protection and respect.

It is well known that the rightful king of France in his exile made a personal appeal by letters to Bonaparte to induce him to devote his genius and influence to the cause of the monarchy. The example of Monk was cited, and the boundless gratitude of royalty pledged on the issue. The fact is history. Of this memorable note I was the bearer. Looking back at the wondrous destiny of that great man, such an overture may easily appear vain and absurd to a degree; but it was by no means so destitute of all chance of success at the time in which it was made. Of this I feel assured, and for the following reason: There was a frequent interchange of letters between the persons attached to the exiled family and leading members of the then French Government. This correspondence was carried on by secret agents, who were suffered to pass freely from capital to capital, and more than once intrusted with even verbal communications. These agents were rigidly instructed to limit themselves strictly to the duty assigned to them, and neither to use their opportunities for personal objects, nor for the acquirement of information on subjects foreign to their mission. They were narrowly watched, and I believe myself that a secret espionage was maintained expressly to observe them. The sudden disappearance of more than one amongst them fully warrants the suspicion that indiscretion had paid its greatest and last penalty.

By the means of these persons, then, a close and compact correspondence was maintained,—a tone of familiarity, and even frankness, was, I am assured, paraded in it; while, in reality, the object of each side was purely treacherous. At one time it was a proposition to some high and leading individual to desert his party and espouse that of its opponents; at another, it was an artful description of the decline of revolutionary doctrines, made purposely to draw from the Royalists some confession of their own future intentions; while, more important than all, there came a letter in Bonaparte's own hand, offering to Louis a sum of several millions of francs, in return for a formal renunciation of all right to that throne from which his destiny seemed sufficiently to exclude him. What a curious page of history will it fill when this secret correspondence shall one day see the light! I know, of my own knowledge, that a great part of it is still in existence, though in the hands of those who have solid reasons for not revealing it.

At the time when I first joined this secret service, the interchange of letters was more than ordinarily great. The momentous change which had taken place in France by the ascendancy of Bonaparte had imparted new hopes to the Royalist party; and they were profuse in their expressions of admiration for the man who of all the world was fated to be the deadliest enemy of their race. Their gratitude was, indeed, boundless,—at least, it transcended the usual limits of the virtue, since it went so far as to betray the cause of the very nation to which they were at the very same moment beholden for a refuge and an asylum! Secret information of the views of the English cabinet; the opinions of statesmen about the policy of the war; the resources, the plans, even the discontents, of the country were all commented on and detailed; while carefully drawn-up statistics were forwarded, setting forth the ships in commission or in readiness for sea, with every circumstance that could render the information valuable.

I know not if the English Government looked with contempt on these intrigues, or whether they themselves did not acquire information more valuable than that they connived at; for assuredly every secret agent was well known to them, and more than one actually in their pay. Of myself, I can boldly say such was not the case. I traversed the Continent, from Hamburg to Naples; I passed freely across Europe in every direction; and on my return to England I met neither molestation nor hindrance, nor did I attract any more attention than an ordinary traveller. If I owed this immunity to a settled plan I had set down for my guidance, it is equally true that it impeded my promotion, and left me in the rank of those who were less secret agents than mere messengers. My plan was to appear totally ignorant of the countries through which I journeyed, neither remarking the events, nor being able to afford any tidings about them. I was not ignorant of the injury this course of action inflicted on my prospects. I saw myself passed over for others of less capacity; I noticed the class with which I was associated as belonging to the humblest members of the walk; and I even overheard myself quoted as unfit for this, and unequal to that. Shall I own at once that the career was distasteful to me in the highest degree? Conceal it how we could, wear what appellation we might, we were only spies; and any estimation we were held in simply depended on whatever abilities we could display in this odious capacity. It was, then, in a sort of compromise with my pride that I stooped to the lowest grade, rather than win my advancement by the low arts of the eavesdropper.

If I seemed utterly incapable of those efforts which depended on tact and worldly skill, my employers freely acknowledged that, as a messenger, I had no equal. No difficulties could arrest my progress; the most arduous journeys I surmounted with ease; the least-frequented roads were all familiar to me. Three, four, and even five days consecutively have I passed in the saddle; and whether over the rude sierras of Spain, the wild paths of the Apennines, or the hot sands of the desert, no fatigue ever compelled me to halt. The Royalist partisans were scattered over the whole globe. Some of them had taken service in the German armies; some were in the Neapolitan service; some had abjured their religion, and were high in command over the Sultan's troops; and many had emigrated to America, where they settled. Wherever they were, whatever cloth they wore, or the flag they were ranged under, they had but one cause and one hope,—the restoration of the Bourbons; and for this were they ever ready to abandon any eminence they might have gained, or any fame or fortune they had acquired, to rally at a moment beneath the banner of him they regarded as their true and rightful sovereign. I knew them well, for I saw them near. Their littleness, their jealousies, their absurd vanity and egregious pretensions, were all well known to me; but many a time have I felt a sort of contemptuous scorn of them repelled by reflecting over the heroic and chivalrous loyalty which bound them to a cause so all but hopeless. If it be asked why I remained in a career so distasteful to me, and served a cause to which no sympathy bound me, my answer is, that I followed it with an object which had engrossed every ambition and every wish of my heart; and this was to find out “my mother” and Raper. I knew that the secrets of my birth were known to them, and that with them alone, of all the world, lay the clew to my family and kindred. While the Count lived, my mother—I cannot call her by any other name—was fearful of revealing circumstances to me, of which he would not suffer any mention in his presence. This barrier was now removed. Besides, I had grown up to manhood, and had a better pretension to ask for the satisfaction of my curiosity.

This was, then, the stimulus that supported me in many a long and weary journey; this the hope that sustained me through every reverse of fortune, and through what is still harder to bear,—the solitude of my lonely, friendless lot. By degrees, however, it began to fail within me; frequent disappointment at last so chilled my ardor that I almost determined to abandon the pursuit forever, and with it a career which I detested. The slightest accident that foreshadowed a prospect of success was still enough to make me change my resolve; and thus I lived on, vacillating now to this side, now to that, and enduring the protracted tortures of expectation.

It was in one of these moments, when despair was in the ascendant, that I received an order to set out for Reichenau and obtain certain papers which had been left there in the keeping of Monsieur Jost, the property of a certain person whose initial was the letter C. I was given to understand that the documents were of great importance, and the mission one to be executed with promptitude. I had almost decided on abandoning this pursuit. The very note in which I should communicate my resignation was begun on the table, when the AbbÉ, who generally was the bearer of my instructions, came to convey this order. He was in a mood of unusual gayety and frankness; and after rallying me on my depression, and jestingly pointing out the great rewards which one day or other would be bestowed upon me, he told me that the tidings from France were of the very best kind, that the insolent airs of Bonaparte were detaching from him many of his stanchest adherents, that Pichegru openly, and Bernadotte secretly, had abandoned him; Davoust had ceased to visit at his house; while Lasalle and others of less note were heard to declare that if they were to have a master, at least it should be one who was born to the station that conferred command.

“We knew,” continued he, joyously, “that we had only to leave this man alone, and he would be his own executioner; and the event has only come a little earlier than we looked for. These papers for which you are now despatched contain a secret correspondence between a great personage and some of the most distinguished generals of the Republic.”

He said much more on this theme,—indeed, he sat late, and talked of nothing else; but I paid little attention to the subject. I had over and over again heard the same observation; and at least a dozen eventful crises had occurred when the Republic was declared in its last struggle, and the cause of the king triumphant.

“I perceive,” said he, at last, “you are less sanguine than I am. Is it not so?”

“You mistake me, Monsieur l'AbbÉ,” said I; “my depression has a selfish origin. I have been long weary of this career of mine, and the note which you see there was the beginning of a formal renunciation of it.”

“It is impossible you could be so insane,” cried he. “You are not one of that vulgar herd that can be scared from a noble duty by a mere name. It is not the word 'spy' that could wound you, enlisted as you are in the noblest cause that ever engaged heroism, and in which the first men of France are your associates.”

“I am no Frenchman, AbbÉ,” said I; “remember that.”

“But you are a good Catholic,” said he, promptly, “and, Ursule tells me, well versed in every duty of the faith.”

I by no means fancied the turn our discussion was likely to take. More than once before had the AbbÉ made allusion to the principles which he hoped might animate me, and which at some future time might obtain for me an admission into his own order; so I hastily changed the topic, by declaring that this journey I should certainly undertake, whatever resolve I might come to for the future.

He had far too much tact to persevere on an unpleasant theme, and after some further allusion to the prospects before me he wished me good-night, and left me. I took my departure the next morning for Hamburg; since latterly some impediments had been thrown in our way about landing in France, and the process of verifying our passports as “agents secrets” occupied much time, and caused delay. On the journey thither I made acquaintance with a young Pole, who, exchanging with me the private signal, showed that he was a “brother of the craft.” He was a fine, dashing, good-looking fellow, with a certain air of pretension and swagger about him that savored more of the adventurer than of the character he wished to assume. He told me that he was the son of the Empress Catherine, and that his father had been a soldier of the Imperial Guard. The story might or might not have been true, but at all events he seemed to believe and was exceedingly vain of it.

With all the secret plotting and political intrigue of the day he appeared quite conversant, and found it difficult to believe in my ignorance or apathy.

“I conceive,” said he, at last, “that you are one of those who feel ashamed of your position, and dislike the word 'spy.' Be it so; it is not a flattering name. But have we not within ourselves the power to extort by force the degree of consideration we would be held in? Any act of insubordination from one or two, or even three of us, would be sure to meet its penalty. That price has been paid before.” [Here he made a significant sign, by rapidly drawing his hand across his throat.] “But if we combined, met at some appointed spot, discussed our rights, and agreed upon the means of asserting them, do you believe that there exists the king or kaiser who could refuse the demand? It is not enough for me that I can pass a frontier by a secret signal, enter a minister's cabinet while others wait in the antechamber, or even ascend the back stairs of a palace. I want a place and a recognition in society; I want that standing in the world to which my habits and manners entitle me, and for which now my hand is ever on the hilt of a rapier or the trigger of a pistol to secure. It is an outrage on us that this has been delayed so long; but if it be deferred a little longer, the remedy will have passed from our hands. Already some of the governments of the Continent begin to suspect that the system works badly.”

“My astonishment is only that it ever could have been permitted,” broke I in; “for it is plain that to know the secrets of others, each country has had to sacrifice its own.”

He gave a smile of supreme contempt, and replied,—

“You are but an apprentice of the trade, after all, Monsieur Gervois, though I have often heard you called a man of tact and shrewdness. Do you not know that we are not the agents of governments or of cabinets, but of those who rule cabinets, dread them, and betray them? The half-dozen crowned heads who rule Europe form a little fraternity apart from all the world. The interests, the passions, the jealousies, and the ambition of the several nations may involve them in wars, compel them to stand in hostility against each other and be what is called great enemies; but while their cannon are thundering and their cavalry charging, while squadrons are crashing and squares are breaking, they for whose sake the blood is shed and life poured forth are calmly considering whether they should gain most by victory or defeat, and how far the great cause—the subjugation of the niasses to the will of one—can be benefited or retarded by any policy they would pursue.”

I need not follow him in his reasonings,—indeed, they were more ingenious and astute than I should be able to convey by repetition. His theory was, that the rulers of states maintained a secret understanding with each other; that however the casualties of fortune should fall heavily on their countries, they themselves should be exempted from such consequences; and that the people might fall, but dynasties should be spared. As long as the Bourbons sat on the throne of France, the compact was a safe and a sure one. The Revolution, however, has broken up the sacred league, and none can tell now what people are next ripe for revolt. As Bonaparte for the moment represents power in France, every effort has been made by the sovereign to draw him into this alliance,—not, of course, to found a dynasty, but to serve the cause of the rightful one. I abstain from entering more fully into his views, or citing the mass of proofs by which he endeavored to sustain them. If not convinced by his arguments, I am free to own that they made a deep impression upon me; rendered more so, perhaps, from the number of circumstances I could myself call to mind which in my own secret service tended to corroborate them.

I asked him whither he was then going, and he told me to Moscow.

“Russia and England meditate a war,” said he, “the two cabinets are embroiled; and I am hastening with an autograph letter from one great personage to another to say with what regret he countersigns a policy so distasteful, and how sincerely he preserves the tie of personal friendship. Believe me,” said he, laughing, “we are the professed traitors of the world; but we are simple-hearted and honest, if weighed in the scale with those who employ us!”

If I was amused by much of what he said, I was also piqued at the tone of superiority he assumed towards me, as he very frankly intimated that by the low estimation in which I held my walk in life I had contrived to make it still meaner and lower.

“It rests with ourselves,” said he, “to be the diplomatists of Europe. Your men who pore over treaties and maps and protocols may plan and scheme to their hearts' content; but we can act. If I choose to change the destination of this letter, and deliver it at Berlin or Vienna; or if I go forward now to Moscow, and convey the answer to Paris, instead of London, do you not suppose that the world would feel it, and to its very centre, too?”

He paused for a minute or two, and then added,—

“You are wondering all this while within yourself why one who knows so well the price of treason has not earned it; and shall I tell you? I am not always aware of the value of my tidings. I may be charged with a secret treaty. It may be a piece of court gossip, the mishap of an archduchess, or the portrait of a court favorite. This very letter—whose contents I believe I know—I am perhaps deceived in. Who can tell, till it be opened, if my treachery be worth a farthing?”

If there was anything wanting to the measure of abhorrence with which I regarded my career, it was amply supplied by such doctrines as these; but probably much of the disgust they were calculated to inspire was lost in the amusement the narrator afforded me. Everything about him bespoke levity rather than systematic rascality; and yet he was one who appeared to have thought profoundly on men and the world.

“I 'll wager a crown,” said he, as we jumped into the boat that was to row us on shore, “that you are fully bent on hiding yourself and your shame in the 'Golden Plover,' or the 'Pilot's Rest,' or some such obscure hotel; but this you shall not for the present. You are my guest while we stay at Hamburg. Unfortunately, the time must needs be brief to both of us. To-morrow we shall be on the road; but to-day is our own.”

I did not consent without reluctance; but he would not take a refusal, and so I yielded; and away we went together to the “Schleswicker Hof,” a magnificent hotel in the finest quarter of the town.

“No need to show your passport to any one,” said he to me, in a whisper, as we entered the house; “I 'll arrange all.”

By the time I had refreshed myself with a bath and dressed, the waiter came to say that Count Ysaffich was waiting dinner for me; and though I gladly would have asked a few particulars of one with whose name and person he seemed evidently acquainted, there was no time allowed me, as he led the way to a splendid apartment, where the table was already spread.

It was not without an effort that I recognized my friend the Count in his change of costume; for, though good-looking and even handsome before, he might now strike the beholder with admiration. He wore a blue military pelisse, richly braided with gold, and fastened with large Brandenburg buttons. It was sufficiently open in front to display a vest of scarlet cloth, all slashed with gold. His trousers were black, with a broad gold band along the sides, while a richly embossed belt of Russia leather supported a sabre of most costly and gorgeous make. He wore several handsome decorations, and around the throat, by a broad blue ribbon, a splendid diamond cross, with the letters “P. C.” in the centre.

“I have not dressed for dinner,” said he, as I entered, “since we must take a stroll under the linden-trees when it grows cool, and have our cigar there. After that, we 'll look in at the opera; and if not very attractive, I 'll present you at one or two houses where they receive of an evening, and where, when you come again, you will be always welcome.”

Since I had gone so far, I resolved to abide by all his arrangements, and suffer him to dispose of my time just as he pleased.

Our dinner was excellent. The Count had bestowed pains in ordering it, and all was of that perfection in cookery for which Hamburg was, and is, so justly famed. Nor was the wine inferior to the rest of the entertainment. Of this the Count appeared to be a connoisseur, and pressed me to taste a dozen different kinds, the very names of which were unknown to me. His conversation, too, was so amusing, so full of strange incidents and adventures, such curious anecdotes, such shrewd remarks, that I was by no means impatient to rise from table.

“I see,” said he, at last, “we are too late for the opera. Hanserlist's reception is also nearly over by this time. Shall we just drop in, then, at Madame von Geysiger's? It is the latest house here, and every one goes there to finish the evening.”

“They are all strangers to me,” I replied, “and I am entirely under your orders.”

“Then Madame von Geysiger's be it,” said he, rising.

As we went along, he told me that the lady to whose house we were going had been, some thirty-five or forty years ago, the great prima donna of Europe. She was also the most celebrated beauty of her time; and by these combined attractions had so captivated a rich merchant of Hamburg that he married her, bequeathing to her on his death-bed the largest fortune of that wealthy city.

“They count it by millions and tens of millions,” said he; “but what matter to us?—at least to me?—for I have been refused by her some half-dozen times; and indeed now am under the heaviest recognizance never to repeat my proposal. If you, however, should like to adventure—”

“Oh, excuse me,” said I, laughing. “Not even all the marcobrunner and champagne I have been drinking could give hardihood for such a piece of impudence.”

“Why not?” cried he. “You are young, good-looking, and of a fashionable exterior. You are a stranger, besides,—and that is a great point; for she is well weary of Hamburg and Hamburgers.”

I stopped him at once by saying that I was by far too conscious of the indignity attached to my career to aspire to the eminence he spoke of.

“And too proud to marry an old woman for her money! Can't you add that?” said he, laughing. “Well, there we differ. I am neither ashamed of the 'espionage,' nor should I be averse to the marriage. To say truth, my dear Gervois, when I have dined in a splendid salon hung round with the best pieces of Cuyp, Wouvermans, and Jansens; when I have seen the dessert set forth in a golden service, of which the great Schnyders over the fireplace was but a faint copy; when I have supped my Mocha out of a SÈvres cup worth more than its full of gold louis, and rested myself on the fairest tapestries of France, with every sense entranced by luxury,—I do find it excessively hard to throw my mantle over my shoulders, and trudge home through the rain and mud to resume the sorry existence that for an hour I had abandoned.”

“There lies the whole question,” said I; “since, for my part, I could not throw off the identity, even under such captivations as you speak of.”

He looked at me very fixedly as I said this,—so fixedly, indeed, that he seemed to feel some apology necessary for it.

“Forgive me,” cried he; “but I could not help staring at the prodigy of a man content to be himself.”

“I have not said that,” replied I. “I only said I was incapable of feeling myself to be any other.”

“You plume yourself upon your birth then, doubtless,” added he; “and so should I, if I knew how to get rid of my father. What were your people: you said they were not French?”

Had the question been put to me half an hour before, as we sat over our wine, I have little doubt that, in the expansiveness of such a situation, I should have told him all that I knew or suspected of my family. The season of confidence, however, had passed. We were walking along a crowded thoroughfare; our talk was desultory, as the objects about were various; and so I coined some history of my family for the occasion, ascribing my birth to a very humble source, and my rank as one of the meanest.

“Your father was, however, English,” said he; “so much you know?”

“Yes,” said I, “that point there is no doubt about.”

“Is he alive?”

“No, he is dead a great many years back.”

“How did he die, or where? Excuse these questions, which I have only to say are not out of idle importunity.”

I own that I did not feel easy under this cross-examination. It might mean more than I liked to avow even to myself. At all events, I resolved, whatever his object, to evade it; and at once gave him some absurd narrative of my father having served in the war of the Low Countries, where he married a Frenchwoman or a Fleming; that he died, of some fever of the country, at a small fishing town on the Dutch coast, leaving me an orphan, since my mother survived him but a few months.

“All this is excellent,” cried he, enthusiastically. “It could not be better by any possibility. Forgive me, Gervois, till I can explain my meaning to you more fully; but what you have just told me has filled my heart with delight. You 'll see how Madame von Geysiger will receive you when she hears this.”

I started back with astonishment. Could it possibly be the case that my stupid story might chime in with the facts of some real history; and should I thus be involved in the web of some tangled incidents in which I had rightfully no share? There was shame and falsehood both in such a situation, and I shrank from it with disgust.

“I will not go to this house, Count,” said I, resolutely. “I foresee that somehow or other an interest would attach to me to which I can lay no claim. Neither Madame von Geysiger, nor any belonging to her, could have known my parents. Their walk in life was of the very humblest.”

“I have not said she did, my dear friend,” said he, soothingly, “nor is it exactly generous to be so suspectful of one whose only feeling towards you is that of kindness and good will. Once for all, if you desire it, I will allude no further to this subject here or elsewhere.”

“On that condition I will accompany you,” said I.

He pressed my hand as if in recognition of the compact, and we entered the house.

There were not above half-a-dozen carriages at the door; but still I could perceive, as we passed through the salons, that a very numerous company was assembled. It was exactly what the Count said,—a rendezvous where all came to wind up the evening; and here were some in all the blaze of diamonds, and in the splendor of full dress; others less magnificently attired, and some again in their walking costume. The suite of rooms then open were not the state ones in use for great occasions, but a ground floor, opening by several doors upon a handsome pleasure ground, that blending of copse and “bosquet,” of terrace and shady alley, which foreigners call an English garden.

Here and there through this, many of the Company lounged and loitered, enjoying the cool of a summer night in preference to the heated and crowded rooms within. We were not long in search of our hostess when she came towards us,—a large, full, but still handsome person, magnificently attired, and with somewhat of what I, at least, fancied the assured air and bearing of the stage.

To the Count she was most cordial; while to me her manner was courteous in the extreme. She regretted that we had not come earlier, and mentioned the names of some one or two distinguished visitors who had just left. After some little conversation on commonplace matters, I joined a party at ombre, a game of which I was fond, and where, fortunately, I found the players satisfied to contend for stakes humble enough for my means. The Count had, meanwhile, given his arm to the hostess, and was making a tour of the company. He appeared to have acquaintance with every one. Indeed, with most it was an easy intimacy; and all saluted him as one they were glad to welcome. I watched him with considerable curiosity, for I own the man was a puzzle to me. At times I half persuaded myself that he was something very much above the condition he assumed; and at other moments I suspected him to be below even that. If he be an impostor, thought I, assuredly there are more dupes than me, and in this very room too. My game soon absorbed my attention, and I ceased to think of or look after him. I know not how long this may have lasted; but I remember, when lifting my head from my cards, I saw straight in front of me Madame von Geysiger steadily contemplating me through her glass, and standing, to do so, in an attitude that implied profound scrutiny. The moment she caught my eye she dropped her “lorgnette,” and hurried away, in what was clear to see was an air of confusion.

It immediately struck me that the Count had broken faith with me, and, whatever his secret scheme, had revealed it to the lady; and, indignant at the treachery, I would have risen at once from the table if I could; as it was, I took the very first opportunity that presented itself, and, by feigning the fatigue of a long journey, I made my excuses and withdrew.

My next care was to leave the house without attracting any notice; and so I mingled with the crowd, and held on my way towards the room by which we had entered. The dense throng interrupted my progress; and in order to make my escape more rapidly, I passed out into the garden, intending to enter the house again by some door lower down. To do so more secretly, I moved into one of the dark alleys, which, after following some time, brought me out upon a little open space, with a small marble fountain spouting its tiny jet in the midst of a clear and starlit pond. Though so near to the house, the spot was still and noiseless, for the thick copse on every side effectually excluded sound. The calming influence of the silence and the delicious freshness of the night air induced me to linger here for a while; and even longer, too, I should have stayed, had not the sound of voices warned me that some persons were approaching. That they might pass without observing me, I stepped hastily into the bosquet, and concealed myself in the thick and leafy cover. My misery and terror may be imagined when I heard my own name uttered, and then perceived that it was the Count and Madame von Geysiger, who now stood within a few feet of where I was, in deep and secret conference.

Not all my training in my odious mode of life had reconciled me to the part of an eavesdropper. Yet what could I do? Should I discover myself, no explanation could possibly account for my situation, nor would any assurances on my part have satisfied them of my ignorance. I will not presume to say that if these were my first thoughts, my second, with some tinge of sophistry, suggested that if treachery were intended me, it would be unpardonable in me to neglect the means of defeating it. There is assuredly a stronger impulse in curiosity, united with fear, than exists in most other incentives; for, reason how I would, it was impossible for me to resist the temptation thus presented to me.

“You mistake him, Anatole,” said the lady; “believe me, you mistake him. I have watched his countenance, and read it carefully as he sat at cards, and my interpretation of him is, that he would never consent.”

“The greater fool he, then,” replied the other. “Take my word for it, his splendid abilities will not stand him in such stead as his mongrel parentage and mongrel tongue. But I do not, cannot, agree with you. It is just possible that so long as the world goes smoothly with him, and no immediate pressure of any kind exists, that he might refuse. But why need that continue? If fortune will deal him bad cards, don't you think we might contrive to shuffle the pack ourselves?”

She muttered something I could not hear, and he quickly rejoined,—

“Even for that I am not unprepared; no, no. Be assured of one thing, he may decline, but will not defy us.”

“I know where your confidence is, Count,” said she; “but that rapier of yours has got you into more trouble than it has ever worked you good.”

“Parbleu, I have no reason to be ungrateful to it!” replied he, laughing; “and, perhaps, with all its rust, it may do some service yet.”

“At all events,” said she, “bethink you well of the consequences before you admit him to any confidence. Remember that when once he is intrusted with our plan, he is the master of our secret, and we are without a remedy.—Pshaw!” said she, scornfully, as if in reply to some gesture on his part; “that remedy may be applied once too often.”

My heart beat fast and full as I heard these words, whose significance there could not be a doubt of, as the same curiosity to discover some clew to the scheme by which I was to be snared was superior to all my fears, and I half resolved, at whatever risk it might cost, to suffer myself to be drawn into the intrigue. They now moved on, and though I could hear their voices stop in low discourse, I could not detect the words they uttered. It was evident that some proposition was to be made to me, the rejection of which on my part might involve me in the greatest peril. With what straining ingenuity did I endeavor to divine what this might be! In all likelihood, it referred to some political intrigue, for which my character as a “secret agent” might seem to adapt me. Yet some of the expressions they had let drop by no means favored this interpretation. What could my “mongrel nationality,” as the Count styled it, avail me in such a conjuncture?

As these thoughts were chasing each other through my mind, I was threading my way through the salons, and at length, to my sincere satisfaction, found myself in the open street. By the time I reached the hotel I had made up my mind to start at once on my mission, without waiting for the Count's arrival. I hastily scratched a few lines of commonplace acknowledgment for his attentions to me, and half-significantly adding that I hoped to express them personally when we met again, wished him a “good journey,” and then set out on my own.

During the rest of that night, and, indeed, for a great part of the following day, I did not feel satisfied with myself for what I had done. It was, indeed, an inglorious mode of escaping from a difficulty, and argued more of fear than resolution. As time wore on, however, I reasoned myself into the notion that against secret treachery, courage and firmness avail little, and if a well-planned scheme was about to environ me, I had done the wisest thing in the emergency.

I suppose the experience of others will bear me out in saying that the actual positive ills of life are more easily endured than the vague and shadowy dangers which seem to hover over the future, and darken the road before us. The calamities that lie in ambush for us are ever present to our thoughts. The hour of our misfortune may be to-day, to-morrow, or the day after. Every chance incident of untoward aspect may herald the bad tidings, and we live in unceasing expectancy of evil. Do what I would, a dreary and despondent gloom now settled on me; I felt as if I were predestined to some grievous misfortune, against which I was utterly powerless, and the hour of which I could neither hasten nor retard. How bitterly I reproached myself for making an acquaintance with the Count! For years I had lived a life of solitary seclusion, avoiding even the commonest forms of acquaintanceship. The shame my calling inspired me with made me reluctant to know those who, perhaps, when they discovered me to be the spy, would have regarded me with aversion! Not that in reality the odious epithet could, with any fairness, be applied to me. My “secret agency” had not risen beyond the mere functions of a messenger; and though at times I was intrusted with verbal communications, they were delivered in confidence of my trustworthiness, and not imparted in any reliance on my skill to improve them; but I cannot stoop to apologize for a condition to which bitter necessity reduced me, and which I clung to as offering the last remnant of hope to find out those who, of all the world, were the only ones who bore me affection.

I have already said that this hope was now fast dying out; repeated disappointment had all but extinguished it; and it was only when the name “Reichenau” had again stirred its almost cold embers that I determined on this last chance ere I abandoned my career forever.