"My name is Ernest de La Briere, related to the
family of the late cabinet minister, and his private secretary during
his term of office. On his dismissal, his Excellency put me in the
Court of Claims, to which I am legal counsel, and where I may possibly
succeed as chief--"
"And how does all this concern Mademoiselle de La Bastie?" asked the
count.
"Monsieur, I love her; and I have the unhoped-for happiness of being
loved by her. Hear me, monsieur," cried Ernest, checking a violent
movement on the part of the angry father. "I have the strangest
confession to make to you, a shameful one for a man of honor; but the
worst punishment of my conduct, natural enough in itself, is not the
telling of it to you; no, I fear the daughter even more than the
father."
Ernest then related simply, and with the nobleness that comes of
sincerity, all the facts of his little drama, not omitting the twenty
or more letters, which he had brought with him, nor the interview
which he had just had with Canalis. When Monsieur Mignon had finished
reading the letters, the unfortunate lover, pale and suppliant,
actually trembled under the fiery glance of the Provencal.
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