Mauprat
lowed this attempt to murder Mademoiselle de Mauprat, you were in a position to hear the words she uttered, either during her delirium or during her lucid intervals?"
"I can give you no information on that point," answered the abbé. "It would be against my inclinations, and, moreover, in my eyes, an outrage on propriety, to repeat words which, in the case of delirium, could prove absolutely nothing, and, if uttered in a lucid moment, could only have been the outpouring of a genuinely filial affection."
"Very good," said the King's advocate, rising. "We shall call upon the Court to deliberate on your refusal of evidence, taking this incident in connection with the main question."
"And I," said the president, "in virtue of my discretionary power, do order that Aubert be meanwhile arrested and taken to prison."
The abbé allowed himself to be led away with unaffected calmness. The spectators were filled with respect, and a profound silence reigned in court, in spite of the bitter efforts of the monks and curés, who continued to revile the heretic in an undertone.
When the various witnesses had been heard (and I must say that those who had been suborned played their part very feebly in public), to crown all, Mademoiselle Leblanc appeared. I was surprised to find the old maid so bitter against me and able to turn her hatred to such account. In truth, the weapons she could bring against me were only too powerful. In virtue of the right which domestics claim to listen at doors and overhear family secrets, this skilled misinterpreter and prolific liar had learnt and shaped to her own purposes most of the facts
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