"No," replied Beauchamp, "I have not considered the question; a totally different subject interests me."
"What is it?"
"The article relative to Morcerf."
"Indeed! Is it not a curious affair?"
"So curious, that I think you are running a great risk of a prosecution for defamation of character."
"Not at all; we have received with the information all the requisite proofs, and we are quite sure M. de Morcerf will keep quiet; besides, it is rendering a service to one's country to denounce those wretches who are unworthy of the honor it bestows on them."
Beauchamp remained thunder-struck.
"Who, then, has so correctly informed you?" asked he; "for my paper, which had announced the subject, has been obliged to stop for want of proof, and yet we are more interested than you in exposing M. de Morcerf, as he is a peer of France, and we are of the opposition."
"Oh! that is very simple; we have not sought to scandalize; this news was brought to us. A man arrived, yesterday, from Janina, bringing the formidable bundle; and as we hesitated to publish the accusatory article, he told us it should be inserted in some other paper. You know, Beauchamp, the value of a bit of important news. We could not let it slip. Now the stroke is made; it is terrible, and will echo through Europe."
Beauchamp understood that nothing remained but to submit, and left the office to dispatch a courier to Morcerf. But what he had been unable to write to Albert, as the events took place after the messenger's departure, was, that the same day, a great agitation was manifest in the House of Peers among the usually calm groups of the noble assembly. Every one had arrived almost before the usual hour, and was conversing on the melancholy event which was to attract the attention of the public toward one of their most illustrious members. Some were reading, in low tones, the article; others making comments and recalling circumstances which substantiated the charges still more.
The Count de Morcerf was no favorite with his colleagues. Like all upstarts, he had had recourse to a great deal of haughtiness to maintain his position. The true nobility laughed at him, the talented repudiated him, and the honorable instinctively despised him. The count was in the terrible position of an expiatory victim; the finger of God once pointed at him, every one was prepared to raise the hue and cry after him.
The Count de Morcerf alone knew nothing. He did not take in the paper containing the defamatory news, and had passed the morning in
