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Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
1. A class is an example of a structured data type.
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: True
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 652
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

2. In C++, class is a reserved word and it defines only a data type.

a. True
b. False
ANSWER: True
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 653
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

3. If the heading of a member function of a class ends with the word const, then the function member cannot modify the
private member variables, but it can modify the public member variables.
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: False
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 655
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

4. In C++ terminology, a class object is the same as a class instance.

a. True
b. False
ANSWER: True
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 656
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 1
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

5. Given this declaration:

class myClass
{
public:
void print(); //Output the value of x;
MyClass();

private:
int x;
};

myClass myObject;

The following statement is legal.

myObject.x = 10;
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: False
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 657
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/30/2016 12:12 PM

6. If an object is declared in the definition of a member function of the class, then the object can access both the public
and private members of the class.
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: True
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 657
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

7. If an object is created in a user program, then the object can access both the public and private members of the
class.
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: False
POINTS: 1

Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 2

Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
REFERENCES: 657
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

8. You can use arithmetic operators to perform arithmetic operations on class objects.
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: False
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 659
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

9. As parameters to a function, class objects can be passed by reference only.

a. True
b. False
ANSWER: False
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 660
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

10. The public members of a class must be declared before the private members.
a. True
b. False
ANSWER: False
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 670
QUESTION TYPE: True / False
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

11. The components of a class are called the ____ of the class.
a. elements b. members
c. objects d. properties
ANSWER: b
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 3
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 652
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

12. Which of the following class definitions is correct in C++?

a. class studentType
{
public:
void setData(string, double, int);
private:
string name;
};

b. class studentType
{
public:
void setData(string, double, int);
void print() const;
private:
string name;
double gpa;
}

c. class studentType
{
public void setData(string, double, int);
private string name;
};

d. studentType class
{
public: void setData(string, double, int);
private: string name;
};

ANSWER: a
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 654
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

13. If a member of a class is ____, you cannot access it outside the class.
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 4
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
a. public b. automatic
c. private d. static
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 654
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

14. A class and its members can be described graphically using a notation known as the ____ notation.
a. OON b. OOD
c. UML d. OOP
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 656
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

clockType
-hr: int
-min: int
-sec: int
+setTime(int, int, int): void
+getTime(int&, int&, int&) const: void
+printTime() const: void
+incrementSeconds(): int
+incrementMinutes(): int
+incrementHours(): int
+equalTime(const clockType&) const: bool

15. The word ____ at the end of several the member functions in the accompanying figure class clockType specifies
that these functions cannot modify the member variables of a clockType object.
a. static b. const
c. automatic d. private
ANSWER: b
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 655
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: clockType definition
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 5
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10

16. Consider the UML class diagram shown in the accompanying figure. Which of the following is the name of the class?
a. clock b. clockType
c. Type d. +clockType
ANSWER: b
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 656
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: clockType definition
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

17. Consider the UML class diagram shown in the accompanying figure. According to the UML class diagram, how many
private members are in the class?
a. none b. zero
c. two d. three
ANSWER: d
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 656
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: clockType definition
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

18. A ____ sign in front of a member name on a UML diagram indicates that this member is a public member.
a. + b. -
c. # d. $
ANSWER: a
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 656
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

19. A ____ sign in front of a member name on a UML diagram indicates that this member is a protected member.
a. + b. -
c. # d. $
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 656
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 6
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

class rectangleType
{
public:
void setLengthWidth(double x, double y);
//Postcondition: length = x; width = y;
void print() const;
//Output length and width;
double area();
//Calculate and return the area of the rectangle;
double perimeter();
//Calculate and return the parameter;
rectangleType();
//Postcondition: length = 0; width = 0;
rectangleType(double x, double y);
//Postcondition: length = x; width = y;

private:
double length;
double width;
};

20. Consider the accompanying class definition. Which of the following variable declarations is correct?
a. rectangle rectangleType;
b. class rectangleType rectangle;
c. rectangleType rectangle;
d. rectangle rectangleType.area;
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 657
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: rectangleType class
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

21. Consider the accompanying class definition, and the declaration:

rectangleType bigRect;

Which of the following statements is correct?

a. rectangleType.print(); b. rectangleType::print();
c. bigRect.print(); d. bigRect::print();
ANSWER: c
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 7
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 657
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: rectangleType class
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

22. Consider the accompanying class definition, and the object declaration:

rectangleType bigRect(14,10);

Which of the following statements is correct?

a. bigRect.setLengthWidth();
b. bigRect.setLengthWidth(3.0, 2.0);
c. bigRect.length = 2.0;
d. bigRect.length = bigRect.width;
ANSWER: b
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 658
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: rectangleType class
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

23. In C++, the ____ is called the member access operator.

a. . b. ,
c. :: d. #
ANSWER: a
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 657
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

24. A class object can be ____. That is, it is created each time the control reaches its declaration, and destroyed when
the control exits the surrounding block.
a. static b. automatic
c. local d. public
ANSWER: b
POINTS: 1

Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 8

Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
REFERENCES: 660
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

25. A class object can be ____. That is, it can be created once, when the control reaches its declaration, and destroyed
when the program terminates.
a. static b. automatic
c. local d. public
ANSWER: a
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 660
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

26. In C++, you can pass a variable by reference and still prevent the function from changing its value by using the
keyword ____ in the formal parameter declaration.
a. automatic b. private
c. static d. const
ANSWER: d
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 660
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

27. In C++, the scope resolution operator is ____.

a. : b. ::
c. $ d. .
ANSWER: b
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 662
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

28. A member function of a class that only accesses the value(s) of the data member(s) is called a(n) ____ function.
a. accessor b. mutator

Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 9

Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
c. constructor d. destructor
ANSWER: a
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 666
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

29. To guarantee that the member variables of a class are initialized, you use ____.
a. accessors b. mutators
c. constructors d. destructor
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 671
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

class secretType
{
public:
static int count;
static int z;

secretType();
secretType(int a);
void print();
static void incrementY();

private:
int x;
static int y;
};

secretType::secretType()
{
x = 1;
}

secretType::secretType(int a)
{
x = a;
}

void secretType::print()
{
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 10
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
cout << "x = " << x << ", y = " << y
<< "z = " << z
<< ", count = " << count << endl;
}

static void secretType::incrementY()

{
y++;
}

30. Consider the accompanying class and member functions definitions. How many constructors are present in the class
definition?
a. none b. one
c. two d. three
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 672
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
PREFACE NAME: secretType class
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

31. How many destructors can a class have?

a. no explicit destructors b. one
c. two d. any number
ANSWER: b
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 681
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/30/2016 12:15 PM

32. A destructor has the character ____, followed by the name of the class.
a. . b. ::
c. # d. ˜
ANSWER: d
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 681
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 11

Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
33. What does ADT stand for?
a. abstract definition type b. asynchronous data transfer
c. abstract data type d. alternative definition type
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 682
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

34. Which of the following is true about classes and structs?

a. By default, all members of a struct are public and all members of a class are private.
b. A struct variable is passed by value only, and a class variable is passed by reference only.
c. An assignment operator is allowed on class variables, but not on struct variables.
d. You cannot use the member access specifier private in a struct.
ANSWER: a
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 685
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

35. If a function of a class is static, it is declared in the class definition using the keyword static in its ____.
a. return type b. parameters
c. heading d. main function
ANSWER: c
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 701
QUESTION TYPE: Multiple Choice
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

36. With ____________________ functions, the definitions of the member functions are placed in the implementations
file.
ANSWER: inline
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 700
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 12
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
DATE MODIFIED: 10/30/2016 12:22 PM

37. If a class object is passed by ____________________, the contents of the member variables of the actual parameter
are copied into the corresponding member variables of the formal parameter.
ANSWER: value
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 660
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

38. Non-static member variables of a class are called the ____________________ variables of the class.
ANSWER: instance
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 666
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

39. A program or software that uses and manipulates the objects of a class is called a(n) ____________________ of that
class.
ANSWER: client
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 666
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

40. A(n) ____________________ function of a class changes the values of the member variable(s) of the class.
ANSWER: mutator
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 666
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

41. A(n) ____________________ contains the definitions of the functions to implement the operations of an object.
ANSWER: implementation file
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 686
Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 13
Name: Class: Date:

Chapter 10
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

42. The header file is also known as the ____________________.

ANSWER: interface file
interface
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 686
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

43. A(n) ____________________ is a statement specifying the condition(s) that must be true before the function is called.
ANSWER: precondition
POINTS: 1
REFERENCES: 687
QUESTION TYPE: Completion
HAS VARIABLES: False
DATE CREATED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM
DATE MODIFIED: 10/5/2016 1:41 PM

Copyright Cengage Learning. Powered by Cognero. Page 14

Other documents randomly have
different content
 “You do indeed suffer,” said she, informed of his state by the contact of
his hand alone.
“Yes, and I come to you for consolation. You alone can save me. Can
you follow me—— ”
“Yes, if you conduct me with your mind.”
“Come!”
“Ah,” said Andrea, “we are in Paris—a street lit by a single lamp—we
enter a house—we go up to the wall which opens to let us pass through. We
are in so strange a chamber, with no doors and the windows are barred.
How greatly in disorder is everything!”
“But it is empty? where is the person who was there last?”
“Give me some object of hers that I may be in touch.”
“This is a lock of her hair.”
Andrea laid the hair on her bosom.
“Oh, I know this woman, whom I have seen before—she is fleeing into
the city.”
“Yes; but what was she doing these two hours before? Trace back.”
“Wait: she is lying on a sofa with a cut in the breast. She wakes from a
sleep, and seeks round her. Taking a handkerchief she ties it to the window
bars. Come down, poor woman! She weeps, she is in distress, she wrings
her arms—ah! she is looking for a corner of the wall on which to dash out
her brains. She springs towards the chimney-place where two lion heads in
marble are embossed. On one of them she would beat out her brains when
she sees a spot of blood on the lion’s eye. Blood, and yet she had not struck
it?”
“It is mine,” said the mesmerist.
“Yes, yours. You cut your fingers with a dagger, the dagger with which
she stabbed herself and you tried to get it away from her. Your bleeding
fingers pressed the lion’s head.”
“It is true: how did she get out?”
“I see her examine the blood, reflect, and then lay her finger where yours
was pressed. Oh, the lion’s head gives way—it is a spring which works: the
chimney-plate opens.”
 “Cursed imprudence of mine,” groaned the conspirator: “unhappy
madman! I have betrayed myself through love. But she has gone out and
flees?”
“The poor thing must be pardoned, she is so distressed.”
“Whither goes she, Andrea? follow, follow, I will it!”
“She stops in a room where are armor and furs: a safe is open but a
casket usually kept in it is now on a table: she knows it again. She takes it.”
“What is in it?”
“Your papers. It is covered with blue velvet and studded with silver, the
lock and bands are of the same metal.”
“Ha! was it she took the casket?” cried Balsamo, stamping his foot.
“Yes, she. Going down the stairs to the anteroom, she opens the door,
draws the chain undoing the street door and is out in the street.”
“It is late?”
“It is nighttime. Once out, she runs like a mad thing up on the main
street towards the Bastile. She knocks up against passengers and questions.”
“Lose not a word—what does she say?”
“She asks a man clad in black where she can find the Chief of Police.”
“So it was not a vain threat of hers. What does she do?”
“Having the address, she retraces her steps to cross a large square—— ”
“Royale Place—it is the right road. Read her intention.”
“Run, run quick! she is going to denounce you—if she arrives at
Criminal Lieutenant Sartine’ before you, you are lost!”
Balsamo uttered a terrible yell, sprang into the hedges, burst a small
door, and got upon the open ground. There an Arab horse was waiting, on
which he leaped at a bound. It started off like an arrow towards Paris.
Andrea stood mute, pale, and cold. But as though the magnetiser carried
life away with him, she collapsed and fell. In his eagerness to overtake
Lorenza, Balsamo had forgotten to arouse Andrea from the mesmeric sleep.
She had barely touched the ground before Gilbert leaped out with the
vigor and agility of the tiger. He seized her in his arms and without feeling
what a burden he had undertaken, he carried her back to the room which she
had left on the call of Balsamo.
 All the doors had been left open by the girl, and the candle was still
burning.
As he stumbled against the sofa when he blundered in, he naturally
placed her upon it. All became enfevered in him, though the lifeless body
was cold. His nerves shivered and his blood burned.
Yet his first idea was pure and chaste: it was to restore consciousness to
this beautiful statue. He sprinkled her face with water from the decanter.
But at this period, as his trembling hand was encircling the narrow neck
of the crystal bottle, he heard a firm but light step make the stairs of wood
and brick squeak on the way to the chamber.
It could not be Nicole who was on the way with Beausire or Balsamo
who was galloping to Paris.
Whoever it was, Gilbert would be caught and expelled from the palace.
He fully comprehended that he was out of his place here. He blew out
the candle and dashed into Nicole’s room, timing his movement as the
thunder boomed in the heavens.
Through its glazed door he could see into the room he quitted and the
anteroom.
In this latter burnt a night-light on a small table. Gilbert would have put
that out also if he had time, but the steps creaked now on the landing. A
man appeared on the sill, timidly glided through the antechamber, and shut
the door which he bolted.
Gilbert held his breath, glued his face to the glass and listened with all
his might.
The storm growled solemnly in the skies, large raindrops spattered on
the windows, and in the corridor, an unfastened shutter banged sinisterly
against the wall from time to time.
But the tumult of nature, these exterior sounds, however alarming, were
nothing to Gilbert: all his thought, mind and being were concentrated in his
gaze, fastened on this man.
Passing within two paces, this intruder walked into the other room.
Gilbert saw him grope his way up to the bed, and make a gesture of surprise
at finding it untenanted. He almost knocked the candle off the table with his
elbow; but it fell on the table where the glass save-all jingled on the marble
top.
 “Nicole,” the stranger called twice, in a guarded voice.
“Why, Nicole?” muttered Gilbert. “Why does this man call on Nicole
when he ought to address her mistress?”
No voice replying, the man picked up the candle and went on tiptoe to
light it at the night-lamp.
Then it was that Gilbert’s attention was so concentrated on this strange
night visitor that his eyes would have pierced a wall.
Suddenly he started and drew back a step although he was in
concealment.
By the light of the two flames he had recognized in the man holding the
candle—the King! All was clear to him: the flight of Nicole, the money
counted down between her and Beausire, and all the dark plot of Richelieu
and Taverney of which Andrea was the object.
He understood why the King should call upon Nicole, the complaisant
female Judas who had sold her mistress.
At the thought of what the royal villain had come to commit in this
room, the blood rushing to the young man’s head blinded him.
He meant to call out; but the reflection that this was the Lord’s anointed,
the being still full of awe as the King of France—that froze the tongue of
Gilbert to his mouth-roof.
Meanwhile, Louis XV. entered the room once more, bearing the light. He
perceived Andrea, in the white muslin wrapper, with her head thrown back
on the sofa pillow, with one foot on another cushion and the other, cold and
stiff, out of the slipper, on the carpet.
At this sight the King smiled. The candle lit up this evil smile; but
almost instantly a smile as sinister lighted up Andrea’s face.
Louis uttered some words, probably of love; and placing the light on the
table, he cast a glance out at the enflamed sky, before kneeling to the girl,
whose hand he kissed.
This was so chilly that he took it between both his to warm it, and with
his other arm enclasping the soft and so beautiful body, he bent over to
murmur some of the loving nonsense fitted for sleeping maids. His face was
so close to hers that it touched it.
Gilbert felt in his pocket for a knife with a long blade which he used in
pruning trees.
 The face was as cold as the hand, which made the royal lover rise; his
eyes wandered to the Cinderella foot, which he took hold of—it was as cold
as the hand and the cheek. He shuddered for all seemed a marble statue.
Gilbert gritted his teeth and opened the knife, as he beheld so much
beauty and regarded the royal threat as a robbery intended on him.
But the King dropped the foot as he had the hand. Surprised at the sleep
which he had thought to be feigned in prudery by a coquet, he prepared to
learn the nature of this insensibility.
Gilbert crept half way out of the doorway, with set teeth, glittering eye
and the knife bared in his grip to stab the King.
Suddenly a frightful flash of lightning lit up Andrea’s face with a vivid
glare of violet and sulphur light while the thunder made every article of
furniture dance in the room. Frightened by her pallor, immobility and
silence, Louis XV. recoiled, muttering:
“Truly the girl is dead!”
The idea of having wooed a corpse sent a shudder through his veins. He
took up the candle and looked at Andrea by its flickering flame. Seeing the
brown-circled eyes, the violet lips, the disheveled tresses, the throat which
no breath raised, he uttered a shriek, let the candlestick fall, and staggered
out through the antechamber like a drunken man, knocking against the
wainscotting in his alarm.
Knife still in hand, Gilbert came out of his covert. He advanced to the
room door and for a space contemplated the lovely young maid still in the
profound sleep.
The candle smouldering on the floor lit up the delicate foot and the pure
lines above it of the adorable creature.
Gilbert trod on the wick and in sudden obscurity was blotted out the
dreadful smile which was curling his lips.
“Andrea,” he muttered, “I swore that you should not escape me the third
time that you fell into my hands as you did the other two. Andrea, a terrible
end was needed to the romance which you mocked at me for composing!”
With extended arms he walked towards the sofa where the girl was still
cold, motionless and deprived of all feeling.
 CHAPTER XXVI.

SARTINES BELIEVES BALSAMO IS A MAGICIAN.

THE mesmerist had galloped on the barb through Versailles in a few

seconds and a league on the road to Paris when an idea came as comfort in
the midst of his misery at the fear that all he did would be too late. He saw
his brothers of the secret society at the mercy of his foes, and the woman
who caused all this, through his infatuation for her, going free.
“Oh, if ever she returns into my power—— ”
He made a desperate gesture, as he pulled up the splendid horse short on
its haunches.
“Let me see,” he said, frowning, “is silence a word or a fact? can it do or
not do? let me try my will, again. Lorenza,” he said while making the
passes to throw the magnetic fluid to a distance, “Lorenza, sleep, I will it!
Wherever you are, sleep, I will it, and rely upon it. Cleave the air, oh, my
supreme will! cross all the currents antipathetic or indifferent; go through
the walls like a cannonball; strike her and annihilate her will. Lorenza, I
will have you sleep—I will have you mute!”
After this mighty effort of animal magnetism, he resumed the race, but
used neither whip nor spur and gave the Arab rein.
It appeared as if he wanted to make himself believe in the potency of the
spell he exercised.
While he was apparently peacefully proceeding, he was framing a plan
of action. It was finished as he reached the paving stones of Sevres. He
stopped at the Park gates as if he expected somebody. Almost instantly a
man emerged from a coach-doorway and came to him.
It was his German attendant Fritz.
“Have you gathered information?” asked the master.
“Yes, Lady Dubarry is in Paris.”
Balsamo raised a triumphant glance to heaven.
“How did you come?”
 “On Sultan, now ready saddled in the inn stables here.”
He went for the horse and came back on its back.
Balsamo was writing under the lantern of the town tax-gatherer’s office
door with a pen which was self-fed with ink.
“Ride back to town with this note,” said he, “to be given to Lady
Dubarry herself. Do it in half an hour. Then get home to St. Claude street,
where you will await Signora Lorenza, who will soon be coming home. Let
her pass without staying her or saying anything.”
At the same time he said “He would!” Fritz laid spur and whip on
Sultan, who sprang off, astonished at this unaccustomed aggression, with a
painful neigh.
Balsamo rode on by the Paris Road, entering the capital in three quarters
of an hour, almost smooth of face and calm in eye—if not a little
thoughtful.
The mesmerist had reasoned correctly: as rapid as Dejerrid the steed
might be, it was not as swift as the will, and that alone could outstrip
Lorenza escaped from her prison-house.
As Andrea—the other medium had clearly seen, the vengeful Italian had
found her way to the residence of Lieutenant Sartines.
Questioned by an usher, she replied merely by these words:
“Are you Lord Sartines?”
The servant was surprised that this young and lovely woman, richly
clothed and carrying a velvet-covered casket under her arm, should confuse
his black coat and steel chain of office with the embroidered coat and
perriwig of the Lieutenant of Police, though a foreigner. But as a lieutenant
is never offended at being called a captain, and as the speaker’s eye was too
steady and assured to be a lunatic’s, he was convinced that she brought
something of value in the casket and showed her into the secretaries.
The upshot of all was that she was allowed to see the Minister of Police.
He sat in an octagonal room, lighted by a number of candles.
Sartines was a man of fifty, in a dressing gown, and enormous wig, limp
with curling and powder; he sat before a desk with looking-glass panels
enabling him to see any one coming into the study without having to turn
and study their faces before arranging his own.
 The lower part of the desk formed a secretary where were kept in
drawers his papers and those in cipher which could not be read even after
his death, unless in some still more secret drawer were found the key to the
cipher. This piece of mechanism was built expressly for the Regent Duke of
Orleans to keep his poisons in, and it came to Sartines from his Prime
Minister Cardinal Dubois per the late Chief of Police. Rumor had it that it
contained the famous contract called the “Compact of Famine,” the statutes
of the Great Grain Ring among the directors of which figured Louis XV.
So the Police Chief saw in this mirror the pale and serious face of
Lorenza as she advanced with the casket under her arm.
“Who are you—what do you want?” he challenged without looking
round.
“Am I in the presence of Lord Sartines, Head of the Police?”
“Yes,” he curtly answered.
“What proof have I of that?” she asked.
This made him turn round.
“Will it be good proof if I send you to prison?”
She did not reply but looked round for the seat which she expected to be
offered her by right, as to any lady of her country. He was vanquished by
that single look for Count Alby de Sartines was a well-bred gentleman.
“Take a chair,” he said brusquely.
Lorenza drew an armchair to her and sat down.
“Speak quick,” said the magistrate; “what do you want?”
“To place myself under your protection,” answered Lorenza.
“Ho, ho,” said he with a jeering look, peculiar to him.
“My lord, I have been abducted from my family and forced into a
clandestine marriage by a man who has been ill-using me during three years
and would be my death.”
He looked at the noble countenance and was moved by the voice so
sweet that it seemed to sing.
“Where do you come from?” he asked.
“I am a Roman and my name is Lorenza Feliciani.”
“Are you a lady of rank, for I do not know the name?”
 “I am a lady and I crave justice on the man who has incarcerated and
sequestrated me.”
“This is not in my province, since you say you are his wife.”
“But the marriage was performed while I was asleep.”
“Plague on it! you must enjoy sound sleep! I mean to say that this is not
in my way. Apply to a lawyer, for I never care to meddle in these
matrimonial squabbles.” He waved his hand as much as to say “Be off!” but
she did not stir.
“I have not finished;” she said “you will understand that I have not come
here to speak of frivolities, but to have revenge. The women of my country
revenge and do not go to law.”
“This is different,” said Sartines: “but have despatch for my time is
dear.”
“I told you that I come for protection against my oppressor. Can I have
it?”
“Is he so powerful?”
“More so than any King.”
“Pray, explain, my dear lady: why should I accord you my protection
against a man according to your statement more powerful than a king, for a
deed which may not be a crime. If you want to be revenged, take revenge,
only do not bring yourself under our laws; if you do a misdeed it will be
you whom I must arrest. Then we shall see all about it. That is the bargain.”
“No, my lord, you will not arrest me, for my revenge is of great utility to
you, the King and France. I revenge myself by revealing the secrets of this
monster.”
“Ha, this man has secrets,” said Sartines interested perforce.
“Great political secrets, my lord. But will you shield me?”
“What kind of shield?” coldly asked the magistrate; “silver or official?”
“I want to enter a convent, to live buried there, forgotten. I want a living
tomb which will never be violated by any one.”
“You are not asking much. You shall have the convent. Speak!”
“As I have your word, take this casket,” said Lorenza; “it contains
mysteries which will make you tremble for the safety of the sovereign and
the realm. I know them but superficially but they exist, and are terrible.”
 “Political mysteries, you say?”
“Have you ever heard of the great secret society?”
“The Freemasons?”
“These are the Invisibles.”
“Yes; I do not believe in them, though.”
“When you open this box, you will.”
“Let us look into it then,” he said, taking the casket from her; but,
reflecting, he placed it on his desk. “No, I would rather you opened it
yourself,” he added with distrust.
“I have not the key,” she replied.
“Not got the key? you bring me a box containing the fate of an empire
and you forget the key?”
“Is it so hard to open a lock?”
“Not when one knows the sort it is.”
He held out to her a bunch of keys in every shape. As she took it, he
noticed that her hand was cold as stone.
“Why did you not bring the key with you?” he asked.
“Because the master of the casket never lets it go from him.”
“This is the man more powerful than the King?”
“Nobody can tell what he is; eternity alone knows how long he has lived.
None but the God above can see the deeds he commits.”
“But his name, his name?’
“He has changed it to my knowledge a dozen times—I knew him as
Acharat.”
“And he lives—— ”
“Saint—— ”
Suddenly Lorenza started, shuddered, let the casket and the keys fall
from her hands. She made an effort to speak, but her mouth only was
contorted in a painful convulsion; she clapped her hands to her throat as if
the words about to issue were stopped and choked her. Then, lifting her
arms to heaven, trembling and unable to articulate a word, she fell full
length on the carpet.
 “Poor dear!” muttered Sartines: “but what the devil is the matter with
her? she is really very pretty. There is some jealousy in this talk of
revenge.”
He rang for the servants while he lifted up the Italian, who seemed with
her astonished eyes and motionless lips, to be dead and far detached from
this world.
“Carry out this lady with care,” he commanded to the two valets; “and
leave her in the next room. Try to bring her to, but mind, no roughness.
Go!”
Left alone, Sartines examined the box like a man who could value fully
the discovery. He tried the keys until convinced that the lock was only a
sham. Thereupon with a cold chisel he cut it off bodily. Instead of the
fulminating powder or the poison which he perhaps expected, to deprive
France of her most important magistrate, a packet of papers bounded up.
The first words which started up before his eyes were the following,
traced in a disguised hand:
“It is time for the Grand Master to drop the name of Baron Balsamo.”
There was no signature other than the three letters “L. P. D.”
“Aha,” said the head of police, “though I do not know this writing I
believe I know this name. Balsamo—let us look among the B’s.”
Opening one of the twenty-four drawers of the famous desk, he took out
a little register on which was written in fine writing three or four hundred
names, preceded, accompanied or followed by flourishes of the pen.
“Whew! we have a lot about this busy B,” he muttered.
He read several pages with non-equivocal tokens of discontent.
He replaced the register in the drawer to go on with inventorying the
contents of the packet. He did not go far without being deeply impressed.
Soon he came to a note full of names with the text in cipher. This appeared
important to him; the edges were worn with fingering and pencil marks
were made on the margin.
Sartines rang a bell for a servant to whom he said:
“Bring me the Chancellor’s cryptographist at once, going through the
offices to gain time.”
Two minutes subsequently, a clerk presented himself, with pen in hand,
his hat under one arm, and a large book under the other. Seeing him in the
mirror, Sartines held out the paper to him over his shoulders, saying:
“Decipher that.”
This unriddler of secret writing was a little thin man, with puckered up
lips, brows bent by searching study; his pale face was pointed up and down,
and the chin quite sharp, while the deep moony eyes became bright at times.
Sartines called him his Ferret.
Ferret sat down modestly on a stool, drew his knees close together to be
a table to write upon, and wrote, consulting his memory and his lexicon
with an impassible face. In five minutes time he had written:
“Order to gather 3000 Brothers in Paris.
“Order to compose three circles and six lodges.
“Order to select a guard for the Grand Copt, and to provide four
residences for him, one to be in a royal domicile.
“Order to set aside five hundred thousand francs for his police
department.
“Order to enroll in the first Parisian lodge all the cream of literature and
philosophy.
“Order to bribe or in some way get a hold on the magistracy, and
particularly make sure of the Chief of Police, by bribery, violence or
trickery.”
Ferret stopped at this passage, not because the poor man reflected but
because he had to wait for the page to dry before he could turn over.
Sartines, being impatient, snatched the sheet from his knees and read it.
Such an expression of terror spread over his features at the final paragraph,
that it made him turn pale to see himself in the glass. He did not hand this
sheet back to the clerk but passed him a clean one.
The man went on with his work, accomplishing it with the amazing
rapidity of decipherers when once they hold the key.
Sartines now read over his shoulder.
“Drop the name of Balsamo beginning to be too well known, to take that
of Count Fe—— ”
A blot of ink eclipsed the rest of the name.
At the very time when the Police Chief was seeking the absent letters,
the out-door bell rang and a servant came in to announce:
 “His Lordship, Count Fenix!”
Sartines uttered an outcry, and clasped his hands above his wig at risk of
demolishing that wonderful structure. He hastened to dismiss the writer by
a side door, while, taking his place at his desk, he bade the usher show in
the visitor.
In his mirror, a few seconds after, Sartines saw the stern profile of the
count as he had seen him on the day when Lady Dubarry was presented at
court.
Balsamo-Fenix entered without any hesitation whatever.
Sartines rose, made a cold bow, and sat himself ceremoniously down
again, crossing his legs.
At the first glance he had seen what was the object of this interview. At a
glance also Balsamo had seen the opened casket on the desk. His glance,
however fleeting, had not escaped the magistrate.
“To what chance do I owe this visit, my lord?” inquired the Chief of
Police.
“My Lord,” returned Balsamo with a smile full of amenity, “I have
found introducers to all the sovereigns of Europe, all their ministers and
ambassadors: but none to present me to your lordship; so I have presented
myself.”
“You arrive most timely, my lord,” replied Sartines: “For I am inclined
to think that if you had not called I should have had to send for you.”
“Indeed—how nicely this chimes in.”
Sartines bowed with a satirical smile.
“Am I happy enough to be useful to your lordship?” queried Balsamo.
These words were pronounced without a shade of emotion or disquiet
clouding the smiling brow.
“You have travelled a good deal, count,” said the Police Chief.
“A great deal! I suppose you want for some geographical items. A man
of your capacity is not cramped up in France but must embrace Europe and
the world—— ”
“Not geographical, my lord, but personal—— ”
“Do not restrict yourself; in both, I am at your orders.”
 “Well, count, just imagine that I am looking after a very dangerous man,
in faith, who seems to be an atheist, conspirator, forger, adulterer, coiner,
charlatan, and chief of a secret league; whose history I have on my records
and in this casket, which your lordship sees.”
“I understand,” said Balsamo; “you have the story but not the man. Hang
it, that seems to me the more important matter.”
“No doubt: but you will see presently how near he is to our hand.
Certainly, Proct Proteon Proteus had not more shapes, Jupiter more names:
Acharat in Egypt, Balsamo in Italy, Somini in Sardinia, the Marquis of
Anna in Malta, Marquis Pellegrini in Corsica, and lastly, Count Fe—this
last name I have not been able to make out; but I am almost sure that you
will help me to it for you must have met this man in the course of your
travels in the countries I have mentioned. I suppose, though, you would
want some kind of description?”
“If your lordship pleases?”
“Well,” continued Sartines, fixing on the other an eye which he
endeavored to make like an inquisitor’s, “he is a man of your age and
stature, and bearing; sometimes a mighty nobleman distributing gold, or a
charlatan seeking natural secrets, or a dark conspirator allied to the
mysterious brotherhood which has vowed in darkness the death of kings
and the downfall of thrones.”
“This is vague,” replied Balsamo, “and you cannot guess how many men
I have met who would answer to this description! You will have to be more
precise if you want my help. In the first place, which is his country by
preference?”
“He lives everywhere at home.”
“But at present?”
“In France, where he directs a vast conspiracy.”
“This is a good piece of intelligence. If you know what conspiracy he
directs you have one end of a clew in your hands which will lead you up to
the man.”
“I am of your opinion.”
“If you believe so, why do you ask my advice? It is useless.”
“It is because I am debating whether or not to arrest him.”
“I do not understand the Not, my lord, for if he conspires—— ”
 “But he is in a measure protected by his title—— ”
“Ah, now I follow you. But by what title? Needless to say that I shall be
glad to aid you in your searches, my lord.”
“Why, sir, I told you that I knew the names he hides under but I do not
know that under which he shows himself, or else—— ”
“You would arrest him? Well, Lord Sartines, it is a blessed thing that I
happened in as I did, for I can do you the very service you want. I will tell
you the title he figures under.”
“Pray say it,” said Sartines who expected to hear a falsehood.
“The Count of Fenix.”
“What, the name under which you were announced?”
“My own.”
“Then you would be this Acharat, Balsamo, and Company?”
“It is I,” answered the other simply.
It took Sartines a minute to recover from the amazement which this
impudence had caused him.
“You see I guessed,” he said; “I knew that Fenix and Balsamo were one
and the same.”
“I confess it. You are a great minister.”
“And you are a great fool,” said the magistrate, stretching out his hand
towards his bell.
“How so?”
“Because I am going to have you arrested.”
“Nonsense, a man like me is never arrested,” said Balsamo, stepping
between the magistrate and the bell.
“Death of my life, who will prevent it? I want to know.”
“As you want to know, my dear Lieutenant of Police, I will tell you—I
shall blow out your brains—and with the more facility and the less injury to
myself as this weapon is charged with a noiseless explosive which, for its
quality of silence, is not the less deadly.”
Whipping out of his pocket, a pistol, with a barrel of steel as exquisitely
carved as though Cellini had chiselled it, he tranquilly leveled it at the eye
of Sartines, who lost color and his footing, falling back into his armchair.
 “There,” said the other, drawing another chair up to the first and sitting
down in it; “now that we are comfortably seated, let us have a chat.”
It was an instant before Lord Sartines was master of himself after so
sharp an alarm. He almost looked into the muzzle of the firearm, and felt
the ring of its cold iron on his forehead.
“My lord,” he said at last. “I have the advantage over you of knowing
the kind of man I coped with and I did not take the cautionary measures I
should with an ordinary malefactor.”
“You are irritated and you use harsh words,” replied Balsamo. “But you
do not see how unjust you are to one who comes to do you a service. And
yet you mistake my intentions. You speak of conspirators, just when I come
to speak to you about a conspiracy.”
But the round phrase was all to no purpose as Sartines was not paying
great attention to his words: so that the word Conspiracy, which would have
made him jump at another time, scarcely caused him to pick up his ears.
“Since you know so well who I am,” he proceeded, “you must know my
mission in France. Sent by the Great Frederick—that is as an ambassador,
more or less secret of his Prussian Majesty. Who says ambassador, says
‘inquisitor;’ and as I inquire, I am not ignorant of what is going on; and one
of the things I have learnt most about is the forestalling of grain.”
Simply as Balsamo uttered the last words they had more power over the
Chief of Police than all the others for they made him attentive. He slowly
raised his head.
“What is this forestalling of the grain?” he said, affecting as much ease
as Balsamo had shown at the opening of the interview. “Will you kindly
enlighten me?”
“Willingly, my lord. Skillful speculators have persuaded his Majesty, the
King of France, that he ought to build grainaries to save up the grain for the
people in case of dearth. So the stores were built. While they were about it
they made them on a large scale, sparing no stone or timber. The next thing
was to fill them, as empty grainarers are useless. So they filled them. You
will reckon on a large quantity of corn being wanted to fill them? Much
breadstuffs drawn out of the markets is a means of making the people
hungry. For, mark this well, any goods withdrawn from circulation are
equivalent to a lack of production. A thousand sacks of corn in the store are
the same as a thousand less in the market. Multiply these thousands by a ten
only and up goes the price of grain.”
Sartines coughed with irritation. Balsamo stopped quietly till he was
done.
“Hence, you see the speculator in the storehouses enriched by the
increase in value. Is this clear?”
“Perfectly clear,” replied the other. “But it seems to me that you are bold
enough to promise to denounce a crime or a plot of which his Majesty is the
author.”
“You understand it plainly,” said Balsamo.
“This is bold, indeed, and I should be curious to know how the King will
take the charge. I am afraid that the result will be precisely the same as that
I conceived when I looked through your papers; take care, my lord, you will
get into the Bastile all the same.”
“How poorly you judge me and how wrong you are in still taking me for
a fool. Do you imagine that I, an ambassador, a mere curious investigator,
would attack the King in person? That would be the act of a blockhead.
Pray hear me out.”
Sartines nodded to the man with the pistol.
“Those who discovered this plot against the French people—pardon the
precious time I am consuming, but you will see presently that it is not lost
time—they are economists, who, very minute and painstaking, by applying
their microscopic lenses to this rigging of the market, have remarked that
the King is not working the game alone. They know that his Majesty keeps
an exact register of the market rate of grain in the different markets: that he
rubs his hands when the rise wins him eight or ten thousand crowns; but
they also know that another man is filling his own alongside of his
Majesty’s—an official, you will guess—who uses the royal figures for his
own behalf. The economists, therefore, not being idiots, will not attack the
King, but the man, the public officer, the agent who gambles for his
sovereign.”
Sartines tried to shake his wig into the upright but it was no use.
“I am coming to the point, now,” said Balsamo. “In the same way as you
know I am the Count of Fenix through your police, I know you are Lord
Sartines through mine.”
 “What follows?” said the embarrassed magistrate; “a fine discovery that
I am Lord Sartines!”
“And that he is the man of the market-notebooks, the gambling, the ring,
who, with or without the knowledge of the King, traffics on the appetites of
the thirty millions of French whom his functions prescribe him to feed on
the lowest possible terms. Now, just imagine the effect in a slight degree of
this discovery! You are little loved by the people; the King is not an
affectionate man. As soon as the cries of the hungry are heard, yelling for
your head, the King, to avoid all suspicion of connivance with you, if any
there be, or to do justice if there is no complicity, will hasten to have you
strung upon a gibbet like that on which dangled Enguerrand de Marigny,
which you may remember?”
“Imperfectly,” stammered Sartines, very pale, “and you show very poor
taste to talk of the gibbet to a nobleman of my degree!”
“I could not help bringing him in,” replied Balsamo, “as I seemed to see
him again—poor Enguerrand! I swear to you he was a perfect gentleman
out of Normandy, of very ancient family and most noble house. He was
Lord High Chamberlain and Captain of the Louvre Palace, and eke Count
of Longueville, a much more important county than yours of Alby. But still
I saw him hooked up on the very gibbet at Montfaucon which was built
under his orders, although it was not for the lack of my telling him:
“Enguerrand, my dear friend, have a care! you take a bigger slice out of
the cake of finance than Charles of Valois will like. Alas, if you only knew
how many chiefs of police, from Pontius Pilate down to your predecessor,
who have come to grief!”
Sartines rose, trying in vain to dissimulate the agitation to which he was
a prey.
“Well, accuse me if you like,” he said: “what does the testimony of a
man like you amount to?”
“Take care, my lord,” Balsamo said: “men of no account were very often
the very ones who bring others to account. When I write the particulars of
the Great Grain Speculation to my correspondent, or Frederick who is a
philosopher, as you are aware, he will be eager to transcribe it with
comments for his friend, Voltaire, who knows how to swing his pen: to
Alembert, that admirable geometrician, who will calculate how far these
stolen grains, laid in a line side by side, will extend; in short when all the
lampoon writers, pamphleteers and caricaturists get wind of this subject,
you, my lord of Alby, will be a great deal worse off than my poor Marigny,
—for he was innocent, or said so, and I would hardly believe that of your
lordship.”
With no longer respect for decorum, Sartines took off his wig and wiped
his skull.
“Have it so,” he said, “ruin me if you will. But I have your casket as you
have your proofs.”
“Another profound error into which you have fallen, my lord,” said
Balsamo: “You are not going to keep this casket.”
“True,” sneered the other; “I forgot that Count Fenix is a knight of the
road who robs men by armed force. I did not see your pistol which you
have put away. Excuse me, my lord the ambassador.”
“The pistol is no longer wanted, my lord. You surely do not think that I
would fight for the casket over your body here where a shout would rouse
the house full of servants and police agents?—— No, when I say that you
will not keep my casket, I mean that you will restore it to me of your own
free will.”
“I?” said the magistrate, laying his fist on the box with so much force
that he almost shattered it. “You may laugh, but you shall not take this box
but at the cost of my life. Have I not risked it a thousand times—ought I not
pour out the last drop of my blood in his Majesty’s service? Kill me, as you
are the master; but I shall have enough voice left to denounce you for your
crimes. Restore you this,” he repeated, with a bitter laugh, “hell itself might
claim it and not make me surrender.”
“I am not going to require the intervention of subterranean powers;
merely that of the person who is even now knocking at your street door.”
Three loud knocks thundered at the door.
“And whose carriage is even now entering the yard,” added the
mesmerist.
“Some friend of yours who does me the honor to call?”
“Just as you say, a friend of mine.”
“The Right Honorable the Countess Dubarry!” announced a valet at the
study door, as the lady, who had not believed she wanted the permission to
enter, rushed in. It was the lovely countess, whose perfumed and hooped
skirts rustled in the doorway.
“Your ladyship!” exclaimed Sartines, hugging the casket to his bosom in
his terror.
“How do you do, Sartines?” she said, with her gay smile.
“And how are you, count?” she added to Fenix, holding out her hand.
He bowed familiarly over it and pressed his lips where the King had so
often laid his. In this movement he had time to speak four words to her
which the Chief of Police did not hear.
“Oh, here is my casket,” she said.
“Your casket,” stammered the Lieutenant of Police.
“Mine, of course. Oh, you have opened it—do not be nice about what
does not belong to you! How delightful this is. This box was stolen from
me, and I had the idea of going to Sartines to get it back. You found it, did
you, oh, thank you.”
“With all respect to your ladyship,” said Sartines, “I am afraid you are
letting yourself be imposed upon.”
“Impose? do you use such a word to me, my lord?” cried Balsamo. “This
casket was confided to me by her ladyship a few days ago with all its
contents.”
“I know what I know,” persisted the magistrate.
“And I know nothing,” whispered La Dubarry to the mesmerist. “But
you have claimed the promise I made you to do anything you asked at the
first request.”
“But this box may contain the matter of a dozen conspiracies,” said
Sartines.
“My lord, you know that that is not a word to bring you good luck. Do
not say it again. The lady asks for her box—are you going to give it to her
or not?”
“But at least know, my lady—— ”
“I do not want to know more than I do know,” said the lady: “Restore me
my casket—for I have not put myself out for nothing, I would have you to
understand!”
 “As you please, my lady,” said Sartines humbly and he handed the
countess the box, into which Balsamo replaced the papers strewn over the
desk.
“Count,” said the lady with her most winning smile, “will you kindly
carry my box and escort me to my carriage as I do not like to go back alone
through those ugly faces. Thank you, Sartines.”
“My lady,” said Balsamo, “you might tell the count who bears me much
ill will from my insisting on having the box, that you would be grieved if
anything unpleasant befel me through the act of the police and how badly
you would feel.”
She smiled on the speaker.
“You hear what my Lord says, Sartines,” she said; “it is the pure truth:
the count is an excellent friend of mine and I should mortally hate you if
you were to vex him in any way. Adieu, Sartines.”
He saw them march forth without showing the rage Balsamo expected.
“Well, they have taken the casket but I have the woman,” he chuckled.
To make up for his defeat he began to ring his bell as though to break it.
“How is the lady getting on whom you took into the next room?”
“Very well indeed, my lord: for she got up and went out.”
“Got up? why, she could not stand.”
“That is so, my lord,” said the usher: “but five minutes or so after the
Count of Fenix arrived, she awoke from her swoon, from which no scent
would arouse her, and walked out. We had no orders to detain her.”
“The villain is a magician,” thought the magistrate. “I have the royal
police and he Satan’s.”
That evening he was bled and put to bed: the shock was too great for him
to bear, and the doctor said that if he had not been called in he would have
died of apoplexy.
In the meantime the count had conducted the lady to her coach. She
asked him to step in, and a groom led the Arab horse.
“Lady,” he said, “you have amply paid the slight service I did you. Do
not believe what Sartines said about plots and conspiracies. This casket
contains my chemical recipes written in the language of Alchemy which his
ignorant clerks interpreted according to their lights. Our craft is not yet
enfranchised from prejudices and only the young and bright like your
ladyship are favorable to it.”
“What would have happened if I had not come to your help?”
“I should have been sent into some prison, but I can melt stone with my
breath so that your Bastile would not long have retained me. I should have
regretted the loss of the formula for the chemical secrets by which I hope to
preserve your marvelous beauty and splendid youthfulness.”
“You set me at ease and you delight me, count. Do you promise me a
philter to keep me young?”
“Yes: but ask me for it in another twenty years. You cannot now want to
be a child forever!”
“Really, you are a capital fellow! But I would rather have that draft in
ten, nay five years—one never knows what may happen.”
“When you like.”
“Oh, a last question. They say that the King is smitten with the Taverney
girl. You must tell me; do not spare me if it is true; treat me as a friend and
tell me the truth.”
“Andrea Taverney will never be the mistress of the King. I warrant it, as
I do not so will it.”
“Oh!” cried Lady Dubarry.
“You doubt? never doubt science.”
“Still, as you have the means, if you would block the King’s fancies——
”
“I can create sympathies and so I can antipathies. Be at ease, countess, I
am on the watch.”
He spoke at random as he was all impatience to get away and rejoin
Lorenza.
“Surely, count,” said the lady, “you are not only my prophet of good but
my guardian angel. Mind, I will defend you if you help me. Alliance!”
“It is sealed,” he said, kissing her hand.
He alighted and whistling for his horse, mounted and gallopped away.
“To Luciennes,” ordered Lady Dubarry, comforted.
 CHAPTER XXVII.

LOVE VERSUS SCIENCE.

IN five minutes Balsamo was in his vestibule, looking at Fritz and asking
with anxiety:
“Has she returned?”
“She has gone up into the room of the arms and the furs, very wornout,
from having run so rapidly that I was hardly in time to open the door after I
caught sight of her. I was frightened; for she rushed in like a tempest. She
ran up the stairs without taking breath, and fell on the great black lion’s-
skin on entering the room. There you will find her.”
Balsamo went up precipitately and found her as said. He took her up in
his arms and carried her into the inner house where the secret door closed
behind them.
He was going to awake her to vent the reproaches on her which were
nursed in his wrath, when three knocks on the ceiling notified him that the
sage called Althotas, in the upper room, was aware of his arrival and asked
speech of him.
Fearing that he would come down, as sometimes happened, or that
Lorenza would learn something else detrimental to the Order, he charged
her with a fresh supply of the magnetic fluid, and went up by a kind of
elevator to Althota’ laboratory.
In the midst of a wilderness of chemical and surgical instruments, phials
and plants, this very aged man was a terrible figure at this moment.
Such part of his face as seemed yet to retain life was empurpled with
angry fire: his knotted hands like those of a skeleton, trembled and cracked
—his deepset eyes seemed to shake loose in the sockets and in a language
unknown even to his pupil he poured invectives upon him.
Having left his padded armchair to go to the trap by which Balsamo
came up through the floor, he seemed to move solely by his long spider-like
arms. It must be extraordinary excitement to make him leave the seat where
he conducted his alchemical work and enter into our worldly life.
 Balsamo was astonished and uneasy.
“So you come, you sluggard, you coward, to abandon your master,” said
Althotas.
As was his habit, the other summoned up all his patience to reply to his
master.
“I thought you had only just called me, my friend,” he meekly said.
“Your friend, you vile human creature,” cried the alchemist, “I think you
talk to me as if I were one of your sort. Friend? I should think I were more
than that: more than your father, for I have reared you, instructed you and
enriched you. But you are no friend to me, oh, no! for you have left me, you
let me starve, and you will be my death.”
“You have a bilious attack, master, and you will make yourself ill by
going on thus.”
“Illness—rubbish! Have I ever been ill save when you made me feel the
petty miseries of your mean human life? I, ill, who you know am the
physician to others.”
“At all events, master, here I am,” coldly observed Balsamo. “Let us not
waste time.”
“You are a nice one to remind me of that. You force me to dole out what
ought to be unmeasured to all human creatures. Yes, I am wasting time: my
time, like others, is falling drop by drop into eternity when it ought to be
itself eternity.”
“Come, master, let us know what is to be done?” asked the other,
working the spring which closed the trap in the floor. “You said you were
starved. How so, when you know you were doing your fortnight’s absolute
fast?”
“Yes; the work of regeneration was commenced thirty-two days ago.”
“What are you complaining about in that case—I see yet two or three
decanters of rainwater, the only thing you take.”
“Of course: but do you think I am a silkworm to perform alone the great
task of transformation and rejuvenation? Can I without any strength alone
compose my draft of life? Do you think I shall have my ability when I am
lying down with no support but refreshing drink, if you do not help me?
abandoned to my own resources, and the minute labor of my regeneration—
you know you ought to help and succor, if a friend?”
 “I am here,” responded Balsamo, taking the old man and placing him in
his chair as one might a disagreeable child, “what do you want? You have
plenty of distilled water: your loaves of barley and sesame are there; and I
have myself given you the white drops you prescribed.”
“Yes; but the elixir is not composed. The last time I was fifty, I had your
father to help me, your faithful father. I got it ready a month beforehand.
For the blood of a virgin which I had to have, I bought a child of a trader at
Mount Ararat where I retired. I bled it according to the rites; I took three
drops of arterial blood and in an hour my mixture, only wanting that
ingredient, was composed. Therefore my regeneration came off passing
well: my hair and teeth fell during the spasms caused by the draft, but they
came again—the teeth badly, I admit, for I had neglected to use a golden
tube for decanting the liquor. But my hair and nails came as if I were fifteen
again. But here I am once more old; and the elixir is not concocted. If it is
not soon in this bottle, with all care given to compounding it, the science of
a century will be lost in me, and this admirable and sublime secret which I
hold will be lost for man, who would thus through me be linked with
divinity. Oh, if I go wrong, if I fail, you, Acharat, will have been the cause,
and my wrath will be dreadful!”
As these final words made a spark flash from his dying eye, the hideous
old man fell back in a convulsion succeeded by violent coughing. Balsamo
at once gave him the most eager care. The old doctor came to his senses; his
pallor was worse; this slight shaking had so exhausted him that he seemed
about to die.
“Tell me what you want, master, and you shall have it, if possible.”
“Possible?” sneered the other, “You know that all is possible with time
and science. I have the science; but time is only about to be conquered by
me. My dose has succeeded; the white drops have almost eradicated most of
my old nature. My strength has nearly disappeared. Youth is mounting and
casting off the old bark, so to say. You will remark, Acharat, that the
symptoms are excellent; my voice is faint; my sight weakened by three
parts; I feel my senses wander at times; the transitions from heat to cold are
insensible to me. So it is urgent that I get my draft made so that on the
proper day of my fifteenth year, I shall pass from a hundred years to twenty
without hesitation. The ingredients are gathered, the gold tube for the
decanting is ready; I only lack the three drops of pure blood which I told
you of.”
Balsamo made a start in repugnance.
“Oh, well, let us give up the idea of a child,” sneered Althotas, “since
you dream of nothing but your wife with whom you shut yourself up
instead of coming to aid me.”
“My wife,” repeated Balsamo, sadly: “a wife but in name. I have had to
sacrifice all to her, love, desire, all, I repeat, in order to preserve her pure
that I may use her spirit as a seer’s to pierce the almost impenetrable.
Instead of making me happy, she makes the world so.”
“Poor fool,” said Althotas, “I believe you gabble still of your
amelioration of society when I talk to you of eternal youth and life for
man.”
“To be acquired at the price of a horrid crime! and even then—— ”
“You doubt—he doubts!”
“But you said you renounced that want: what can you substitute?”
“Oh, the blood of the first virgin creature which I find—or you supply
within a week.”
“I will attend to it, master,” said Balsamo.
Another spark of ire kindled the old man’s eye.
“You will see about it!” he said, “that is your reply, is it? However, I
expected it, and I am not astonished. Since when, you insignificant worm,
does the creature speak thus to its creator? Ah, you see me feeble,
solicitating you and you fancy I am at your mercy! Do you think I am fool
enough to rely on your mercy? Yes or no, Acharat—and I can read in your
heart whether you deceive me or not—ay, read in your heart—for I will
judge you and pursue you.”
“Master, have a care! your anger will injure you. I speak nothing but the
truth to my master. I will see if I can procure you what you want without its
bringing harm, nay, ruin upon us both. I will seek the wretch who will sell
you what you wish but I shall not take the crime upon me. That is all I can
say.”
“You are very dainty. Then, you would expose me to death, scoundrel;
you would save the three drops of the blood of some paltry thing in order to
let the wondrous being that I am fall into the eternal abysm. Acharat, mark
me,” continued the weird old man, with a frightful smile, “I no longer ask
you for anything. I want absolutely nothing of you. I shall wait: but if you
do not obey me, I shall take for myself; if you abandon me I shall help
myself. You hear? away!”
Without answering the threat in any way, Balsamo prepared all things for
the old man’s wants; like a good servant or a pious son attending to his
father. Absorbed in quite another thought than that torturing Althotas, he
went down through the trap-hole without noticing the old sage’s ironical
glance following him. He smiled like an evil genius when he saw the
mesmerist beside Lorenza, still asleep.
 CHAPTER XXVIII.

THE ULTIMATE TEST.

BEFORE the Italian beauty, Balsamo stopped, with his heart full of painful
but no longer violent thoughts.
“Here I stand,” he mused, “sad but resolute, and plainly seeing my
situation. Lorenza hates me and betrayed me as she vowed she would do.
My secret is no longer mine but in the hands of this woman who casts it to
the winds. I resemble the fox caught in the trap, who gnaws off his leg to
get away, but the hunter coming on the morrow and seeing this token can
say: ‘He has escaped but I shall know him when I catch him again.’
“Althotas could not understand this misfortune, which is why I have not
told him; it breaks all my hope of fortune in this country and consequently
in the Old World, of which France is the heart—it is due to this lovely
woman, this fair statue with the sweet smile. To this accursed angel I owe
captivity, exile or death, with ruin and dishonor meanwhile.
“Hence,” he continued, animating, “the sum of pleasure is surpassed by
that of harm, and Lorenza is a noxious thing to me. Oh, serpent with the
graceful folds, they stifle: your golden throat is full of venom; sleep on, for
I shall be obliged to kill you when you wake.”
With an ominous smile he approached the girl, whose eyes turned to his
like the sunflower follows the sun.
“Alas, in slaying her who hates me, I shall slay her who loves.”
His heart was filled with profound grief strangely blended with a vague
desire.
“If she might live, harmless?” he muttered. “No, awake, she will renew
the struggle—she will kill herself or me, or force me to kill her. Lorenza,
your fate is written in letters of fire: to love and to die. In my hands I hold
your life and your love.”
The enchantress, who seemed to read his thoughts in an open book, rose,
fell at the mesmerist’s feet, and taking one of his hands which she laid on
her heart, she said with her lips, moist as coral and as glossy: