sometimes been guided by his opinion, and Count Felix recognized long ago, that, in his claim to the Dukedom, the support of Father Bertrand would be of very real value.

If he is a weak man who cannot refrain from speaking his thoughts, the priest was a very strong man, for to no one had he betrayed himself. Count Felix felt confident of his support; Mademoiselle de Liancourt believed that he heartily shared her ideas of right and justice; while, as a priest, he spoke with authority to the great mass of the people, who believed his policy based entirely upon his religion. A few who fondly believed themselves in his confidence, but were in reality little more than his tools, knew at least that other schemes were working in his mind, and that, as[36] a member of a secret order, his information was invariably correct and reached him long before it was known in the castle. In a peculiar sense he was all things to all men, yet really known by none. Such a man must needs walk warily, for his path is beset with snares.

[36]

Father Bertrand, moreover, was a man of wealth. His charity was known in Vayenne, yet he fared simply himself, it was whispered; and there were those who could tell of the mean, poor room he occupied in his house in the Rue St. Romain, a room little removed as regards comfort from that of the ordinary toiler of the city. But there were other rooms in the house in the Rue St. Romain, and there was no lack of luxury in the large chamber on the upper floor which the priest paced slowly from end to end to-night. It was evidence not only of wealth, but of taste, too, and had they known of it, many in Vayenne would probably have formed a different estimate of Father Bertrand's character.

Absorbed as he was in his calculations, the priest was keenly alive to every new sound in the street or in the house. Several times he paused to listen, and once drew aside the heavy window curtains to look down into the street below. The Rue St. Romain lay along the north side of the Church of St. Etienne, and was little frequented after nightfall. Any excitement resulting from the death of the Duke would hardly penetrate here.

There was a knocking at the door at last, and Father Bertrand immediately took his seat at a large writing-table, and, drawing some of the papers with which it was covered toward him, began to study them carefully. No matter how agitated he might be in thought, his visitor would only see him calm and self-possessed,[37] and doubtless be more impressed than ever with the priest's strength of 

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