stupefaction, while, scarlet with confusion and apprehension, both her aunt and the Abbot exchanged significant looks that betrayed their embarrassment. Struck speechless for an instant, Mademoiselle Plouernel turned to the stranger and asked:
"And why, monsieur, do you warn me against the journey to England?"
"For two reasons, mademoiselle, two important reasons—"
"Monsieur," the Abbot interrupted the stranger with, in an icy tone, "I wish to call your attention, first, to the fact that you have committed a breach of confidence; secondly, that you have not understood a word of the letter that you found and that you took the freedom of reading—an indiscretion that a man of good breeding would have carefully guarded against."
"And I, in turn, will call your attention, Monsieur Abbot," retorted the stranger, "first, to the fact that to read an unsealed letter, found on the pavement of a public thoroughfare, is no breach of confidence; secondly, that, without priding myself on being gifted with extraordinary intellectual power, yet am I intelligent enough to understand the value of words. For that reason I have advised mademoiselle not to go to England, and resolutely to refuse to undertake the journey."
"Monsieur," broke in Bertha with profound feeling, as she yielded to a sudden and painful sense of danger that flashed through her mind. "I ask it as a favor of you, explain yourself clearly. Be good enough to give me your reasons for the advice."
"One moment, my dear child," the Abbot hastened to interpose, in order to parry off the stranger's answer; "I am the writer of that letter; it is for me to speak intelligently upon it. I can tell monsieur that the despatch which he read is addressed to an envoy of his Majesty Louis XIV at the court of his Majesty Charles II, and that it deals with very delicate affairs of state. Now, then, I must add, that unless one be the most reckless of men, which I certainly am not, one does not conduct a correspondence upon matters of such a nature, except in cipher, or by means of enigmatic phrases, that bear a double sense, both of which seem perfectly logical on their face, but the real purport of which remains secret between the correspondents themselves, who are alone able to interpret it. It will be well for monsieur to understand that."
"If that is the case, Monsieur Abbot, there will be nothing left to me but to admit a mistake," replied the stranger with mock humility, "a mistake, however, that was quite excusable, and of which I request Mademoiselle Plouernel herself to be the judge," he added, taking the letter out of his pocket, "from the terms in which this interesting missive is couched."
"Monsieur, the reading of the letter is wholly superfluous, it being established that the letter no wise concerns mademoiselle."
"No doubt," replied the stranger, "mademoiselle is not touched upon in it except in an enigmatic and mysterious manner. Accordingly, when Monsieur the Abbot writes to Monsieur the Count of Plouernel:
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