listening. It has been said that conversa- | his eloquence being the natural outpourtion has become a lost art in these our ing of a full mind and heart, flowing like times because every man reflects on what a torrent from a subterraneous lake. He he shall answer instead of paying atten- had a clear and melodious voice; his gestion to what he hears; Vitali, on the con- tures were few and graceful, and his Cortrary, hearkened with all his ears, and his sican imagination tinged his speeches with memory was so retentive that he often a warm colouring, with happy metaphors, surprised a client by reminding him of a and with occasional beauties of true poetcursory remark which had been uttered ical pathos, more especially when he was without any intention that it should be re- pleading in cases in which his own sensimembered. It was a maxim of his that bilities were greatly stirred. the merits of a case are ascertained less by what a client says than by what he lets slip; and he had a tact for drawing on a speaker to be communicative by an appearance of tacitly acquiescing in all his observations. This power of concentrated attention brought to bear on the reading of his briefs lent Vitali the force which an advocate must needs acquire who speaks with a full knowledge of his case, and it made him a dangerous opponent for leading barristers of large practice who went into court having but skimmed their briefs. It got to be said that when eminent counsel knew they were to be pitted against Justin Vitali they took care to master their facts and charged a heavier fee for the trouble. But, though other barristers might by fits and starts emulate the Corsican's industry, few could compete with the inborn gifts which made him an orator. He was a muscular man of middle height, with a swarthy complexion, black hair which he wore long and brushed off his high forehead without any parting, thick black whiskers trimmed short, and dark eyes, large and piercing. In his ordinary attire he might have been taken for a provincial farmer in Sunday dress, for he wore ill-cut baggy clothes of rough cloth, and was not careful about dusting them; but in court his gown and cambric fall became him well, and as soon as he had put them on he was another man. In this atmosphere of justice, which was his real sphere, he thawed; the cold expression of his features gave place to a look of ardent interest in all that was going on; he would turn his eyes with prompt, inquiring flashes on judges, witnesses, and on the jury if it were a criminal case; and casual spectators who did not know his ways, might have thought that he was continually tempted to spring on to his legs before the time. But this excitement was only outward, for when Vitali rose to speak, his impulses were always under his control; they were like a steammachine which a child's hand can guide. He despised tricks of rhetoric, declamatory gestures, and sensational phrases, This very frequently happened, for Vitali had laid down for himself a singular rule of conscience: he would plead no causes which he did not sincerely believe to be just. A well-known Scotch professor of jurisprudence being asked to deal with the question as to whether an advocate were justified in pleading iniquitous causes, answered that a counsel is a mouthpiece, not a judge, and that it is merely his function to place his client's case before the bench in the manner in which the client himself would have stated it had he possessed the requisite oratorical ability and legal knowledge. Vitali took a different view of an advocate's duties, and contended that a man has no right to place his talents and his learning at the service of a person who is endeavouring to do a wrong. "As well," said he, 66 might a locksmith argue that he was justified in aiding a burglar to break into a house so long as he took no share in the proceeds of the robbery." And on another occasion, smiling at somebody who had styled barristers "the defenders of the widow and the orphan," he replied dryly, "Yes, but if some barristers defend the widow and orphan it is presumably because others attack them; therefore the bar contains as many assailants as champions of the widow and orphan." Often when he had read a brief through, Vitali returned it with a note to the effect that he thought the cause untenable. And once or twice he had appended some words of critical advice which proved most unwelcome to the suitors who had wished to retain him. Had he been less laborious or able, or less successful in winning the causes which he did undertake, his hyper-scrupulousness would have blighted his professional prospects. As it was, solicitors gave him a character for eccentricity, and while praising him aloud, thanked heaven in secret that there were not more like him. But Vitali had also made himself numerous enemies, for it was not to be expected that a man should set up a rigid moral principle without seriously offend tion which the prefect was holding that evening; so did the deputy procuratorgeneral, for he was impatient to demonstrate that he had done his very utmost to get the journalists fined and sent to prison. him. "What a speech!" he said musingly to the president; "a dismal pity that such an orator should belong to the Radicals." ing many worthy people who were less rigid. All the suitors whom Vitali had snubbed spoke with wrathful contempt of his pretended integrity, deriding it as the affectation of an hypocritical character; and from esprit de corps the Corsican's But they found the prefect much less fellow-barristers concurred. After all they concerned about the failure of his prosewere as good as he. Did he imagine cution than about Vitali's remarkable disforsooth that they pleaded unrighteously, play of eloquence and legal acumen. He that they had no principles, that they was a Bonapartist, who served the repubwould let the temptation of a heavy re-lic grudgingly and hoped perseveringly taining fee sway their sensitive conscien- for a restoration of the third empire, ces? Although M- is a large mari- which might make a cabinèt minister of time city of nearly half a million inhabitants, its society is thoroughly provincial, and everybody there knows or believes he knows everybody else. It came to be rumoured that Justin Vitali's "bearishwas due to his having been crossed in love; others discovered that his real name was Vitali della Sebbia, but that he had dropped his aristocratical patronymic because he was the son of a fraudulent bankrupt, who had hanged himself to escape the hulks; others felt sure that Vitali would turn out to have been a secret agent of the Jesuits, and they begged the "If he be a Bonapartist, he is a man to rest to mark their words. In short, envy be taken up," exclaimed the prefect, eager being unable to deny the Corsican's tal-ly, for he knew the president was also an ent went to work dropping fly-spots on Imperialist. "We might push him forhis reputation or his motives; but this did ward at the next election. He would be not prevent Vitali from increasing in a wonderful recruit for our party, now credit among suitors day by day, for suit- that Rouher is aging." ors, like patients, will run to the man who can bring them speediest relief, and there is no relief in law like a good verdict. ness II. "But M. Vitali is a Bonapartist, I believe," replied the president, glad to show that he and his assessors had not been worsted by a republican. "A Bonapartist — and yet he pleads for the Reds'?" "That is the failing of the man. He pleads for anybody-whom he thinks in the right." "H'm! he would give you a good deal of trouble. Independence is his hobby." "Oh! as to that, I have known many an Aristides grow tractable when a good berth was offered him," was the prefect's confident answer. "The procurator-generalship of M is still vacant, and I'll see if I can't get Vitali appointed to it." "He wouldn't accept," said the presi dent, with assurance. "So long as you "You leave the honour out of account," rejoined the prefect. Besides, the post would only be a stepping stone to politics. At all events we can try." Ar the moment when this tale opens Justin Vitali had just been pleading a cause which was to set the seal to his renown. He had appeared as counsel for an opposition newspaper prosecuted by government. The prosecution was un-pay a procurator-general but fifteen thou just, but as there is no jury in press-trials, sand francs a year, the post isn't worth the the defendants had little justice to expect consideration of a man of thirty in large from three judges who, besides being practice." ever anxious to serve government, seemed to have the letter of the law on their side. Vitali took codes and precedents in hand, and proved that law as well as abstract equity were on the side of his clients; and he forced the bench to acquit on a legal technicality. No such thing had ever been seen in the annals of newspaper-trials in M—; and after the judges had delivered their finding, in a densely-crowded court, which had become the scene of enthusiastic and tumultuous cheering, they grew afraid of their own work. The president of the tribunal, a shrewd old time-serving judge, repaired to a recep The deputy procurator, who was ap proaching, and overheard the prefect's remarks, pulled a wry face. He had set influences at work to obtain the procuratorship for himself, and he lost no time in leaving the party to go and telegraph to his friends in Paris to bestir themselves. Meanwhile Justin Vitali, exhausted by his long and intricate speech in court, had returned to his chambers. They were poorly furnished rooms, whose chief lux He had got so far when there was a ring at the door of his chambers, and his servant entered with a card, saying that a lady desired to see M. Vitali at once. "A lady at this hour? Did you ask her business?" said Vitali, as he glanced at the card, on which was the name "Madame Desplans." "She is a young person, sir, and she says she will not detain you above an hour," said the servant. "An hour; that is at least frank: they generally say 'not above five minutes,' remarked Vitali with a weary smile. "Inquire whether the business is so urgent that the lady cannot fix an appointment." "She seemed very anxious to see you, sir," rejoined the man, and he opened the door to go out; but at this moment a lady dressed in deep mourning suddenly glided past him, and entered the room. The shade over the table-lamp kept the light down and rendered it difficult to discern the visitor's features. But it was evident that she was young, slight of stature, and judging by the quality of her apparel and her gracefully dignified carriage, a person accustomed to good society. She walked straight up to Vitali's table without speaking. He rose astonished, but bowing, and offered her a seat, and it was only when the servant had retired that she addressed him in a musical voice of great vivacity and rendered slightly tremulous by excitement. "Excuse me for intruding upon you, M. Vitali, but I wish you to appear for me in a lawsuit. I received notice this morning of an unworthy action that is to be brought against me, and nobody was ever so shamefully abused as I am in that paper. Here it is in my pocket, and I will leave it with you. When I got it at ten o'clock I cried for an hour; but my maid told me I had better come to you who are so famous, so I went to the courts, but and when it was over I could not get near you were speaking in that newspaper-case, you because of the throng of persons who were applauding you. I applauded like the rest, for I assure you you were very could find so many things to say for a eloquent, and it occurred to me that if you journalist, you would speak still better in defence of a lonely persecuted woman." Vitali politely, for he was proof against "The suit is about a will," interrupted the paper. H'm! mercenary acts, wiles. compliments. "Allow me to glance at It appears the plaintiffs wish to have the testator's will annulled on the ground of แ "Yes, on the ground that I used undue influence!" exclaimed Madame Desplans. “Did you ever hear of such a thing? Why the money in question was bequeathed me by a man who at least twenty times offered to marry me and who might have been alive now if I had given him my hand! But I won't waste your time in exclamations; here are the bare facts. I was left an orphan at twelve, and at eighteen was married to a retired naval officer, who had been a great friend of my father. Captain Desplans, though much older than I, was a most affectionate husband, and we lived happily together for four years until the captain, having embarked all his fortune in a speculation, was ruined. The blow preyed greatly on his mind because of me. During a few months he tried hard to find employment, but his age for active work was past, so that he fell ill of despair and very soon died, leaving me unprovided for." "You were absolutely destitute?" asked Vitali, who continued to glance at the notice of process. "I had just ten thousand francs and my jewels." "And no relatives or friends to give you a home?" "No relative at all," said Madame Desplans, shaking her head; "but I had one friend, Captain Lacroix, who had formerly been lieutenant on board my husband's ship, and who is the person men "Console yourself, madam," said Vitali gently: "these law papers are often drawn up in brutal terms; but if the charges brought against you be false, there will be so much the more dishonour for your accusers." tioned in that document. It is he who left | terror, and with some remorse, for it is me the property in dispute, and whose horrible to be told one is causing the death mourning I am wearing. And oh, when I of a man whose only crime is to have think that those selfish relatives of his, loved you too well. Consulting only my who never once came near him in his illness, first impulse, I hastened to Captain and who had done all they could to make Lacroix's house, thinking that I would his life wretched - when I think that they only stay there a few days to nurse him dare to accuse me of having been merce- until he got well. But he lingered on for nary, false, depraved, and everything that's months alternately lucid and delirious, but wicked, it's too much to bear: oh, oh!" always quite incapable of taking care of and the young widow burst into tears. himself, and in such a complete physical prostration that I awoke every morning with the conviction that he would be dead before night. When he did die at last it was found that by a will dated during the time while my husband was alive, he had left me half his fortune, that is a million francs, for he was a rich man, the son of a Marseilles merchant. Then it was that his relatives, who had left me to nurse him on his deathbed, fell upon me with that paper in which they charge me with having circumvented the unhappy man, with having tried to cozen him into marrying me; indeed they almost hint that when I found he would not yield to me, I ended by poisoning him, so as to become possesed of what he had left me the sooner. Ah, it is all too infamous, M. Vitali! like a scheming adventuress like a poisoner?" "False, why of course they are false; can you doubt it?" ejaculated Madame Desplans, looking up as if the merest hesitation were an outrage on her. "Why I devoted myself to Captain Lacroix, and spent six months nursing him when, as I have told you, I might have become his wife if I had pleased, and have inherited the whole of his property instead of the half which he left me. He was about forty years old when I first became acquainted with him, that is some six years younger than my husband. He frequently visited at our house, and I was not long in perceiving that he cherished a deep attachment towards me. He ended by declaring himself, and I ordered him not to let me see his face again, threatening if he returned to our house I would inform my husband of his conduct. He did go away and remained absent for two years; but so soon as my husband was dead he hastened back from Italy, where he was, and made me an offer of his hand. I felt no doubt that he sincerely loved me, but I was angry with him for his past behaviour; besides which he was a man of passionate and morose temper, with whom I knew it would have been impossible for me to live happy." "This paper says that he was almost imbecile from confirmed intemperance." "He became that after I had rejected him," said Madame Desplans, drying her eyes. "I believe he had given way to drink during his two years' absence, but upon my telling him that I would never be his wife he appears to have abandoned himself altogether; so that one day I received a raving letter from him in which he said that he was on his deathbed, that it was my cruelty that was killing him, but | that I could restore him to life if I would go and see him and give him a word of hope. I confess that I was seized with Do I look do I look She had half risen in uttering these words. Vitali lifted the lamp-shade and the light fell full on her features. No, it was not the face of an adventuress nor of anything but what was sweet and good. She had large blue eyes, soft and candid as a child's, a tiny mouth which no falsehood could ever have defiled, and pale golden hair that seemed to crown her pure brow with an aureola of innocency like So at least those on angels' heads. thought Justin Vitali as his admiring gaze fell on the young face turned supplicatingly towards his. From that moment his destiny altered its course. She had no need to continue clasping her hands as she did, for her cause was now right in his eyes, although all mankind should arise to accuse her. There was a look of protection in the glance he bent on her; then something like timidity stole into it, and a sensation which he could not account for, but which made his heart beat, took sudden possession of him. He turned towards his desk, caught up a pen, and to give himself a countenance, asked his visitor some desultory questions, her full names and address (her Christian name was Clotiide), whether she had a solicitor, what documents she could furnish to assist her defence, etc. All this "Oh dear!" exclaimed Madame Desplans, opening wide her blue eyes and assuming an air of contrition, "but I hope I have said nothing- was that M. della Sebbia time he felt nervous, and dared not look | ruin overtook him and his shareholders he again at Madame Desplans. He stam- committed suicide." mered, and the consciousness that he was doing so made him redder: then he became aware that he was prolonging his questions with an inward purpose of preventing his visitor from going away- - and this discovery filling him with confusion lest he should be detected, he said abruptly, by manner of closing the interview: "Your solicitor will have to instruct me in due form, madame, but your case is happily not a difficult one. By the way, am I to understand that you are entirely dependent for support on Captain Lacroix's legacy?" 66 "He was my father," said Justin Vitali, whose brow contracted as with pain. There was a moment's silence. The young widow had risen, and the Corsican and his client stood for a brief space close together with downcast faces, neither speaking. Madame Desplans broke the silence by saying, in a tone of compassion and regret: - I could "I am truly sorry, M. Vitali not guess but this will not prevent you from defending me, will it ?" Yes," answered the young widow artlessly; "I brought my husband no dower, but though destitute I probably should not have accepted the captain's money if his relatives had behaved with common kind-" ness to me. I knew nothing about his will till it was opened after his death, and I was more surprised than anybody to find that a million had been bequeathed to me. But now that I have been so basely slandered I would maintain my rights at any cost, even if I were bound to throw the million into the sea as soon as I got it." man "That is a question for yourself to decide," answered Vitali, a little bitterly. But if you cannot believe in the honesty of the father, I would advise you not to submit your fortune and reputation to the care of the son." "I will believe anything you tell me, M. Vitali," said Madame Desplans, without hesitation; then she added, with a halfsmile, "but, unintentionally as it may be, your father was the cause of our ruin. He was the cause that I am standing before you to-day; so you owe me a kind of reparation. Prevent me from being despoiled III. "That is natural," answered Vitali, who was too much of a Corsican not to sympathize with the craving for revenge. "The legacy is but a just acknowledgment of of Captain Lacroix's legacy, and we shall your devotedness in tending the dying be quits." besides, I suppose the captain was aware that your husband had been ruined." "He was not only aware of it, but he was himself partially the author of our ruin, and that is just the point, for in his will he treats the legacy as a retribution," exclaimed Madame Desplans animatedly. "I should tell you that Captain Lacroix often advised my husband on pecuniary matters, and once he counselled him to invest in a mining-company which had been started in Corsica." "In Corsica!" exclaimed Vitali with a start, while a deep pallor of a sudden overspread his face. WHAT momentous events may not happen between two paragraphs of a letter interrupted for an hour! When Vitali wrote to his mother that he would devote himself to clearing his father's memory "to the exclusion of all other objects or ambitions," he said what he meant: when he resumed his letter, this passage in it was no longer true. His filial piety had not lessened, but a new element of hopes and fears had entered his life. His main object at present was to clear Clotilde Desplans; and when he had done that, what "Yes; and the company soon went to then? Here he asked himself with uneasiruin, for it had been founded by a dishon- ness why he should shrink from looking est banker one Della Sebbia. But what to the time when the professional relations is the matter, M. Vitali?—you look un-between himself and the young widow well." should be at an end, and when perhaps "Della Sebbia was not dishonest, I sol- she would go away and be never more emnly vow," said Vitali, standing up and seen of him? His life would become a speaking with considerable emotion. "In cheerless blank again then, as it had been founding the mining-company, madame, he sincerely believed that he was promoting a genuine enterprise, and when the before she had come to him like a sunbeam into a prison cell. He had looked upon her, and it seemed to him that her face |