Page:The Mystery of Madeline Le Blanc (1900).djvu/99

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THE MYSTERY OF MADELINE LE BLANC.
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ness of the hour; but that was easily accounted for; since the public nervousness before and after short and decisive revolutions always manifested itself in crowded streets of staring people who wandered everywhere and nowhere.

"What is to be done now that we are here?" said Monsieur Le Blanc, looking out the open window at Paris in her gala evening dress, that he had not seen for years—but once since he had taken away his young wife, and that was when Madeline was a little girl. "Does she now flaunt somewhere amid this invisible throng?" the father was asking himself.

"Don't you think we ought to notify the police?" asked Joseph, leaning on his elbows at the table.

"We shall go to the prefecture to-morrow —and then?" said the father, looking at a light a little west of Notre Dame that was growing larger with the lapse of every moment,

Joseph made no reply, but sat in deep meditation.

Presently Monsieur said: "Come here. What do you think this can be?"

"Fire—perhaps revolution! Liste—