was only as it were a glance that he became aware of it. Suddenly he perceived that his belief in Sauverand's words was unrestricted, and that Florence was perhaps not the loathsome creature that he had had the right to think, but a woman whose eyes did not lie and whose face and soul were alike beautiful.
Suddenly he learnt that the two people before him, as well as Marie Fauville, for love of whom they had fought so unskilful a fight, were imprisoned in an iron circle which their efforts would not succeed in breaking. And that circle traced by an unknown hand he, Perenna, had drawn tighter around them with the most ruthless determination.
"If only it is not too late!" he muttered.
He staggered under the shock of the sensations and ideas that crowded upon him. Everything clashed in his brain with tragic violence: certainty, joy, dismay, despair, fury. He was struggling in the clutches of the most hideous nightmare; and he already seemed to see a detective's heavy hand descending on Florence's shoulder.
"Come away! Come away!" he cried, starting up in alarm. "It is madness to remain!"
"But the house is surrounded," Sauverand objected.
"And then? Do you think that I will allow for a second? No, no, come! We must fight side by side. I shall still entertain some doubts, that is certain. You must destroy them; and we will save Mme. Fauville."
"But the detectives round the house?"
"We'll manage them."
"Weber, the deputy chief?"
"He's not here. And as long as he's not here I'll take everything on myself. Come, follow me, but at some
