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"Mademoiselle is still unconscious, er inquiry "The doctors have been several times this afternoon, but they hold out no hope"

"I wonder if I can be of any assistance?" Hugh asked in French

"I think not, ive poor Madeht as he put down the receiver

Yet while she lived, there was still a faint hope that he would be able to learn the secret which he anticipated would place hiht defy those who had raised their hands against his father and hie with Dorise, indeed his whole future, depended upon the disclosure of the clever plot whereby Louise Lambert was to become his wife

His friend Brock was not in the hotel, so he went to his rooht a o over to Nice to the ball

He drew a long breath He was in no arding the critical condition of the notorious woman who had turned his friend

On every hand there hispers and wild reports concerning the tragedy at the Villa Ah not a as in the papers Yet nobody dreamed that he, of all men, had been present when the mysterious shot was fired, or that he was, indeed, the cause of the secret attack

He dressed slowly, and having done so, descended to the salle a ay, reckless cosmopolitan crowd--the crowd of well-dressed ht at Monte Carlo, attracted by the candle held by the great god Hazard

Brock was not there, and he seated hi-curtainedHe was surprised at his friend's absence Perhaps, however, he had one over to Beaulieu, Nice, or Mentone with them

He had but little appetite He ate a souste with an exquisite salad, and drank a single glass of chablis Then he rose and quitted the chattering, laughing crowd of diners, whose gossip was mainly upon a sensational run on the red at five o'clock that evening One wo with three men, ildly merry, for she had won the equivalent to sixty thousand pounds

All that recklessness jarred upon the young man's nerves He tried to close his ears to it all, and ascended again to his room, where he sat in silent despondency till it was tio round to the Metropole to join Lady Ranscomb and Dorise