(Bibl. of M. Ambroise Firmin-Didot.)

Miss Firmin, Ipswich.

Paris: Firmin Didot, Frères & Cie. 1860.

In those days, you understand, it was in the essence of my business to know as much as possible of the private affairs of people in their position, and instinct had at once told me that in the case of M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour such knowledge might prove very remunerative.

la Marquise de Firmin-Latour.

Marquise de Firmin-Latour acquiesced and aided her father in his determination.

I had drifted in there chiefly because I had quite accidentally caught sight of M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour walking arm-in-arm up the Rue Lepic with a lady who was both youthful and charminga well-known dancer at the opera.

M. de Firmin-Latour's friend hailed them, introduced them to him, and soon he was host, not to one lady, but to four, and instead of two dinners he had to order five, and more champagne, and then dessertpeaches, strawberries, bonbons, liqueurs, flowers, and what not, until I could see that the bill which presently he would be called upon to pay would amount to far more than his quarterly allowance from Mme.

Already I had made up my mind to see the little comedy through to the end, and I watched with a good deal of interest and some pity the clouds of anxiety gathering over M. de Firmin-Latour's brow.

The proprietor himself offered me my hat, and a moment or two later M. de Firmin-Latour

The very next day M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour called upon me at my office in the Rue Daunou.

If it succeededand there was no reason why it should notM. de Firmin-Latour would pocket a cool half-million, whilst I, sir, the brain that had devised the whole scheme, pronounced myself satisfied with the paltry emolument of one hundred thousand francs, out of which, remember, I should have to give Theodore a considerable sum.

la Marquise de Firmin-Latour's sumptuous abode in the Rue de Grammont.

He offered to go himself to the Rue Daunou at the hour appointed and to do his best to induce M. le Comte de Naquetif indeed he existedto forgo his rights on the lady who had so innocently taken on the name and hand of M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour.

But M. de Firmin-Latour . . .!

la Marquise, and she, after the usual attack of hysterics, duly confided the matter to M. de Firmin-Latour.

While M. de Firmin-Latour alternately raved and lamented I had already planned and contrived.

If you had been, you would surely recollect the sensation caused throughout the entire city by the disappearance of M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour, one of the most dashing young officers in society and one of its acknowledged leaders.

Soon it was common talk in Paris that M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour had disappeared from his home and that Madame was trying to put a bold face upon the occurrence.

When the policeacting on information supplied to them by M. Mauruss Mosensteinforced their way into that apartment, they were horrified to find M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour there, tied hand and foot with cords to a chair, his likely calls for help smothered by a woollen shawl wound loosely round the lower part of his face.

Why, IHector Ratichon, of courseHector Ratichon, in whose apartment M. de Firmin-Latour was discovered in a position bordering on absolute inanition.

I met his glance firmly whilst M. le Juge d'instruction placed the question to him in a solemn and earnest tone: "M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour, will you look at the prisoner before you and tell us whether you recognize in him the man who assaulted you?"

What price he was paid for this Judas trick I shall never know, and all that I do know is that he actually swore before the juge d'instruction that M. le Marquis de Firmin-Latour called at my office in the late forenoon of the tenth of October; that I then ordered himTheodoreto go out to get his dinner first, and then to go all the way over to Neuilly with a message to someone who turned out to be non-existent.

I told of the false M. de Naquet's threats to create a gigantic scandal which would forever ruin the social position of the so-called Marquis de Firmin-Latour.

la Marquise de Firmin-Latour had to pawn her jewels in order to satisfy the exigencies of her first and only lawful husband who has since mysteriously disappeared; and some people will vow that he never came back from the Antipodes, whilst othersby far the most numerouswill shrug their shoulders and sigh: 'One never knows!' which will be exceedingly unpleasant for Mme.