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window. Nicole was on the point of crying out, but she took Gilbert for another, and said, after the first emotion of terror was past :
    “You here ! What imprudence “
    “Yes, it is I,” replied Gilbert, in a whisper, “but do not cry out for me more than you would do for another.”
    This time Nicole recognized her interlocutor.
     
    NICOLE’S TWENTY-FIVE LOUIS O’OR:
     
    Dumas, I’oi. Seven
     
    MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN. 51
    “Gilbert I” she exclaimed, “oh, Heaven !”
    ” I requested you not to cry out,” said the young man, coldly.
    ” But what are you doing here, sir ? ” exclaimed Nicole, angrily.
    ” Come ‘ said Gilbert, as coolly as before, “a, moment ago you called rne imprudent, and now you are more imprudent than I.”
    ” I think I am only too to kind you in asking what you are doing here,” said Nicole ; “for I know very well.-“
    ” What am I doing, then ? “
    ” You came to see Mademoiselle Andre.”
    ” Mademoiselle Andre ? ” said Gilbert, as calmly as before.
    ” Yes, you are in love with her ; but, fortunately, she does not love you.”
    “Indeed?”
    “But take care, Monsieur Gilbert,” said Nicole, threateningly.
    “Oh, I must take care ?”
    “Yes.”
    “Of what ?”
    “Take care that I do not inform on you.”
    ” You, Nicole ? “
    ” Yes, I ; take care I don’t get you dismissed from the house.”
    ” Try,” said Gilbert, smiling.
    “You defy me?”
    ” Yes, absolutely defy you.”
    ” What will happen then, if I tell mademoiselle, Monsieur Philip, and the baron that I met you here ? “
    ” It will happen as you have said not that I shall be dismissed I am, thank God, dismissed already but that I shall be tracked and hunted like a wild beast. But she who will be dismissed will be Nicole.”
    ” How Nicole ? “
    (t Certainly ; Nicole, who has stones thrown to her over the walls.”
    “Take care, Monsieur Gilbert,” said Nicole, in a
     
    52 MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN.
    threatening tone, ” a piece of mademoiselle’s dre<=r-V.TS found in your hand upon the Place Louis XV.”
    “You think so ?”’
    ” Monsieur Philip told his father so. He suspects nothing as yet, but if he gets a hint or two, perhaps he will suspect in the end.”
    ” And who will give him the hint ?”
    “I shall.”
    “Take care, Nicole ! One might suspect, also, that when you seem to be drying lace, you are picking up the stones that are thrown over the wall.”
    ‘ ‘ It is false ! ” cried Nicole. Then, retracting her denial, she continued, ” At all events, it is not a crime to receive a letter not like stealing in here while mademoiselle is undressing. Ah ! what will you say to that, Monsieur Gilbert ? “
    ” I shall say, Mademoiselle Nicole, that it is also a crime for such a well-conducted young lady as you are to slip keys under the doors of gardens.”
    Nicole trembled.
    “I shall say,” continued Gilbert, “that if I, who am known to Monsieur de Taverney, to Monsieur Philip, to Mademoiselle Andre, have committed a crime in entering here, in my anxiety to know how the family I so long served were, and particularly Mademoiselle Andre, whom I endeavored so strenuously to save on the evening of the fireworks, that a piece of her dress remained in my hand I shall say, that if I have committed this pardonable crime, you have committed the unpardonable one of introducing a stranger into your master’s house, and are now going to meet him a second time, in the greenhouse, where you have already spent an hour in his company “
    “Gilbert! Gilbert!”
    ” Oh ! how virtuous we are all of a sudden, Mademoiselle Nicole ! You deem it very wicked that I should be found here, while “
    ” Gilbert ! “
    ” Yes, go and tell mademoiselle that I love her. I shall say that it is you whom I love, and she will believe
     
    MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN. 53
    me, for you were foolish enough to tell her so at Tav-ern ey.
    “Gilbert, my friend!”
    ” And you will be dismissed,