Armine, Chapters XXV-XXVII [pp. 218-242]

1833.] ARM-IKE. 239
am not willing to die-far from it, for I have much work yet
to do-but if it was to be one of us, I was the right one. You
will suffer enough as it is for having been persuaded to come
with me. Don't talk!" he said almost sharply, as Egerton
began to speak. "There is something I must say to you,
and I may not have many minutes in which to say it. Ah!
what agony," he cried out suddenly, and his whole frame
writhed with a convulsion which haunted Egerton for many
a long day afterward. When it subsided sufficiently for him
to speak, great drops of sweat, like that which we are told
accompanies torture, stood on his livid brow.
"It is-of-Armine," he gasped faintly.
Here Egerton, thinking to spare him, interposed with an
assurance that he would charge himself with the future welfare of Mile. Duchesne; but the words had scarcely passed
his lips when the dying Socialist answered with a tone of
pride:
"My daughter is not dependent on the kindness of stran
gers. If she needed charity the comrades of her father
would gladly care for her. But she has an inheritance which
is hers by right, and this she must claim."
There was another pause, which Egerton did not break.
He feared by a word to exhaust the little strength which
Duchesne possessed, and which he now perceived was necessary for some essential statement. Presently he was able to
speak again:
"She knows nothing of it; it will be for you to tell her,
and to direct her what to do. And I must tell you, if-if this
agony will let me speak! You know-or you have heard of
-the Vicomte de Marigny. But he has no claim to his rank
or property. I am the heir of both!"
"You!" said Egerton, thunderstruck. For an instant he
thought that the mind of the speaker was surely wandenug, but
the dark eyes which met his own were clearly rational.
"Yes, I!" repeated Duchesne. "I have not time for seeking
phrases. I must speak to the point. Listen, then. The name
which I bear I inherited from my father; but I always knew
that he assumed it.on account of its revolutionary association,
and because he could not prove his right to that of his father,
who was Vicomte de Marigny when the Revolution broke out.
It is a ~ng story, for which I have not breath; but when the
Revolution was at its height this Vicomte de Marigny, flying
for his life, was saved by a daughter of the people. She con