ONE:Philippe-galit was now Duc dOrlans, and his eldest son Duc de Chartres. That young prince was about seventeen, and like all the Orlans family, except the Duchess and the Comte de Beaujolais, was thoroughly indoctrinated with the detestable spirit that prevailed at the Palais Royal.The Marquis de , a proud, stern man of a reserved and apparently cold temperament, had a young wife whom he adored. Their married life went on prosperously for some years, at the end of which the young Marquise was seized with a fatal illness. When on her death-bed she confessed to her husband, who was nearly frantic with grief, that she had once, several years since, been unfaithful to him, that remorse in consequence had poisoned her happiness, and that she could not die in peace without his forgiveness. The Marquis consented to pardon her fault on condition that she would tell him the name of her seducer, which she did, after having extorted from her husband a solemn promise that he would not challenge him to a duel, as she feared the blood of one or the other might rest upon her soul.
