"Yes, my friend," said he in a low tone, "Madame Gerdy has experienced great mental suffering, she has been frightfully tortured by remorse.

Listen, Herve.

I will confide our secret to your honour and your friendship.

Madame Gerdy is not my mother; she despoiled me, to enrich her son with my fortune and my name.
Three weeks ago I discovered this unworthy fraud; she knows it, and the consequences terrify her.

Ever since, she has been dying minute by minute." The advocate expected some exclamations of astonishment, and a host of questions from his friend; but the doctor received the explanation without remark, as a simple statement, indispensable to his understanding the case.
"Three weeks," he murmured; "then, that explains everything.