How choose a path in the midst of so many perplexities! Impelled by different interests, he wavered, undecided between the most opposite decisions, his mind oscillating from one extreme to the other.
What could he do?
His reason after this new and unforeseen shock vainly sought to regain its equilibrium.
"Resign ?" said he to himself.

"Where, then, would be my courage?
Ought I not rather to remain the representative of the law, incapable of emotion, insensible to prejudice?
am I so weak that, in assuming my office, I am unable to divest myself of my personality?
Can I not, for the present, make abstraction of the past?
My duty is to pursue this investigation.

Claire herself would desire me to act thus.

Would she wed a man suspected of a crime?
Never.

If he is innocent, he will be saved; if guilty, let him perish!" This was very sound reasoning; but, at the bottom of his heart, a thousand disquietudes darted their thorns.