"Speak, my old friend." And he gazed at the oilcloth table cover as if he had been listening.
But the fingers of the paralysed woman were growing weary.

They had begun the word more than ten times over, and now, in tracing this word, they wandered to right and left.

Michaud and Olivier bent forward, and being unable to read, forced the impotent old lady to resume the first letters.
"Ah! Bravo!" exclaimed Olivier, all at once, "I can read it, this time.
She has just written your name, Therese.

Let me see: '_Therese and_----' Complete the sentence, dear lady." Therese almost shrieked in anguish.

She watched the finger of her aunt gliding over the oilcloth, and it seemed to her that this finger traced her name, and the confession of her crime in letters of fire.