He decided to put up for the night at Argenteuil, and sought hospitality at the inn of the Coeur-Volant, where he ordered served forthwith a great bowl of punch, his favourite drink.
He betook himself to bed in the full expectation of enjoying most delicious dreams; but his sleep was troubled by a truly disagreeable incident.

Glorious days are at times succeeded by most wretched nights, and the inn of Coeur-Volant was destined to leave most disagreeable reminiscences with Samuel Brohl.
Towards four o'clock he heard some one knocking at his door, and a voice not unknown to him cried: "Open, I beseech you!" He was seized with an insupportable anguish; he felt like one paralyzed, and it was with great difficulty that he rose up in a sitting posture.
He remembered that the bolt was drawn, and this reassured him.

What was not his stupefied amazement to see the bolt glide back in its shaft! The door opened; some one entered, slowly approached Samuel, drew back the curtains of his bed, and bent towards him, fixing upon him great eager eyes that he recognised.

They were singular eyes, these, at once full of sweetness and full of fire, of audacity and of candour; a child, a grand soul, an unbalanced weakling--all this in one was in this gaze.
Samuel Brohl quailed with horror.

He tried to speak, but his tongue was powerless to move.