The Great Breach
In 1816 there appeared in the office of the Sub-prefect or Vendome a Spanish prisoner of war, the Count de Feredia. The Spanish nobleman was a handsome man who carried himself with the hauteur proverbial among the Spaniards of noble birth. Before the stern, forbidding Sub-prefect, the Count de Merret, Feredia stands awaiting the result of a note from the Prefect to his subordinate, ordering the latter to find suitable quarters for the prisoner and to obtain his parole. Having given his word of honor not to attempt to escape, the Spaniard seeks to beguile the hours among the gay throngs along the avenues where he sees and meets the Countess de Merret, the beautiful wife of the Sub-prefect. Condemned to a monotonous and uneventful life in the quiet province and married to a man in whose stern character she finds nothing to respond to the joyousness of her own nature, the Countess discovers in the person of Feredia a congenial companion; while in the society of one so beautiful and sympathetic, the courtly Spaniard finds palliation of his melancholy and forgets the irksomeness of his parole. Between two such souls a friendship such as this could scarce do less than ripen into love, and soon the fleeting moments in each other's company in the presence of others seem not so sweet as stolen hours beneath the fragrant rose bower in the old formal garden. Even here, however, they are not alone, as two masons soon intrude their rudely material selves upon the spiritual loveliness enveloping these two throbbing souls. The Sub-prefect, though scarcely one to whom his wife's fair charms appeal, guards jealously the honor of his ancient name and. his suspicions having been aroused, he lays the trap in which he hopes to snare the fluttering wings of Cupid-gone-astray. The Count de Merret announces his departure on some business of a pressing kind and drives away from La Grande Breteche only to return within the hour. In the meantime the Countess, thinking that her husband has now left for several days, has summoned her Spanish lover to her side and now within the dainty boudoir Feredia pours forth in a torrent of words the passionate story of his love. Seeing a crucifix suspended on a thread of gold around his sweetheart's neck, he swears upon it fidelity through all eternity and then thrusting it next his heart, he gives his own ebony crucifix to her in return. Fatal gift. He little knows how in this emblem of the greatest tragedy and love earth ever witnessed his own doom is sealed. When the Sub-prefect returns and hurries to his wife's apartments, he finds Rosalie, the maid, on guard. Thrusting her aside, he rains thunderous blows upon the door. Within terror blanches the face of the pretty wife. Ruin stalks before her eyes. Disgrace cries out in every blow her furious husband delivers on the panel. In desperation she forces Feredia into her closet, and mustering all her self-control, she opens the door. As the Count enters he is surprised to find his wife alone, but his glance falling on the closet, he accuses her of having hidden her lover there. This she denies and when her husband, doubting, advances toward the door, springs before him, "If you find no one," she cries, "reflect that all will he over between us." Apparently convinced by his wife's declaration, he turns to leave. On the table lies the ebony crucifix. Seeing it, the Count makes his now terrified wife swear that no one is concealed within her closet. For the sake of her lover she consents to the perjury. "I know," exclaims the Count, "your purity of soul, and since it would mean separation either way. I prefer not to examine the closet." With that he summons the two masons working on the grounds and orders them to seal up the door which so nearly wrecked their home. Baffled, the frenzied girl stands watching the hideous work go on. Once, when the Count is called away, she makes a vain effort to rescue her imprisoned lover, but her implacable husband returns after only a
