'Here,sir--thanks to the valour of a brave man,'she answered,speaking in a voice so low I scarcely heard her.And then,dropping her eyes,she stepped back into the shadow,as if either she had said too much already,or doubted her composure were she to say more.She was so radiantly dressed,she looked in the firelight more like a fairy than a woman,being of small and delicate proportions;and she seemed in my eyes so different a person,particularly in respect of the softened expression of her features,from the Mademoiselle de la Vire whom I had known and seen plunged in sloughs and bent to the saddle with fatigue,that I doubted still if I had seen aright,and was as far from enlightenment as before.
It was M.de Rosny himself who relieved me from the embarrassment I was suffering.He embraced me in the most kind and obliging manner,and this more than once;begging me to pardon the deception he had practised upon me,and to which he had been impelled partly by the odd nature of our introduction at the inn,and partly by his desire to enhance the joyful surprise he had in store for me.'Come,'he said presently,drawing me to the window,'let me show you some more of your old friends.'
I looked out,and saw below me in the courtyard my three horses drawn up in a row,the Cid being bestridden by Simon Fleix,who,seeing me,waved a triumphant greeting.A groom stood at the head of each horse,and on either side was a man with a torch.
My companion laughed gleefully.'It was Maignan's arrangement,'
he said.'He has a quaint taste in such things.'
After greeting Simon Fleix a hundred times,I turned back into the room,and,my heart overflowing with gratitude and wonder,Ibegged M.de Rosny to acquaint me with the details of mademoiselle's escape.
'It was the most simple thing in the world,'he said,taking me by the hand and leading me back to the hearth.'While you were engaged with the rascals,the old woman who daily brought mademoiselle's food grew alarmed at the uproar,and came into the room to learn what it was.Mademoiselle,unable to help you,and uncertain of your success,thought the opportunity too good to be lost.She forced the old woman to show her and her maid the way out through the garden.This done,they ran down a lane,as Iunderstand,and came immediately upon the lad with the horses,who recognised them and helped them to mount.They waited some minutes for you,and then rode off.'
'But I inquired at the gate,'I said.
'At which gate?'inquired M.de Rosny,smiling.
'The North-gate,of course,'I answered.
'Just so,'he rejoined with a nod.'But they went out through the West-gate and made a circuit.He is a strange lad,that of yours below there.He has a head on his shoulder,M.de Marsac.
Well,two leagues outside the town they halted,scarcely knowing how to proceed.By good fortune,however,a horse-dealer of my acquaintance was at the inn.He knew Mademoiselle de la Vire,and,hearing whither she was bound,brought her hither without let or hindrance.'
'Was he a Norman?'I asked,M.de Rosny nodded,smiling at me shrewdly.'Yes,'he said,'he told me much about you.And now let me introduce you to my wife,Madame de Rosny.'
He led me up to the lady who had risen at my entrance,and who now welcomed me as kindly as she had before looked on me,paying me many pleasant compliments.I gazed at her with interest,having heard much of her beauty and of the strange manner in which M.de Rosny,being enamoured of two young ladies,and chancing upon both while lodging in different apartments at an inn,had decided which he should visit and make his wife.He appeared to read what was in my mind,for as I bowed before her,thanking her for the obliging things which she had uttered,and which for ever bound me to her service,he gaily pinched her ear,and said,'When you want a good wife,M.de Marsac,be sure you turn to the right.'
He spoke in jest,and having his own case only in his mind.But I,looking mechanically in the direction he indicated,saw mademoiselle standing a pace or two to my right in the shadow of the great chimney-piece.I know not whether she frowned more or blushed more;but this for certain,that she answered my look with one of sharp displeasure,and,turning her back on me,swept quickly from the room,with no trace in her bearing of that late tenderness and gratitude which I had remarked.
