"Mademoiselle Suzanne!" I cried, and at what she read in my face the white in her cheeks went to the pink of a shell. "Why! what does this mean?"

"That there are more roads than one to Orthez, Monsieur; and that Father Paulus, who is within, will tell you the rest."

"But, Mademoiselle——"

"But, Monsieur, the roads are free to all; only," and turning on the midway landing of the stairs up which I followed her, leaving Martin and the landlord to care for the horses, she went on, lowering her voice, "remember that henceforward there is no longer a Mademoiselle de Narbonne, only Suzanne D'Orfeuil. Father Paulus is here, Monsieur de Helville."

Thenceforward? What thenceforward did she mean? And why, in a chief city of Navarre, should a Narbonne of Morsigny deny her name? Taking my two hands in both his at the top of the stairs, Father Paul answered my second question as directly as if I had spoken aloud.

"Though it is Orthez, it is also a post of the King of France, and to travel as Suzanne D'Orfeuil is less risk."

"To travel? To travel where?"

"To Plessis, my son."

"Did you think," broke in Mademoiselle through my dismayed protest, the door being shut behind us, "did you really think us so cold, so callous, so ungrateful? If so, then we have not taught you much in our two months, Monsieur."

"Not taught me much? Suzanne D'Orfeuil has taught me more than can ever be told to Mademoiselle de Narbonne. Not taught me much? From a man I have learned faith; from a woman—ah! Mademoiselle, I dare not say one half——"

"Then do not try, Monsieur," she began, with one of her little old-time curtseys. But her forced gaiety ended in a sigh. "All that is past, and where we go there is little love and no faith," which showed that, though she stopped my mouth, she caught my meaning.

"Plessis? Father Paul, that must never be."

"Why not, Son Gaspard?"

"Our Suzanne at Plessis? Our Suzanne in the power of that cold, cruel devil, Louis of France? It is monstrous; it is infamous! Yes, I will speak!" for with her hand upon my arm she tried to silence me, not understanding that her very nearness, the mere touch of her fingers, was a spur to protest. "Why should I not? You are Suzanne D'Orfeuil, and Mademoiselle de Narbonne is at home in Morsigny; why should I not speak? By what right, Brother Paulus, do you risk a life not your own?"

It was Mademoiselle who answered.

"Then if you must speak, speak to me if you please, Monsieur, not to Brother Paul. I love him like a father, I reverence him as my guide spiritual, but if you think Brother Paul would keep Suzanne D'Orfeuil from doing that which Suzanne de Narbonne has bidden her, then, I say again, we have not taught you much in our two months at Morsigny."

"Then, Mademoiselle, I ask you. By what right do you risk a life not your own?"

"Not my own? Then whose is my life, Monsieur, if you please? and when you answer, take care you do not presume too far. Whose, Monsieur, whose?"

"Navarre's."

"Has a nation no honour, even as a man has?"

"Its honour is dishonoured if it saves its honour at a woman's cost. Oh! Mademoiselle, you know not what you do. You have not heard the King's threats as I have, the rack, the cord, infamy not to be named in words; no, no, you know not what you do. For God's sake return to Morsigny, that your blood be not on my head."

"And would there be none on mine?" she answered vehemently, and with a passion the equal of my own. "Would I be blood-guiltless if, with a Good-day, and merci, Monsieur! I curtsied a good-bye on the steps at Morsigny, and gave no second thought why you rode away and where? Or for whose sake you carried a foot of King Louis' cord in your pocket? His Most Christian Majesty's new-founded Order of Noble Faith!"

"Oh! that?" said I lamely, for I remembered that the ease with which she sent me to my death had hurt me sorely; "that was not a woman's business."

"A man's, then? Brother Paul taught you a man's faith, did he? Fie, fie, Monsieur! Is it a man's faith to pray in safety to the good God to do for us what we should do for ourselves? And did Brother Paul not teach you, bad theologian that he is! that faith without works is little worth? There, Monsieur, the man and the woman are both accounted for; are you content?"

Content? Desperate, rather, and in despair I turned upon the priest who stood by in silence, the lines upon his face those of perplexity rather than doubt or anxious care.

"Do you consent to this worse than madness?"

"Is it madness?" said he, taking Mademoiselle's hand in his to comfort and hearten her. "Then, my son, and I say it in all reverence, then was Christ mad. He came——"

"To die for the sinful and unworthy," I cried in bitterness of heart; "you need not tell me I am that, I know it already."

"Because there was no other way; and who knows but Louis will hearken," said Paul gently, his eyes growing wistful, "though, indeed, Monsieur Hellewyl, even while my heart said she was right, I gave faith the lie and urged her all I knew not to go."

"Louis hearken!" I answered scornfully. "What can she say to move him? I tell you, Paul, Louis will wring the rights and freedom of Navarre out of her woman's flesh."

"No, no, you mistake; Suzanne will not appear at all, Louis will know nothing of Suzanne. She will move Monsieur de Commines, and Monsieur de Commines will move the King to mercy. We have thought it all over. It was settled the night we returned from La Voule."

"By me it was settled as we sat at the table in the Justice Hall," said Mademoiselle. "Could you give yourself up to save a peasant woman who was nothing to you, nothing at all—remember, Monsieur, I understand she was nothing at all to you—while we, to whom you—you—are so much, raised no finger to aid you? There and then I settled my plan, and we have had two days to think it over, Brother Paul and I."

Oh, the irony of it! the unconscious, sardonic irony! yes, and the pathos, too. They had thought it all over, these two—the gentle unworldly priest and the generous, tender-hearted, too grateful woman, they had thought it all over, and now in their swerveless cleaving to what they held to be right, they were as inflexible, as inexorable, as stonily determined as Louis himself.

But if argument and pleading failed, there at least remained protest.

"Remember, this is not done with my consent."

In an instant she was Suzanne D'Orfeuil de Narbonne, and turned to freeze me with a stare.

"Consent! Monsieur, consent? You forget yourself surely? When I desire either your consent or your approval, I shall ask for it; till then I take leave to decide and act for myself."

There was no more to be said. With such a bow as a Mademoiselle de Narbonne had a right to claim from a Gaspard Hellewyl I withdrew.

Men and women, liars all, have whispered that, having crept like a traitor into Morsigny under cover of a woman's skirts, I now tried to purchase my own safety by the sacrifice of Mademoiselle de Narbonne. The men have not repeated the lie but the women knew they were safe. It has been openly alleged that, knowing her loftiness of mind, her generous-hearted impulsiveness, I so played upon her sense of gratitude that she took the desperate step of substituting herself in my place, and th............