I
turned away, and feigned to be overcome by gratitude.
'I have no words--to thank you!' I muttered presently. 'I am a
little shaken this morning. I--pardon me.'
'We will leave you for a while,' Mademoiselle de Cocheforet said
in gentle pitying tones. 'The air will revive you. Louis shall
call you when we go to dinner, M. de Barthe. Come, Elise.'
I bowed low to hide my face, and they nodded pleasantly--not
looking closely at me--as they walked by me to the house. I
watched the two gracious, pale-robed figures until the doorway
swallowed them, and then I walked away to a quiet corner where
the shrubs grew highest and the yew hedge threw its deepest
shadow, and I stood to think.
And, MON DIEU, strange thoughts. If the oak can think at the
moment the wind uproots it, or the gnarled thorn-bush when the
landslip tears it from the slope, they may have such thoughts, I
stared at the leaves, at the rotting blossoms, into the dark
cavities of the hedge; I stared mechanically, dazed and
wondering. What was the purpose for which I was here? What was
the work I had come to do? Above all, how--my God! how was I to
do it in the face of these helpless women, who trusted me, who
believed in me, who opened their house to me? Clon had not
frightened me, nor the loneliness of the leagued village, nor the
remoteness of this corner where the dread Cardinal seemed a name,
and the King's writ ran slowly, and the rebellion long quenched
elsewhere, still smouldered.
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