"Ah, Félix," she said, "if you really pitied me, you would get him out
of Paris!" And she fell to weeping as if her heart would break.
I had no skill to comfort her. I bent my head before her, silent. At
length she sobbed out:
"It boots little for us to quarrel over what you shall say to M. de Mar,
when we know not that you will ever speak to him again. And it was all
my fault."
"Mademoiselle, it was the fault of my hasty tongue."
But she shook her head.
"I maintained that to you, but it was not true. Mayenne had something in
his mind before. A general holds his schemes so dear and lives so cheap.
But I will do my utmost, Félix, lad. It is not long to daylight now. I
will go to François de Brie and we'll believe I shall prevail."
She took up her candle and said good night to me very gently and
quietly, and gave me her hand to kiss. She opened the door,--with my
fettered wrists I could not do the office for her,--and on the threshold
turned to smile on me, wistfully, hopefully. In the next second, with a
gasp that was half a cry, she blew out the light and pushed the door
shut again.