The servant brought a light, and some refreshments, but they stood
before me untasted. I was busy with my thoughts. The house was very
still; not a sound broke the silence, not the murmur of a voice, nor the
fall of a footstep. I might have been in a house of the dead.

Suddenly the door was pushed open noiselessly, and the adventurer stood
before me beckoning. I rose from my seat and followed him without a word
into another apartment. In the bed in the alcove a woman lay dying. She
must have been beautiful in her youth, and traces of beauty still
lingered on her face. She stretched out her hands and drew my head down
to hers.

"Renaud tells me you have done him a great service," she said feebly.
"It is through you that he was able to come to me. A dying woman blesses
you, monsieur, and surely the saints will reward you. A goodly youth! A
goodly youth! May God hold you in His holy keeping! Treasure him,
Renaud, my son, even to the giving of your life for his!"

Her eyes closed, she sank back exhausted, and I stole from the room. How
my heart ached that night! "Treasure him, Renaud!" Poor soul! How
merciful that she should die ignorant of the wretched truth! "Even to
the giving of your life for his!" And his life was in my hands already!
Oh, the pity, the horror of it! She called on God to bless me, and I was
about to lead her only son straight from her death-bed to the
executioner!

For I could not disguise from myself the fact that this man would die
the death of a spy. Ambroise Devine was in Rochelle, and he would show
no mercy. And, terrible as it might seem, there were those in the city
who would scout the idea that Renaud L'Estang had risked his life solely