'Are you very sure of that?'

'I am here,' he explained, 'because I am so sure.'

'And you desire--'

'I, Madame,' he said quickly and shortly, 'desire two things--the good
of my country and your good. If I desire anything else, God knows it is
to keep my promise.'

'What is your promise?'

'Madame,' said Richard, 'I bear the Cross on my shoulder, as you see.'

'Why,' she said, fearfully regarding it, 'that is God's work!'

She began to walk about the room quickly, and to talk to herself. He
could not catch properly what she said. Religion came into it, and a
question of time. 'Now it should be done, now it should be done!' and
then, 'Hear, O thou Shepherd of Israel!' and then with a wild look into
Richard's face--'That was a strange thing to do to a lady. They can
never lay that to me!' Afterwards she began to wring her hands, with a
cry of 'Fie, poison, poison, poison!' looking at Richard all the time.

'This poor lady,' he told himself, 'is possessed by a devil, therefore
no wife for me, who have devil enough and to spare.'

'What ails you, Madame?' he asked her. 'Tell me your grief, and upon my
life I will amend it if I can.'