her notice, it might be in her very presence! He would lure her
to Cahors, and then--

I shuddered. I well might feel that a precipice was opening at
my feet. There was something in the plan so devilish, yet so
accordant with those stories I had heard of the Wolf, that I felt
no doubt of my insight. I read his evil mind, and saw in a
moment why he had troubled himself with us. He hoped to draw
Mademoiselle to Cahors by our means.

Of course I said nothing of this to Louis. I hid my feelings as
well as I could. But I vowed a great vow that at the eleventh
hour we would baulk the Vidame. Surely if all else failed we
could kill him, and, though we died ourselves, spare Kit this
ordeal. My tears were dried up as by a fire. My heart burned
with a great and noble rage: or so it seemed to me!

I do not think that there was ever any journey so strange as this
one of ours. We met with the same incidents which had pleased us
on the road to Paris. But their novelty was gone. Gone too were
the cosy chats with old rogues of landlords and good-natured
dames. We were travelling now in such force that our coming was
rather a terror to the innkeeper than a boon. How much the
Lieutenant-Governor of Quercy, going down to his province,
requisitioned in the king's name; and for how much he paid, we
could only judge from the gloomy looks which followed us as we
rode away each morning. Such looks were not solely due I fear to
the news from Paris, although for some time we were the first
bearers of the tidings.