her mind of Jean Paul Marat in his maddest moods, fled, with the
unreasoning terror of her kind, before the sternly controlled, fierce
passion of this man.

Chauvelin never noticed that she went. He sat for a long time, silent
and immovable. Now he understood. Thank all the Powers of Hate and
Revenge, no thought of disappointment was destined to embitter the
overflowing cup of his triumph. He had not only brought his arch-enemy
to his knees, but had foiled one of his audacious ventures. How clear
the whole thing was! The false Paul Mole, the newly acquired menial in
the household of Marat, had wormed himself into the confidence of his
employer in order to wrest from him the secret of the aristo's child.
Bravo! bravo! my gallant Scarlet Pimpernel! Chauvelin now could see it
all. Tragedies such as that which had placed an aristo's child in the
power of a cunning demon like Marat were not rare these days, and
Chauvelin had been fitted by nature and by temperament to understand and
appreciate an execrable monster of the type of Jean Paul Marat.

And Paul Mole, the grimy, degraded servant of the indigent demagogue,
the loathsome mask which hid the fastidious personality of Sir Percy
Blakeney, had made a final and desperate effort to possess himself of
the ring which would deliver the child into his power. Now, having
failed in his machinations, he was safe under lock and key--guarded on
sight. The next twenty-four hours would see him unmasked, awaiting his
trial and condemnation under the scathing indictment prepared by
Fouquier-Tinville, the unerring Public Prosecutor. The day after that,
the tumbril and the guillotine for that execrable English spy, and the
boundless sense of satisfaction that his last intrigue had aborted in
such a signal and miserable manner.