all your lives safe by night or
day. And not only would ye yourselves be in peril, but peril would
threaten good Jean and Margot; and methinks you would be sorely loath
that harm should come to them through the faithful kindness they have
ever shown to you and yours."

"Sooner would we die than that one hair of their head should be
touched!" cried both the boys impetuously; "and Margot lives in fear and
trembling ever since we told her of the words we spoke to yon tyrant and
usurper of Saut. We told her for her comfort that he would think us too
poor and humble and feeble to vent his rage on us; but she shook her
head at that, and feared no creature hearing the name of De Brocas would
be too humble to be a mark for his spite. And then we told her that we
would sally forth to see the world, as we had ever longed to do and
though she wept to think that we must go, she did not bid us stay. She
said, as thou hast done, good Father, that she had known that such day
would surely come; and though it has come something early and something
suddenly, she holds that we shall be safer facing the perils of the
unknown world, than living here a mark for the spite and malice of the
foe of our house. If no man holds us back, why go we not forth tomorrow?"

The priest's face was grave and even sorrowful, but he made no objection
even to so rapid a move.

"My sons, if this thing is to be, it is small use to tarry and linger. I
would not that the Sieur de Navailles should know that you have hidden
your heads here so long; and a secret, however faithfully kept, that
belongs to many, may not be a secret always. It is right that you should
go, and with the inclement winter season hard upon us, with its dangers
from heavy snows, tempests at sea, and those raids from wolves that make
the peril of travellers when the cold once sets in, it behoves you, if
go ye must, to go right speedily. And in the belief that I should find
your minds made up and your preparations well-nigh complete, I have
brought to you the casket given into my charge by your mother on her
dying bed. Methinks that you will find therein gold enough to carry you
safe to England, and such papers as shall suffice to prove to your proud
kinsmen at the King's Court that ye are in very truth the sons of their
brother, and that it is of just and lawful right that you make your
claim to Basildene."

The brothers looked eagerly at the handsome case, wrought and inlaid
with gold, in