t when the student came down from the preacher's
study. She heard his voice when the door opened,--by the street-lamp
saw his face. And she recognized also the voice of Mazurier, who, till
the last moment of separation, seemed endeavoring to dissuade his friend
from leaving him that night.

He heard footsteps following him, as he passed along the
pavement,--observed that they gained on him. And could it be any other
than Jacqueline who touched his arm, and whispered, "Victor"?

His fast-beating heart told him it was she. He took her hand, and
drew it within his arm, and looked upon her face,--the face of his
Jacqueline.

"Now where?" said he. "It is late. It is after midnight. Why are you
alone in the street?"

"Waiting for you, Victor. I heard you were at liberty, and I supposed
you were with him. I was safe."

"Yes,--for you fear nothing. That is the only reason. You knew I was
with the preacher, Jacqueline. Why? Because--because I _am_ with him,
of course."

"Yes," she said. "I heard it was so, Victor."

"Strange!--strange!--is it not? A prison is a better place to learn the
truth than the pure air of liberty, it seems," said he, bitterly.

"What is that?" she asked. She seemed not to understand his meaning.

"Nothing. I am acquitted of heresy, you know. It seems, what we talked
so bravely meant--nothing. Oh, I am safe, now!"

"It was to preach none the less,--to hold the truth none the less. But
if he lost his life, there was an end of all; or if he lost his
liberty, it was as bad. But he would keep both, and serve God so," said
Jacqueline.

"Yes," cried Victor, "precisely what he said. I have said the same, you
think?"

"If you are quite clear that Leclerc and the rest of us are all wrong,
Victor."

"Jacqueline!"

"What is it, Victor?"

"'The rest of us,' you say. What would _you_ have done in my place?"

"God knows. I pretend not to know anything more."

"But 'the rest of us,' you said. You think that you at least are with
Leclerc?"

"That was the truth you taught me, Victor. But--I have not yet been
tried."

"That is safe to say. What makes you speak so prudently, Jacqueline? Why
do you not declare, 'Though all men deny Thee, yet will I never deny
Thee'? Ah, you have not been tried! You are not yet in danger of the
judgment, Jacqueline!"

"Do not speak so; you frighten me; it is not like you. How can I tell?
I do not know but in this retirement, in this thought you have been
compelled