s dead.
But you--you must still go on."

With clasped hands she stood looking down at him. She scarcely knew
what he was saying; her mind seemed in a stupor; with apathetic eyes
she gazed down the road. But the accident had happened in a little
hollow, so that the outlook in either direction along the highway was
restricted.

"My emperor is both chivalrous and noble," continued the _plaisant_,
quickly. "Go to him. You must not wait here longer. I did not tell
you, but I think the free baron will have no difficulty in crossing.
You have no time to lose. Go; and--good-by!"

"But--he had a long way to ride--even if he could cross," she said
slowly, passing her hand over her brow.

"Jacqueline!" he cried out, impatiently.

She made no motion to leave, and, reading in her face her
determination, angered by his own helplessness, he strove violently to
release himself, until wrenching his foot in his frantic efforts, he
sank back with a groan. At that sound of pain, wrung from him in spite
of his fortitude, all her seeming apathy vanished. With a low cry, she
dropped on her knees in the road and swiftly took his head in her arms.

It was he, not the young girl, who spoke first. He forgot all
peril--hers and his. He only knew her warm, young arms were about him;
that her heart was throbbing wildly.

"Jacqueline!" he cried, passionately. "Jacqueline!" And threw an arm
about her, drawing her closer, closer.

Did she hear him? She did not reply. Nor did she release him. She
did not even look down. But he felt her bosom rising and falling
faster than its wont.

"Jacqueline," he repeated, "are you listening?"

She stirred slightly; the pallor left her face. In her gaze shone a
light difficult to divine--pity, tenderness, a warmer passion? Where
had he seen it before? In the cell when he lay injured; in his waking
dreams? It seemed the sudden dawn of the full beauty of her eyes; a
half-remembered impression which now became real. Yet even as she
looked down his face changed; his eager glance grew dark; he listened
intently.

The sound of horses' hoofs beat upon the air.

"Jacqueline!--go!--there is yet time!"

Abruptly she arose. He held out his hand for a last quick pressure; a
God-speed to this stanch maid-comrade of the motley.

"God keep you, mistress!"

Standing in the road, gazing up the hollow, she neither saw his hand
nor caught his words of farewell. An expression of bewilderment ha