"

"I will tell you, miscreant! I am John de Winter, and that woman"----

"And that woman"----gasped the executioner.

"Was my mother!"

The headsman uttered a shriek, the long and terrible one which Grimaud
and the innkeeper had heard.

"Oh, pardon, pardon!" murmured he--"forgive me, if not in God's name,
at least in your own. If not as a priest, as a son."

"Pardon you!" replied the pretended monk; "pardon you! God may perhaps
do it, but I never will. Die, wretch, die! unabsolved, despairing, and
accursed." And, drawing a dagger from under his gown, he plunged it
into the breast of the headsman. "Take that," said he, "for my
absolution."

It was then that the second cry, followed by a long moan, had been
uttered. The headsman, who had partially raised himself, fell back
upon the bed. The monk, without withdrawing his dagger from the wound,
ran to the window, opened it, jumped out into the little flower-garden
below, and hurried to the stable. Leading out his mule, he plunged
into the thickest part of the adjacent forest, stripped off his monk's
garb, took a horseman's dress out of his valise, and put it on. Then,
making all haste to the nearest post-house, he took a horse, and
continued with the utmost speed his journey to Paris.

The headsman lives long enough to inform Grimaud of what has passed;
and Grimaud, who was present at the decapitation of Lady de Winter,
returns to Paris, to put Athos and his friends on their guard against
the vengeance of her son. Mordaunt, _alias_ De Winter, is one of
Cromwell's most devoted and unscrupulous agents, and is proceeding to
the French capital to negotiate with Mazarine on the part of the
Parliamentary general. Guided by what he has heard from the
executioner of Bethune, he discovers who the men are by whose order
his mother was beheaded, and he vows their destruction. The four
friends soon afterwards meet in England, whither D'Artagnan and
Porthos have been sent on a mission to Cromwell; whilst Athos and
Aramis have repaired thither to strive to prop the falling fortunes of
Charles the First. We cannot say much in favour of that portion of the
book of which the scene is laid on English ground. M. Dumas is much
happier in his delineations of Frondeurs and Mazarinists than of
Puritans and Cavaliers; and his account of Charles the First, and of
the scenes prior to his execution, is horribly Frenchified.

After numerous narrow escapes from Mordaunt, who pursues them wi