"You have quarreled?"

"No--only that I asserted independence. He would have entered this
tent as my husband, and I forbade his doing so. He stormed and
threatened, but dare not venture further. He knows me now as other
than a weak girl, but my next lesson must be a more severe one. 'Tis
partly to prepare that I sent for you; I ask the loan of a pistol--the
smaller one, to be concealed in my dress."

"You would kill the man?"

"Pooh! small danger of that. You may draw the charge if you will. For
him to know that I possess the weapon will protect me. You do not
grasp my plan?"

He shook his head gloomily, as though it was all a deep puzzle to his
mind, yet his great hand held forth the pistol, the short barrel of
which gleamed wickedly in the fire glow, as I thrust it out of sight.

"'Tis not the way I front enemies," he growled stubbornly, "and I make
little of it. _Mon Dieu!_ I make them talk with these hands."

"But my weapons are those of a woman," I explained, "and I will learn
more than you would with your brute strength. All I ask of you now,
Uncle Chevet, is that you keep on friendly terms with Monsieur
Cassion, yet repeat nothing to him of what I have said, and gain me
opportunity for speech alone with Sieur de Artigny."

"Ah! perhaps I perceive--you love the young man?"

I grasped his sleeve in my fingers, determined to make this point at
least clear to his understanding. His blunt words had set my pulses
throbbing, yet it was resentment, indignation, I felt in strongest
measure.

"Mother of God, no! I have spoken with him but three times since we
were children. He is merely a friend to be trusted, and he must be
made to know my purpose. It will be joy to him to thus affront
Cassion, for there is no love lost between them. You understand now?"

He growled something indistinctly in his beard, which I interpreted as
assent, but I watched his great form disappear in the direction of the
fire, my own mind far from satisfied; the man was so lacking in brains
as to be a poor ally, and so obstinate of nature as to make it
doubtful if he would long conform to my leadership. Still it was
surely better to confide in him to the extent I had than permit him to
rage about blindly, and in open hostility to Cassion.

I seated myself just within the tent, my eyes on the scene as revealed
in the fire-glow, and reflected again over the details of my hastily
born plan. The possibility of the Commissaire's return