indirect roads, make
me lose time at chateaux. When I arrived at the grim old chateau--a true
dungeon, precise as a convent--there was the dame, playing the Queen
Jeanne as well as she could, and having the insolence to tell me that it
was true that Madame la Baronne de Ribaumont, as she was pleased to call
her, had honoured her residence for some months, but that she had now
quitted it, and she flatly refused to answer any question whither she
was gone! The hag! she might at least have had the decorum to deny all
knowledge of her, but nothing is more impertinent that the hypocritical
sincerity of the heretics.'

'But her people,' exclaimed the Abbess; 'surely some of them knew, and
could be brought to speak.'

'All the servants I came in contact with played the incorruptible; but
still I have done something. There were some fellows in the village who
are not at their ease under that rule. I caused my people to inquire
them out. They knew nothing more than that the old heretic Gardon with
his family had gone away in Madame la Duchesse's litter, but whither
they could not tell. But the _cabaretier_ there is furious secretly with
the Quinets for having spoilt his trade by destroying the shrine at the
holy well, and I have made him understand that it will be for his
profit to send me off intelligence so soon as there is any communication
between them and the lady. I made the same arrangement with a couple of
gendarmes of the escort the Duke gave me. So at least we are safe for
intelligence such as would hinder a marriage.'

'But they will be off to England!' said the Abbess.

'I wager they will again write to make sure of a reception. Moreover,
I have set that fellow Ercole and others of his trade to keep a strict
watch on all the roads leading to the ports, and give me due notice of
their passing thither. We have law on our side, and, did I once claim
her, no one could resist my right. Or should the war break out, as is
probable, then could my son sweep their whole province with his troops.
This time she cannot escape us.

The scene that her father's words and her own imagination conjured up,
of Eustacie attracting the handsome widower-duke, removed all remaining
scruples from Madame de Selinville. For his own sake, the Baron must be
made to fulfil the prophecy of the ink-pool, and allow his prison doors
to be opened by love. Many and many a tender art did Diane rehearse;
numerous were her sighs; wakeful, languishing