m the captivity into
which she had been forced by a designing lady of Dauphiny. Was that a
task to set a soldier, a man of his years and birth and name? He had
revolted at it; yet that stubborn pride of his that would not brook his
return to Paris to confess himself defeated by a woman over this woman's
business, held him relentlessly to his distasteful course.

And gradually the distaste of it had melted. It had begun to fall
away five nights ago, when he had heard what passed between Madame de
Condillac and Valerie. A great pity for this girl, a great indignation
against those who would account no means too base to achieve their ends
with her, a proper realization of the indignities she was suffering,
caused him to shed some of his reluctance, some of his sense of injury
to himself.

His innate chivalry, that fine spirit of his which had ever prompted him
to defend the weak against the oppressor, stirred him now, and stirred
him to such purpose that, in the end, from taking up the burden of his
task reluctantly, he came to bear it zestfully and almost gladly. He was
rejoiced to discover himself equipped with histrionic gifts of which
he had had no suspicion hitherto, and it delighted him to set them into
activity.

Now it happened that at Condillac there was a fellow countryman of
"Battista's," a mercenary from Northern Italy, a rascal named Arsenio,
whom Fortunio had enlisted when first he began to increase the garrison
a month ago. Upon this fellow's honesty Garnache had formed designs.
He had closely observed him, and in Arsenio's countenance he thought he
detected a sufficiency of villainy to augur well for the prosperity
of any scheme of treachery that might be suggested to him provided the
reward were adequate.

Garnache went about sounding the man with a wiliness peculiarly his own.
Arsenio being his only compatriot at Condillac it was not wonderful
that in his few daily hours of relief from his gaoler's duty "Battista"
should seek out the fellow and sit in talk with him. The pair became
intimate, and intercourse between them grew more free and unrestrained.
Garnache waited, wishing to risk nothing by precipitancy, and watched
for his opportunity. It came on the morrow of All Saints. On that Day of
the Dead, Arsenio, whose rearing had been that of a true son of Mother
Church, was stirred by the memory of his earthly mother, who had died
some three years before. He was silent and moody, and showed little
re