re chattering. I was faint without
feigning, and felt a kind of terror, hard to explain, at the sound of
this woman's voice.

'One of our people has told me about you, she continued, speaking out of
the darkness. 'I am sorry that this has happened to you here, but I am
afraid that you were indiscreet.'

'I take all the blame, Madame,' I answered humbly. 'I ask only shelter
for the night.'

'The time has not yet come when we cannot give our friends that!' she
answered with noble courtesy. 'When it does, Monsieur, we shall be
homeless ourselves.'

I shivered, looking anywhere but at her; for, if the truth be told,
I had not sufficiently pictured this scene of my arrival--I had not
foredrawn its details; and now I took part in it I felt a miserable
meanness weigh me down. I had never from the first liked the work, but I
had had no choice, and I had no choice now. Luckily, the guise in which
I came, my fatigue, and wound were a sufficient mask, or I should have
incurred suspicion at once. For I am sure that if ever in this world a
brave man wore a hang-dog air, or Gil de Berault fell below himself,
it was then and there--on Madame de Cocheforet's threshold, with her
welcome sounding in my ears.

One, I think, did suspect me. Clon, the porter, continued to hold the
door obstinately ajar and to eye me with grinning spite, until his
mistress, with some sharpness, bade him drop the bars and conduct me to
a room.

'Do you go also, Louis,' she continued, speaking to the man beside her,
'and see this gentleman comfortably disposed. I am sorry,' she added,
addressing me in the graceful tone she had before used, and I thought
that I could see her head bend in the darkness, 'that our present
circumstances do not permit us to welcome you more fitly, Monsieur. But
the troubles of the times--however, you will excuse what is lacking.
Until to-morrow, I have the honour to bid you good-night.'

'Good-night, Madame,' I stammered, trembling. I had not been able to
distinguish her face in the gloom of the doorway, but her voice, her
greeting, her presence unmanned me. I was troubled and perplexed; I
had not spirit to kick a dog. I followed the two servants from the hall
without heeding how we went; nor was it until we came to a full stop
at a door in a white-washed corridor, and it was forced upon me that
something was in question between my two conductors that I began to take
notice.

Then I saw that one of them, Louis, wished to