continued. "I might have you
punished for it, wench! I might have you whipped and branded for it! Do
you mind me? You robbed me, and that which you took----"

"I took at his instigation!" she retorted, pointing an accusing finger
at Blondel, who stood gnawing his beard, hating the part he was playing,
and hating still more this white-faced girl who had come so near to
ruining, if she had not ruined, his last chance of life. Hate her? The
Syndic hated her for the hour of anguish through which he had just
passed, hated her for the price--he shuddered to think of it--which he
must now pay for his life. He hated her for his present humiliation, he
hated her for his future shame. She seemed to blame for all.

"You took it," Basterga answered, acknowledging her words only by a
disdainful shrug, "and gave it to your mother. Why, I care not. Now that
you see we know so much, will you let us go up!"

"No!" She faced him bravely and steadfastly. "No. If you know so much,
you know also why I took it, and why I gave it to her." And then, the
radiance of unselfish love illuminating her pallid face, "I would do it
again were it to do," she said. "And again, and yet again! For you, I
have done you wrong; I have robbed you, and you may punish me. I must
bear it. But as to him," pointing to Messer Blondel, "I am innocent!
Innocent," she repeated firmly. "For he would have done it himself and
for himself; it was he who would have me do it. And if I have done it, I
have done it for another. I have robbed you, if need be I must pay the
price; but that man has naught against me in this! And for the rest, my
mother is well."

"Ah?"

"Ay, well! well!" she repeated, the light of joy softening her eyes as
she repeated the word. "Well! and I fear nothing."

Basterga laughed cruelly. "Well?" he said. "Well, is she? Then let us go
up and see her. If she be well, why not?"

"No!"

"Why not?"

She did not answer, but she did not make way.

"Why not? I will tell you, if you please," he said. "And it will make
you pipe to another tune. You have given her, young woman, that which
will make her worse, and not better!"

"She is better!"

"For an hour, or for twelve hours!" he retorted. "That certainly. Then
worse."

"No!"

"No? But I see what it is," he continued--and, alas, his voice
strengthened the fear that like a dead hand was closing on her heart and
staying it; deepened the terror that like a veil was falling before her
eyes a