nt in Paris, for that the
king was dying, and that all France, France the bankrupt and distracted,
was on the brink of sudden and perhaps fateful change.

With a quick revival of all his Highland superstition, Law hailed now as
happy harbinger the fact that, upon his entry into Paris, the city once
more of his hopes, he had met in such fashion this lady of his dreams,
even at such time as the seal of silence was lifted from his lips. It
was no wonder that his eye gleamed, that his voice took on the old
vibrant tone, that every gesture, in thought or in spite of thought,
assumed the tender deference of the lover.

It was a fair woman, this chance guest of the highway whom he now
accosted--bronze-haired, blue-eyed, soft of voice, queenly of mien,
gentle, calm and truly lovable. Oh, what waste that those arms should
hold nothing, that lips such as those should know no kisses, that eyes
like those should never swim in love! What robbery! What crime! And this
man, thief of this woman's life, felt his heart pinch again in the old,
sharp anguish of remorse, bitterest because unavailing.

For the Lady Catharine herself there had been also many changes. The
death of her brother, the Earl of Banbury, had wrought many shifts in
the circumstances of a house apparently pursued by unkind fate. Left
practically alone and caring little for the life of London, even after
there had worn away the chill of suspicion which followed upon the
popular knowledge of her connection with the escape of Law from London,
Lady Catharine Knollys turned to a life and world suddenly grown vague
and empty. Travel upon the continent with friends, occasional visits to
the old family house in England, long sojourns in this or the other
city--such had been her life, quiet, sweet, reproachless and
unreproaching. For the present she had taken an hotel in the older part
of Paris, in connection with her friend, the Countess of Warrington,
sometime connected with the embassy of that Lord Stair who was later to
act as spy for England in Paris, now so soon to know tumultuous scenes.
With these scenes, as time was soon to prove, there was to be most
intimately connected this very man who, now bending forward attentively,
now listening respectfully, and ever gazing directly and ardently, heard
naught of plots or plans, cared naught for the Paris which lay about,
saw naught but the beautiful face before him, felt naught but some deep,
compelling thrill in every heart