ver lose it?" Pangs hitherto
unknown to her wrung her heart, for she now loved truly and for the
first time. Yet she had not so wholly delivered herself to her lover
that she could not take refuge from her pain in the natural pride and
dignity of a young and beautiful woman. The secret of her love--a secret
often kept by women under torture itself--had not escaped her lips.
Presently she rose from her reclining attitude, ashamed that she had
shown her passion by her silent sufferings; she shook her head with a
light-hearted action, and showed a face, or rather a mask, that was gay
and smiling, then she raised her voice to disguise the quiver of it.

"Where are we?" she said to Captain Merle, who kept himself at a certain
distance from the carriage.

"About six miles from Fougeres, mademoiselle."

"We shall soon be there, shall we not?" she went on, to encourage a
conversation in which she might show some preference for the young
captain.

"A Breton mile," said Merle much delighted, "has the disadvantage of
never ending; when you are at the top of one hill you see a valley
and another hill. When you reach the summit of the slope we are now
ascending you will see the plateau of Mont Pelerine in the distance.
Let us hope the Chouans won't take their revenge there. Now, in going up
hill and going down hill one doesn't make much headway. From La Pelerine
you will still see--"

The young _emigre_ made a movement at the name which Marie alone
noticed.

"What is La Pelerine?" she asked hastily, interrupting the captain's
description of Breton topography.

"It is the summit of a mountain," said Merle, "which gives its name to
the Maine valley through which we shall presently pass. It separates
this valley from that of Couesnon, at the end of which is the town
of Fougeres, the chief town in Brittany. We had a fight there last
Vendemiaire with the Gars and his brigands. We were escorting Breton
conscripts, who meant to kill us sooner than leave their own land; but
Hulot is a rough Christian, and he gave them--"

"Did you see the Gars?" she asked. "What sort of man is he?"

Her keen, malicious eyes never left the so-called vicomte's face.

"Well, mademoiselle," replied Merle, nettled at being always
interrupted, "he is so like citizen du Gua, that if your friend did not
wear the uniform of the Ecole Polytechnique I could swear it was he."

Mademoiselle de Verneuil looked fixedly at the cold, impassible young
man who h