hich did not escape me. Among
their cries I could plainly distinguish the words, 'In the king's name!'
which bore out Simon's statement.

At the moment I drew comfort from this; for if we had merely to deal
with the law we had that on our side which was above it. And I speedily
made up my mind what to do. 'I think the lad speaks the truth, sire,' I
said coolly. 'This is only your Majesty's Provost-Marshal. The worst to
be feared, therefore, is that he may learn your presence here before
you would have it known. It should not be a matter of great difficulty,
however, to bind him to silence, and if you will please to mask, I will
open the grille and speak with him.'

The king, who had taken his stand in the middle of the room, and seemed
dazed and confused by the suddenness of the alarm and the uproar,
assented with a brief word. Accordingly I was preparing to open the
grille when Madame de Bruhl seized my arm, and forcibly pushed me back
from it.

'What would you do?' she cried, her face full of terror. 'Do you not
hear? He is there.'

'Who is there?' I said, startled more by her manner than her words.

'Who?' she answered; 'who should be there? My husband! I hear his voice,
I tell you! He has tracked me here! He has found me, and will kill me!'

'God forbid!' I said, doubting if she had really heard his voice. To
make sure, I asked Simon if he had seen him; and my heart sank when I
heard from him too that Bruhl was of the party. For the first time I
became fully sensible of the danger which threatened us. For the first
time, looking round the ill-lit room on the women's terrified faces,
and the king's masked figure instinct with ill-repressed nervousness, I
recognised how hopelessly we were enmeshed. Fortune had served Bruhl so
well that, whether he knew it or not, he had us all trapped--alike
the king whom he desired to compromise, and his wife whom he hated,
mademoiselle who had once escaped him, and me who had twice thwarted
him. It was little to be wondered at if my courage sank as I looked from
one to another, and listened to the ominous creaking of the door, as the
stout panels complained under the blows rained upon them. For my first
duty, and that which took the PAS of all others, was to the king--to
save him harmless. How, then, was I to be answerable for mademoiselle,
how protect Madame de Bruhl?--how, in a word, redeem all those pledges
in which my honour was concerned?

It was the thought of the Prov