rtial's arguments, for the satisfaction of Jacqueline.
Much pride as well as joy had he in the service; for he reverenced his
teacher, and feared nothing so much, in these repetitions, as that this
listener, this animated, thinking, feeling Jacqueline, should lose
anything by his transmission of the preacher's arguments and eloquence.

And sometimes, on those special occasions which were now constantly
occurring, she walked with him to the town, and hearkened for herself in
the assemblages of those who were now one in the faith.

Elsie looked on and wondered, but did not jest with Jacqueline, as girls
are wont to jest with one another on such points as seemed involved in
this friendship between youth and youth, between man and woman.

Towards the conclusion of the girls' appointed labor in the vineyard, a
week passed in which Victor Le Roy had not once come out from Meaux in
the direction of the setting sun. He knew the time when the peasants'
labor in the vineyard would be done; Jacqueline had told him; and with
wonder, and with trouble, she lived through the days that brought no
word from him.

At work early and late, Jacqueline had no opportunity of discovering
what was going on in Meaux. But it chanced, on the last day of the last
week in the vineyard, tidings reached her: Martial Mazurier had been
arrested, and would be tried, the rumor said, as John Leclerc had been
tried; and sentence would be pronounced, doubtless, said conjecture,
severe in proportion to the influence the man had acquired, to the
position he held.

Hearing this, oppressed, troubled, yet not doubting, Jacqueline
determined that she would go to Meaux that evening, and so ascertain the
truth. She said nothing to Elsie of her purpose. She was careful in all
things to avoid that which might involve her companion in peril in an
unknown future; but at nightfall she had made herself ready to set
out for Meaux, when her purpose was changed in the first steps by the
appearing of Victor Le Roy.

He had come to Jacqueline,--had but one purpose in his coming; yet it
was she who must say,--

"Is it true, Victor, that Martial Mazurier is in prison?"

His answer surprised her.

"No, it is not true."

But his countenance did not answer the glad expression of her face with
an equal smile. His gravity almost communicated itself to her. Yet this
rebound from her recent dismay surely might demand an opportunity.

"I believe you," said she. "But I was c