an open cart, under the
pitiless rain, amidst a crowd of evil-smelling, blaspheming, wounded
republicans, who, when a more cruel jolt than usual awakens their
wounds, curse the woman in words that should have drawn avenging bolts
from heaven. She sits silent, lofty, tearless; but her eyes, when they
are not lost in the grey distance, ever wistfully seek his face.

The day is drawing to a close; they reach their goal, a miserable,
grey, draggled town at the mouth of the Vilaine, and are roughly
brought before the arbiter of their lives--Thureau himself, the
monstrous excrescence of the times, who, like Marat and Carrier, sees
nothing in the new freedom but a free opening for the lowest instincts
of ferocity.

And before this monstrous beast, bedizened in his general's frippery,
in a reeking tavern-room, stand the noble lady of Savenaye and the
young heir of Pulwick.

The ruffian's voice rings with laughter as he gazes on the silent
youthful pair.

"Aha, what have we here; a couple of drowned rats? or have we trapped
you at last, the ci-devant Savenaye and her _godam_ from England? I
ought really to send you as a present to the Convention, but I am too
soft-hearted, you see, my pigeons; and so, to save time and make sure,
we will marry you to-day."

One of the officers whispers some words in his ear, which Thureau,
suddenly growing purple with rage, denies with a foul oath and an
emphatic thump of his huge fist on the table.

"Hoche has forbidden it, has he? Hoche does not command here. Hoche
has not had to hunt down the brigands these last two years. Dead the
beast, dead the venom, I say. And here is the order," scribbling
hurriedly on a page torn from a pocket-book. "It shall not be said
that I have had the bitch of Savenaye in my hands and trusted her on
the road again. Hoche has forbidden it! Call the cantineer and hop:
the marriage and quick--the soup waits."

Unable to understand the hidden meaning of the order, Adrian looks at
his lady askance, to find that, with eyes closed upon the sight of the
grinning faces, she is whispering prayers and fervently crossing
herself. When she turns to him again her face is almost serene.

"They are going to drown us together; that is their republican
marriage of aristocrats," she says in soft English. "I had feared
worse. Thank heaven there is no time now for worse. We shall be firm
to the last, shall we not, cousin?"

There is a pathetic smile on her worn weather-sta