--not knowing.

But she thrust her arms out furiously as if to strike him.

"Go--go!" she cried, "you are breaking my heart every instant you
remain. Is it not enough, that which you have done? I would be quiet.
They are waiting for you to take you to Pilate's House. But tell me
first where to find this--this Claire Agnew!"

She pronounced the name with difficulty.

"Ah," Valentine continued, when John had told her how she was safe in
Provence, "that is no great way. I shall go and soon return. Then to
Madrid is farther, but easier. But if I suffer--what I must suffer--you
can well abide here a little season. The hope--the future is with you.
For me there is neither--save to do the greatest thing for you that ever
woman did for man! That shall be my revenge."

CHAPTER XLV.

VALENTINE FINDS CLAIRE WORTHY

The mornings are fair--yes, very sweet and very clear at the Mas of the
Mountain well-nigh all the year round. However hot the day, however
mosquito-tormented the nights for those who do not protect themselves,
the morn is ever fresh, with deep draughts of air cool as long-cellared
wine, and everywhere the scent of springy, low-growing plants--the
thyme, the romarin, the juniper--making an undergrowth which supports
the foot of the wanderer, and carries him on league after league almost
without his knowledge.

There was great peace on the Valley of the Rhone. It was at peace even
from the drive of the eternal mistral, which, from horizon to horizon,
turns all things greyish-white, the trees and herbage heavy with dust,
and the heavens hiding themselves away under a dry steely pall.

"Avenio ventoso,
Si non ventoso, venenoso,"

muttered the Professor, as he looked at the black mass to the north,
which was the Palace of the Popes. "But I thank God it is windy, this
Rhone Valley of ours, with its one great, sweeping, cleansing wind, so
that no poison can lurk anywhere."

He had a book in his hand, and he was looking abroad over the wide
valley between the grey ridges of the Mountain of Barbentane and the
little splintered peaks of the Alpilles. As on the landscape, great
peace was upon the Professor.

But all suddenly, without noise of approach, Jean-aux-Choux stood before
him--changed, indeed, from him who had been called "The Fool of the
Three Henries." The fire of a strange passion glowed in his eye. His
great figure was hollowed and ghastly. His regard seemed to burn like a
t