"By you, Sophie! Impossible!"

"And God alive, why impossible, I pray you?" she retorted. "The money, I
understand, is in a very portable form, notes and bankers' drafts, which
can be stowed away quite easily. Why shouldn't I be journeying back to
Paris after Crystal's wedding? Who would suspect me, I should like to
know, of carrying twenty-five millions under my petticoats? All I should
want would be a couple of sturdy fellows on the box to protect me
against footpads. Impossible?" she continued tartly. "Men are always so
ready with that word. Get a sensible woman, I say, and she will solve
your difficulties before you have finished exclaiming: 'Impossible!'"

And she looked triumphantly from one man to the other. There was obvious
relief on the ruddy face of little M. Fourier, and even M. le Comte was
visibly taken with the idea.

"Well!" he at last condescended to say, "it does sound feasible after
all."

"Feasible? Of course it's feasible," said Madame with a shrug of
contempt. "Either the King is in want of the money, or he is not. Either
Bonaparte is likely to get it or he is not. If the King wants it, he
must have it at any cost and any risk. Twenty-five millions in
Bonaparte's hands at this juncture would help him to reconstitute his
army and make it very unpleasant for the King and for us all. M. le
prefet, who has been in charge of the money all along, and M. le Comte
de Cambray, who is the only true royalist in the district, are both
marked down by spies: ergo Mme. la Duchesse d'Agen is the only possible
agent for the business, and an inoffensive old woman without any
political standing is the least likely to be molested in her task. If I
fail, I fail," concluded Madame decisively, "if I am stopped on the way
and the money taken from me, well! I am stopped, that's all! and M. le
prefet or M. le Comte de Cambray or any male agent they may have sent
would have been stopped likewise. But I maintain that a woman travelling
alone is far safer at this business and more likely to succeed than a
man. So now, for God's sake, don't let's argue any more about it.
Crystal is to be married on Tuesday and I could start that same
afternoon. Can you bring the money over with you to-night?"

She put her query directly to the prefet, who was obviously overjoyed,
and intensely relieved at the suggestion.

M. le Comte too seemed to be won over by his sister's persuasive
rhetoric: her strength of mind and firmness of pu