By my faith, madame, I'll put myself under no conditions."

"Monsieur de Blassemare, have you no honor, no pity, no manhood? Will
you be accessory to a _murder_? I will go with you on no other terms."

"I accept none, madame."

"You are a coward, sir, and a criminal."

"Madame might command, at least, her countenance and her gestures;
imitate me. You call me hard names; I'm prepared for them. Now listen: I
won't accept your condition, because, if I did, I should keep my word;
and, I tell you frankly, I won't despair, and I don't despair. But,
madame, you shan't perish. What do you say to leaving the chateau with
De Secqville?"

"Yes, _he_ will agree to whatever I propose."

"I dare say."

"But when--how?"

"To-morrow night, at ten o'clock, through that door; a coach shall wait
in the park. You know the well under the two chestnut-trees; there he
will await you; don't fail--a moment late, and all may be lost."

"But--but how to evade the woman who watches me?"

"She shall be perfectly drunk."

"And the man?"

"Drunker still. Leave all details to me. There are more than one Argus
besides these; but a man of resource is at home among difficulties.
Watch at ten o'clock. When you see a light in the window of the small
pavilion, all is prepared: you will find the door open."

Blassemare signed to the woman to approach, and said, as he bowed his
adieu, in a louder key--

"I shall not fail, madame, to report to Monsieur Le Prun the unfortunate
temper in which I have the honor to find you."

"And have the goodness to add, that I only regret my inability to repeat
the same sentiments in his presence."

"Madame shall be obeyed."

So, with an air of affected defiance on the one side, and of sarcastic
levity on the other, the two conspirators parted. Her protracted
residence in the Chateau des Anges, gloomy and anxious before, had
become absolutely terrifying since she had heard the dark and menacing
insinuations used by Blassemare. The evening that followed that scene,
the night, and the ensuing morning, seemed endless, filled with horrid
images, and haunted by the hideous thought that the catastrophe might
possibly anticipate the hour of escape, or that some one untoward chance
might defeat the entire scheme, and leave her at the mercy of a more
than ever exasperated tyrant.

As the day wore on, every incident appeared to her overstrained mind an
omen of good or ill-success. Towards evening the sky became ov