a horse alone could save me, I--I stole
it. Oh, if I can but get that again!"

"Why not? It is doubtless in the stables behind the _cours criminel_,
where the guard stable theirs."

It was there; so that difficulty was soon solved, no objection being
offered by the authorities to giving up the property of a prisoner who
was so distinguished as to be acquitted by the king's order an hour
before his execution; and then, when St. Georges had recovered it, he
announced his intention of at once setting forth. He was impatient to
be gone now he was so near; he calculated that by midday on the morrow
he would have forced from Aurelie de Roquemaure a confession of what
she had done with Dorine. She was at Troyes he knew; Boussac, who
professed himself well acquainted with her movements, having told him
that such was the case.

"She is much at court now," he said; "I often see her. And she must be
back at Troyes by now--I mean--that--she has been absent from there of
late. But--but she would be back by now--she--told me--she was----"

"What?" asked St. Georges, looking at him and wondering why he seemed
so incoherent about the woman's movements; wondering also how he came
to know so much about them, especially her recent ones--"what did she
tell you when last you saw her?"

"That--she has been paying a visit--to--to--assist a friend--but----"

"Her friendship seems as strong as her hate--and greed," muttered St.
Georges.

"But that," Boussac continued, still floundering a good deal in his
speech, "she would be at the manoir last night--yes, last night."

"So. Then she will doubtless be there to-morrow also; she will require
rest after rendering her friend so much assistance. I shall find her
there."

"_We_ shall find her there," Boussac answered. "I am going with you."

"You! Why?" Then he laughed--for the first time for many a day. "Do
you think I am in danger now, with Louis's protection in my pocket,
or," and his brow darkened a little, "do you fear that she is in
danger from me?"

"_Mon ami_," Boussac replied, "I think neither of those things. The
king's permission has made you safe--your manhood makes her so. Yet,
let me ride with you. Remember"--and again he halted in his speech, as
though seeking for a suitable reason for accompanying him--"we rode
together when _la petite_ was about to be lost to you; let us do so
now when, I hope most fervently, she is about to be restored to you.
And, my friend, I have ob