boy his eyes had travelled upwards, following the protecting
arm which lay across the slender shoulders, and it was Ursula de Vesc
who answered. Charles had caught her hand in both his and held it
pressed against his breast. It was clear that he did not understand,
but the full meaning of the tragedy of death is not comprehensible in a
single moment, nor was the girl's answer much more than an exclamation.

"Monsieur d'Argenton! The King? The King dead?"

"Dead," he said dully, "the greatest King that France has ever known,
the greatest mind that was alive in France. In France? In Europe!
There was none like him--none. A great King, great in his foresight,
great in his wisdom, great in his love for France; a great King, and he
is dead. But yesterday, this very day even, he held the peace of
nations in the hollow of his hand, now---- Why, how poor a thing is
man. Dead! dead! But his monument is a great nation, a new France;
and who shall hold France in her pride of place amongst the nations
where his dead hand raised her? Dead; the Great King and my friend."

CHAPTER XXV

"IT IS A TRAP"

This time no one broke the silence, and for a little space the quiet
was like the reverent stillness of a death-chamber. The awe
inseparable from sudden death possessed them. And yet, after the first
shock of natural horror, La Mothe was conscious of a great relief. Not
till then did he realize how tense the strain had been, how acute the
fear. But at the slow dropping of Commines' bitter-hearted words there
came a revulsion of feeling, and he was ashamed to find a gladness in
such a cause of grief. For the loss to France he cared little. To him
Louis had been but a name, the figurehead of state. If not Louis, then
another, and France would still be France. But as Commines turned away
and, following that other instinct of nature which, in the dumb animal,
hides its wounds, covered his face with his arms as he leaned against
the wall, the lad's heart went out in sympathy to the man who had lost
his friend. And surely over and above his greatness of mind there must
have been some deep heart of goodness in the dead man when he moved
affection to such a grief. But at last the silence came to an end, and
again it was Ursula de Vesc who spoke.

"Monsieur d'Argenton, you will, of course, go to Valmy at once?"

"To Valmy?" Commines brushed his hand across his forehead with a
characteristic gesture and paused,