he loved.

But his look did not answer her firm appeal; it was fixed far away
beyond the prison walls, on a lonely country road outside Paris, with
the rain falling in a thin drizzle, and leaden clouds overhead chasing
one another, driven by the gale.

"Poor mite," he murmured softly; "he walked so bravely by my side, until
the little feet grew weary; then he nestled in my arms and slept until
we met Ffoulkes waiting with the cart. He was no King of France just
then, only a helpless innocent whom Heaven aided me to save."

Marguerite bowed her head in silence. There was nothing more that she
could say, no plea that she could urge. Indeed, she had understood, as
he had begged her to understand. She understood that long ago he had
mapped out the course of his life, and now that that course happened to
lead up a Calvary of humiliation and of suffering he was not likely to
turn back, even though, on the summit, death already was waiting and
beckoning with no uncertain hand; not until he could murmur, in the wake
of the great and divine sacrifice itself, the sublime words:

"It is accomplished."

"But the Dauphin is safe enough now," was all that she said, after that
one moment's silence when her heart, too, had offered up to God the
supreme abnegation of self, and calmly faced a sorrow which threatened
to break it at last.

"Yes!" he rejoined quietly, "safe enough for the moment. But he would
be safer still if he were out of France. I had hoped to take him one day
with me to England. But in this plan damnable Fate has interfered.
His adherents wanted to get him to Vienna, and their wish had best be
fulfilled now. In my instructions to Ffoulkes I have mapped out a simple
way for accomplishing the journey. Tony will be the one best suited to
lead the expedition, and I want him to make straight for Holland; the
Northern frontiers are not so closely watched as are the Austrian ones.
There is a faithful adherent of the Bourbon cause who lives at Delft,
and who will give the shelter of his name and home to the fugitive King
of France until he can be conveyed to Vienna. He is named Nauudorff.
Once I feel that the child is safe in his hands I will look after
myself, never fear."

He paused, for his strength, which was only factitious, born of the
excitement that Marguerite's presence had called forth, was threatening
to give way. His voice, though he had spoken in a whisper all along, was
very hoarse, and his temples were t