ough the starlit night was very dark, she
perceived a cloaked and hooded figure approaching cautiously toward her.

"Who goes there?" she called suddenly.

The figure paused: then came rapidly forward, and a voice said timidly:

"Ah! Lady Blakeney!"

"Who are you?" asked Marguerite peremptorily.

"It is I... Desiree Candeille," replied the midnight prowler.

"Demoiselle Candeille!" ejaculated Marguerite, wholly taken by surprise.
"What are you doing here? alone? and at this hour?"

"Sh-sh-sh..." whispered Candeille eagerly, as she approached quite close
to Marguerite and drew her hood still lower over her eyes. "I am all
alone ... I wanted to see someone--you if possible, Lady Blakeney... for
I could not rest... I wanted to know what had happened."

"What had happened? When? I don't understand."

"What happened between Citizen Chauvelin and your husband?" asked
Candeille.

"What is that to you?" replied Marguerite haughtily.

"I pray you do not misunderstand me..." pleaded Candeille eagerly. "I
know my presence in your house... the quarrel which I provoked must have
filled your heart with hatred and suspicion towards me... but oh! how
can I persuade you?... I acted unwillingly... will you not believe
me?... I was that man's tool... and... Oh God!" she added with sudden,
wild vehemence, "if only you could know what tyranny that accursed
government of France exercises over poor helpless women or men who
happen to have fallen within reach of its relentless clutches..."

Her voice broke down in a sob. Marguerite hardly knew what to say or
think. She had always mistrusted this woman with her theatrical ways and
stagy airs, from the very first moment she saw her in the tent on the
green: and she did not wish to run counter against her instinct, in
anything pertaining to the present crisis. And yet in spite of her
mistrust the actress' vehement words found an echo in the depths of her
own heart. How well she knew that tyranny of which Candeille spoke with
such bitterness! Had she not suffered from it, endured terrible sorrow
and humiliation, when under the ban of that same appalling tyranny
she had betrayed the identity--then unknown to her--of the Scarlet
Pimpernel?

Therefore when Candeille paused after those last excited words, she said
with more gentleness than she had shown hitherto, though still quite
coldly:

"But you have not yet told me why you came back here to-night? If
Citizen Chauvelin was your ta