nothing
save that she was well guarded; the sentry who passed up and down
outside room No. 6 had heard her voice and that of the Abbe Foucquet, in
the course of the afternoon.

Chauvelin had asked the Committee of Public Safety for aid in his
difficult task, but forty-eight hours at least must elapse before such
aid could reach him. Forty-eight hours, during which the hand of an
assassin might be lurking for him, and might even reach him ere his
vengeance was fully accomplished.

That was the only thought which really troubled him. He did not want to
die before he had seen the Scarlet Pimpernel a withered abject creature,
crushed in fame and honour, too debased to find glorification even in
death.

At this moment he only cared for his life because it was needed for the
complete success of his schemes. No one else he knew would have that
note of personal hatred towards the enemy of France which was necessary
now in order to carry out successfully the plans which he had formed.

Robespierre and all the others only desired the destruction of a man who
had intrigued against the reign of terror which they had established;
his death on the guillotine, even if it were surrounded with the halo
of martyrdom, would have satisfied them completely. Chauvelin looked
further than that. He hated the man! He had suffered humiliation through
him individually. He wished to see him as an object of contempt rather
than of pity. And because of the anticipation of this joy, he was
careful of his life, and throughout those two days which elapsed
between the capture of Marguerite and the arrival of Collot d'Herbois at
Boulogne, Chauvelin never left his quarters at the Hotel de Ville, and
requisitioned a special escort consisting of proved soldiers of the town
guard to attend his every footstep.

On the evening of the 22nd, after the arrival of Citizen Collot in
Boulogne, he gave orders that the woman from No. 6 cell be brought
before him in the ground floor room of the Fort Gayole.

Chapter XXII: Not Death

Two days of agonizing suspense, of alternate hope and despair, had told
heavily on Marguerite Blakeney.

Her courage was still indomitable, her purpose firm and her faith
secure, but she was without the slightest vestige of news, entirely shut
off from the outside world, left to conjecture, to scheme, to expect and
to despond alone.

The Abbe Foucquet had tried in his gentle way to be of comfort to her,
and she in her