l be years of dearest mercy. Wait, tell me first, Miramon and
Mejia----"

"Yes, yes, we will save them too. Only, the risk is greater."

"Bien!" He had almost accepted, but he smothered the word, and starting
up, began to pace the room. At last he stopped. "The risk must be
lessened, for them," he said. "_I_ will remain."

"H'm'n," the girl ejaculated, "Hamlet declines? Then there will be no
play at all, at all."

Maximilian knew how stubborn she could be; and so, reluctantly, he
joined the plot.

"I have deserved Marquez and Fischer and Lopez," he sighed. "But why
there should be friends, even now, that I cannot understand."

Yet she told him bluntly why she wanted his safety. It was on France's
account. Still, his gratitude was no less profound. She who would give
life to others, what was her life to be henceforth? The mellowing
sorrow, which her vivacity could not hide, smote him again, as it had
that evening in Mexico when he came to her for counsel. He remembered.
Out of a useless ambition for her country she had squandered her name,
blighted her future. He remembered how, looking on her saddened face, he
had been exalted to a pure devotion, and had burned with knightly fervor
to do her some impossible service. But what was the service? There his
memory failed, and he despised the chivalrous ardor which could be
quenched with feeding on itself. After the fearful vigil of the night
before, he had found a suit of armor beside him. In a word, he had
forgotten self. Simple compassion was enough. That service? that
service? If he could only remember. But he must. And in hot anger he
strode back and forth, while Jacqueline sat and gazed in wonder. Once,
turning from the corridor window, he paused. The guard had stopped a
man, who now was evidently waiting until the prisoner should be
unoccupied. Unseen himself, Maximilian recognized in the man the
American named Driscoll. And then he remembered. He remembered
Jacqueline's secret, betrayed to him that evening in Mexico. He
remembered that her happiness was lost in the loss of this man's
respect. Here, at last, lay the impossible service!

Maximilian glanced toward her stealthily. No, from where she sat she
could not see the corridor, could not see the waiting American. A moment
later Maximilian stood behind her; and when he spoke, she thought it odd
that he should change from French to halting English.

"Miss d'Aumerle," he began, in distinct if nervous phrasing,