ou will bring blankets for m'sieu'," he added, "and there's an order
on my table for tobacco, which you will send your comrade for."

In a moment we were left alone.

"You'll live like a stuffed pig here," he said, "though 'twill be cold
o' nights."

After another pass or two of words he left me, and I hastened to make
a better toilet than I had done for a year. My old rusty suit which
I exchanged for the one I had worn seemed almost sumptuous, and the
woollen wear comforted my weakened body. Within an hour my cell looked
snug, and I sat cosily by the fire, feeding it lazily.

It must have been about four o'clock when there was a turning of keys
and a shooting of bolts, the door opened, and who should step inside
but Gabord, followed by Alixe! I saw Alixe's lips frame my name thrice,
though no word came forth, and my heart was bursting to cry out and
clasp her to my breast. But still with a sweet, serious look cast on me,
she put out her hand and stayed me.

Gabord, looking not at us at all, went straight to the window, and,
standing on a stool, busied himself with the stanchions and to whistle.
I took Alixe's hands and held them, and spoke her name softly, and she
smiled up at me with so perfect a grace that I thought there never was
aught like it in the world.

She was the first to break the good spell. I placed a seat for her, and
sat down by her. She held out her fingers to the fire, and then, after a
moment, she told me the story of last night's affair. First she made me
tell her briefly of the events of the morning, of which she knew, but
not fully. This done, she began. I will set down her story as a whole,
and you must understand as you read that it was told as women tell a
story, with all little graces and diversions, and those small details
with which even momentous things are enveloped in their eyes. I loved
her all the more because of these, and I saw, as Doltaire had said, how
admirably poised was her intellect, how acute her wit, how delicate and
astute a diplomatist she was becoming; and yet, through all, preserving
a simplicity of character almost impossible of belief. Such qualities,
in her directed to good ends, in lesser women have made them infamous.
Once that day Alixe said to me, breaking off as her story went on, "Oh,
Robert, when I see what power I have to dissimulate--for it is that,
call it by what name you will--when I see how I enjoy accomplishing
against all difficulty, how I can blind