Church will hold you close."

I calmed myself again while listening to him, and I asked, "Is there no
other way?"

He shook his head.

"Is there no Monsieur Doltaire?" said I. "He has a king's blood in his
veins!"

He looked sharply at me. "You are mocking," he replied. "No, no, that is
no way, either. Monsieur Doltaire must never mate with daughter of mine.
I will take care of that; the Church is a perfect if gentle jailer."

I could bear it no longer. I knelt to him. I begged him to have pity on
me. I pleaded with him; I recalled the days when, as a child, I sat upon
his knee and listened to the wonderful tales he told; I begged him, by
the memory of all the years when he and I were such true friends to
be kind to me now, to be merciful--even though he thought I had done
wrong--to be merciful. I asked him to remember that I was a motherless
girl, and that if I had missed the way to happiness he ought not to make
my path bitter to the end. I begged him to give me back his love and
confidence, and, if I must for evermore be parted from you, to let me be
with him, not to put me away into a convent.

Oh, how my heart leaped when I saw his face soften! "Well, well," he
said, "if I live, you shall be taken from the convent; but for the
present, till this fighting is over, it is the only safe place. There,
too, you shall be safe from Monsieur Doltaire."

It was poor comfort. "But should you be killed, and the English take
Quebec?" said I.

"When I am dead," he answered, "when I am dead, then there is your
brother."

"And if he speaks for Monsieur Doltaire?" asked I.

"There is the Church and God always," he answered.

"And my own husband, the man who saved your life, my father," I urged
gently; and when he would have spoken I threw myself into his arms--the
first time in such long, long weeks!--and, stopping his lips with my
fingers, burst into tears on his breast. I think much of his anger
against me passed, yet before he left he said he could not now prevent
the annulment of the marriage, even if he would, for other powers were
at work; which powers I supposed to be the Governor, for certain reasons
of enmity to my father and me--alas! how changed is he, the vain old
man!--and Monsieur Doltaire, whose ends I knew so well. So they will
unwed us to-morrow, Robert; but be sure that I shall never be unwed in
my own eyes, and that I will wait till I die, hoping you will come and
take me--oh, Robert, my husband--ta