roken by the fall of
Rabecque's heavily shod feet upon the stones of the yard, as he crossed
it to do his master's bidding. The door creaked on its hinges; the key
grated screaming in its lock, and Rabecque returned to Garnache's side
even as Garnache tapped Marius on the shoulder.

"This way, Monsieur de Condillac, if you please," said he, and as Marius
turned at last to face him, he stood aside and waved his left hand
towards the door through which they had lately emerged. A moment stood
the youth facing his stern conqueror; his hands were clenched until the
knuckles showed white; his face was a dull crimson. Vainly he sought
for words in which to vent some of the malicious chagrin that filled
his soul almost to bursting-point. Then, despairing, with a shrug and an
inarticulate mutter, he flung past the Parisian, obeying him as the cur
obeys, with pendant tail and teeth-revealing snarl.

Garnache closed the door upon him with a bang, and smiled quietly as he
turned to Valerie.

"I think we have won through, mademoiselle," said he, with pardonable
vanity. "The rest is easy, though you may be subjected to some slight
discomfort between this and Grenoble."

She smiled back at him, a pale, timid smile, like a gleam of sunshine
from a wintry sky. "That matters nothing," she assured him, and strove
to make her voice sound brave.

There was need for speed, and compliments were set aside by Garnache,
who, at his best, was not felicitous with them. Valerie felt herself
caught by the wrist, a trifle roughly she remembered afterwards, and
hurried across the cobbles to the tethered horses, with which Rabecque
was already busy. She saw Garnache raise his foot to the stirrup and
hoist himself to the saddle. Then he held down a hand to her, bade her
set her foot on his, and called with an oath to Rabecque to lend her his
assistance. A moment later she was perched in front of Garnache, almost
on the withers of his horse. The cobbles rattled under its hooves, the
timbers of the drawbridge sent up a booming sound, they were across--out
of Condillac--and speeding at a gallop down the white road that led to
the river; after them pounded Rabecque, bumping horribly in his
saddle, and attempting wildly, and with awful objurgations, to find his
stirrups.

They crossed the bridge that spans the Isere and took the road to
Grenoble at a sharp pace, with scarce a backward glance at the grey
towers of Condillac. Valerie experienced an over