ots announced that the fight had begun
again. Every moment of delay was dangerous now. I seized a torch, and
lifting a trap door made her descend with me to the cellar. Thence we
passed into a subterranean passage, and finally hurried forth into the
open, holding each other's hands as a sign of mutual trust. I found a
horse that had belonged to my grandfather in the forest, and this animal
carried us some miles from Roche-Mauprat, before it stumbled and threw
us. Edmee was unhurt but my ankle was badly sprained. Fortunately we
were near a lonely building called Gayeau Tower, the dwelling place of a
remarkable man called Patience, a peasant who was both a hermit and a
philosopher, and who, like Edmee, was filled with the new social gospel
of Rousseau. Between these two a warm friendship existed.

"The lamb in the company of the wolf," cried Patience when he saw us.

"My friend," replied Edmee, "welcome him as you welcome me. I was a
prisoner at Roche-Mauprat, and it was he who rescued me."

At that Patience took me by the arm and led me in. A few days later I
was carried to the chateau of the chevalier, M. Hubert de Mauprat, at
Sainte-Severe, and there I learnt that Roche-Mauprat had been taken,
that five of my uncles were dead, and that two, John and Antony, had
disappeared.

"Bernard," added the chevalier, "I owe to you the life I hold dearest in
the world. All my own life shall be devoted to giving you proofs of my
gratitude and esteem. Bernard, we are both of us victims of a vicious
family. The wrong that has been done you shall be repaired. They have
deprived you of education, but your soul has remained pure. Bernard, you
will restore the honour of your family, promise me this."

_III.--I Go to America and Return_

For a long time I am sure my presence was a source of utter discomfort
to the kind and venerable chevalier, and to his daughter. I was boorish
and illiterate and Edmee was one of the most perfect women to be found
in France. She found her happiness in her own family, and the sweetest
simplicity crowned her mental powers and lofty virtues. Brute like, at
that time I saw her only with the eyes of the body, and believed I loved
her because she was beautiful. Her fiance, M. de la Marche, the
lieutenant-general, a shallow and frigid Voltairean, understood her but
little better. A day came when I could understand her--the day when M.
de la Marche could have understood her would never have come.

The