putation, for that is not
at stake. The affairs of Bretagne are known to the world: your brother,
Talhouet, and your cousin have fled to Spain: Solduc, Rohan, Sanbilly
the counselor, have all disappeared, yet their flight was supposed to be
natural, and from some simple cause of discontent. I confess, if the
advice be repeated, I shall fly."

"We have nothing to fear, my friends," said Pontcalec, "our affairs were
never more prosperous. See, the court has no suspicion, or we should
have been molested already. La Jonquiere wrote yesterday; he announces
that De Chanlay is starting for La Muette, where the regent lives as a
private gentleman, without guards, without fear."----"Yet you are
uneasy," said Du Couedic.

"I confess it, but not for the reason you suppose."

"What is it, then?"

"A personal matter."

"Of your own!"

"Yes, and I could not confide it to more devoted friends, or any who
know me better. If ever I were molested--if ever I had the alternative
of remaining or of flying to escape a danger, I should remain; do you
know why?"

"No, speak."

"I am afraid."

"You, Pontcalec?--afraid! What do you mean by these words, after those
you have just uttered?"

"Mon Dieu! yes, my friend; the ocean is our safeguard; we could find
safety on board one of those vessels which cruise on the Loire from
Paimboeuf to Saint Nazaire; but what is safety to you is certain death
to me."

"I do not understand you," said Talhouet.

"You alarm me," said Montlouis.

"Listen, then, my friends," said Pontcalec.

And he began, in the midst of the most scrupulous attention, the
following recital, for they knew that if Pontcalec were afraid there
must be a good cause.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE SORCERESS OF SAVERNAY.

"I was ten years old, and I lived at Pontcalec, in the midst of woods,
when one day my uncle Crysogon, my father, and I, resolved to have a
rabbit hunt in a warren at five or six miles distance, found, seated on
the heath, a woman reading. So few of our peasants could read that we
were surprised. We stopped and looked at her--I see her now, as though
it were yesterday, though it is nearly twenty years ago. She wore the
dark costume of our Breton women, with the usual white head-dress, and
she was seated on a large tuft of broom in blossom, which she had been
cutting.

"My father was mounted on a beautiful bay horse, with a gold-colored
mane, my uncle on a gray horse, young and ardent, and I rode on