fingers. The soldiers, with a barbarous joy, amused
themselves with laying little brands in her way to burn her naked feet.
The oldest took the smoking match of his arquebus, and, approaching it to
the edge of her robe, said in a hoarse voice:

"Come, madcap, tell me your history, or I will fill you with powder and
blow you up like a mine; take care, for I have already played that trick
to others besides you, in the old wars of the Huguenots. Come, sing."

The young woman, looking at him gravely, made no reply, but lowered her
veil.

"You don't manage her well," said Grand-Ferre, with a drunken laugh; "you
will make her cry. You don't know the fine language of the court; let me
speak to her." And, touching her on the chin, "My little heart," he said,
"if you will please, my sweet, to resume the little story you told just
now to these gentlemen, I will pray you to travel with me upon the river
Du Tendre, as the great ladies of Paris say, and to take a glass of
brandy with your faithful chevalier, who met you formerly at Loudun, when
you played a comedy in order to burn a poor devil."

The young woman crossed her arms, and, looking around her with an
imperious air, cried:

"Withdraw, in the name of the God of armies; withdraw, impious men! There
is nothing in common between us. I do not understand your tongue, nor you
mine. Go, sell your blood to the princes of the earth at so many oboles a
day, and leave me to accomplish my mission! Conduct me to the Cardinal."

A coarse laugh interrupted her.

"Do you think," said a carabineer of Maurevert, "that his Eminence the
Generalissimo will receive you with your feet naked? Go and wash them."

"The Lord has said, 'Jerusalem, lift thy robe, and pass the rivers of
water,'" she answered, her arms still crossed. "Let me be conducted to
the Cardinal."

Richelieu cried in a loud voice, "Bring the woman to me, and let her
alone!"

All were silent; they conducted her to the minister.

"Why," said she, beholding him--"why bring me before an armed man?"

They left her alone with him without answering.

The Cardinal looked at her with a suspicious air. "Madame," said he,
"what are you doing in the camp at this hour? And if your mind is not
disordered, why these naked feet?"

"It is a vow; it is a vow," answered the young woman, with an air of
impatience, seating herself beside him abruptly. "I have also made a vow
not to eat until I have found the man I seek."

"My sister