until they enter it." She stamped
her foot upon the velvet carpet and clinched her white hands at her
sides.

"Then your Majesty is resolved to give up the enterprise she has
promised to support, to abandon those loyal servants who have depended
upon her and his Majesty the King?" asks Adrienne, looking at the Queen,
her face pale as marble and her eyes burning with indignation.

"Does Madame Calvert permit herself to question our actions?" says the
Queen, turning imperiously upon her. Suddenly her beautiful eyes filled
with tears. "Forgive me--you are right," she says. "'Tis our fate--our
wretched fate--to seem to abandon and injure all who are brought near
us, all who attempt to serve us. We cannot help ourselves--even now we
must break our faith with these loyal friends, for now I see that after
the refusal of the Assembly to allow us to leave Paris, 'twere madness
to attempt to go. We would but increase the danger, the humiliation we
already have to endure. The only wise course is to await Brunswick and
the allies. I see now the folly of this plan of escape--indeed, I was
never fully persuaded of its wisdom. The confidence I felt in this
young American--his devotion to us and that of those other
friends--blinded me to the dangers and difficulties of the undertaking."

"And the King?" asks Adrienne, turning from the Queen to his Majesty,
who sat by, indecision and weariness and timidity written on all his
heavy features.

"We dare not," he says, at length, apathetically. "The Queen is
right--after the refusal by the Assembly to allow us to depart, after
this new humiliation, it were worse than folly to think of escaping. We
are surrounded by spies--treachery is within these very walls--how can
we hope to get away? It is best to await our doom quietly here. What
think you, Beaufort?" he asks.

"I implore your Majesty to make the effort," says Beaufort. "Once
outside Paris, the Swiss Guards await you, Lafayette with his loyal
regiments is even now at Compiegne----"

"Lafayette at Compiegne?--who knows?" says the Queen, gloomily,
interrupting Beaufort again. "Monsieur de Lafayette hath betrayed us
before and may do so again. I trust him not! To know that he has a share
in this enterprise is to make me fear to pursue it! No, no," she goes
on, shuddering and turning away. "St. Cloud and the 5th of October are
too well remembered. I should have thought of all this before," she
says, striking her hands together in an