o which you have had the honour to be born."

"If your bearing is to be accepted as a sign that you remember it, I
will pray God that I may, indeed, forget it--completely and for all
time."

And then the door opened to admit the good Henriette, who came to
announce that she had contrived a hasty meal, and that it was served and
awaiting them.

"Diable!" he laughed. "Those are the first words of true wit that I have
heard these many days. I swear," he added, with a pleasantness that was
oddly at variance with his sullen humour of a moment back, "that I have
not tasted human food these four weeks, and as for my appetite--it is
capable of consuming the whole patrimony of St. Peter. Lead the way, my
good Henriette. Come, Mademoiselle."

CHAPTER XXI. THE ARREST

Facts proved how correct had been La Boulaye's anticipations of the
course that Cecile would adopt, Within a half-hour of his having quitted
the house of Billaud Varennes, she presented herself there, and demanded
to see the Deputy. Upon being told that he was absent she determined to
await his return.

And so, for the matter of an hour, she remained in the room where the
porter had offered her accommodation, fretting at the delay, and only
restrained from repairing to some other member of the Convention by the
expectation that the next moment would see Varennes arrive. Arrive he
did at last, when her patience was all but exhausted, and excitedly she
told her tale of what had taken place. Varennes listened gravely, and
cross-questioned her in his unbelief--for it seemed, indeed, monstrous
that a man of La Boulaye's position should ruin so promising a future
as was his by an act for which Varennes could not so much as divine a
motive. But her story hung together so faithfully, and was so far borne
out by the fact that Varennes himself had indeed signed such a document
as she described, that in the end the Deputy determined to take some
steps to neutralise the harm that might have been done.

Dismissing the girl with the assurance that the matter should have
his attention, he began by despatching a courier to Robespierre at
Chartres--where he knew the Incorruptible to be. That done, he resorted
to measures for La Boulaye's detention. But this proved a grave
matter. What if, after all, that half-hysterical girl's story should be
inaccurate? In what case would he find himself if, acting upon it in the
meantime, he should order Caron's arrest? The person o