Part 49 (2/2)
”And you refused?”
”Yes, and yet--ah, Jeanne, I hardly know what I should have urged. The thought of the guillotine for you made me afraid.”
”It would have been easier than marrying any other man,” she whispered.
”Something, perhaps something you said, Richard, changed Latour. He evidently arranged my escape. Sabatier came early yesterday with these clothes. He told me to dress myself in them. Think of it, Richard! I walked through the streets with him like this, into a house in some alley, where we waited until it was dusk. Then we rode to the barrier.
I was some horrible wretch thirsting for blood, young as I was; I do not know what Sabatier said, but even the men at the barrier shuddered at me and turned away.”
Barrington laughed and held her closer.
”Then we rode here. We came by the Sceaux road, Sabatier said. This lonely place made me afraid. It was so unlikely you would find me here.
Then I wondered whether you were dead. You have always seemed to come to me when I was in need, and this time--oh, it seemed so long, so hopeless! Now I want to cry and laugh both at once.”
”You have no fear of the journey before us?” Barrington whispered.
”Fear! With you!”
”I mean just because it is with me. Do you know what we are going to do?
We travel to the sea, to a s.h.i.+p, then to my home in Virginia. Are you sure you do not fear the journey which means having me always with you?”
”Richard,” she whispered, ”you have never yet asked me to take that journey. Won't you ask me now?”
”Jeanne, my darling, my wife to be, will you come?”
”If G.o.d wills, dearest--oh, so willingly, if G.o.d wills.”
She remembered how far the sea was, how terribly near to Paris they yet were. Disaster might be lying in wait for them along the road.
”He will keep us to the end, dear,” Barrington whispered.
Presently she drew back from him. ”How hateful I must look!” she exclaimed. ”Do I seem fit to be the wife of any man, let alone your wife?”
”Shall I tell you what is in my mind?” he said.
”Yes, tell me, even if it hurts me.”
”I am longing to see you again as I first saw you at Beauvais. I did not know who you were, remember, but I loved you then.”
”Even then?”
”Yes,” he answered, ”and ever since and forever-more.”
A few minutes later Sabatier entered the room.
”It is time,” he said. ”We must start at once. Citizen Mercier goes no farther. You are now three men under my command. Your names are as before Roche and Pinot. Mademoiselle is called Morel, a desperate young patriot, Monsieur Barrington. Do not forget that; only forget that she is a woman.”
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