To go to the prisoner, Mazurier assured Jacqueline, was impossible, but she might send a message; indeed, he was here to serve his dear friends.  Ah, poor girl, did she trust the man by whom she sent into a prison words like these?—­

“Hold fast to the faith that is in you, Victor.  Let nothing persuade you that you have been mistaken.  We asked for light,—­it was given us,—­let us walk in it; and no matter where it leads,—­since the light is from heaven.  Do not think of me,—­nor of yourself,—­but only of Jesus Christ, who said, ‘Whosoever would save his life shall lose it.’”

Mazurier took this message.  What did he do with it?  He tossed it to the winds.

A week after, Le Roy was brought to trial,—­and recanted; and so recanting, was acquitted and set at liberty.

Mazurier supposed that he meant all kindly in the exertion he made to save his friend.  He would never have ceased from self-reproach, had he conveyed the words of Jacqueline to Victor,—­for the effect of those words he could clearly foresee.

And so far from attempting to bring about an interview between the pair, he would have striven to prevent it, had he seen a probability that it would be allowed.  He set little value on such words as Jacqueline spoke, when her conscience and her love rose up against each other.  The words she had committed to him he could account for by no supposition acceptable and reasonable to him.  There was something about the girl he did not understand; she was no fit guide for a man who had need of clear judgment, when such a decision was to be made as the court demanded of Le Roy.

Elsie Meril, between hope and fear, was dumb in these days; but her presence and her tenderness, though not heroic in action nor wise in utterance, had a value of which neither she nor Jacqueline was fully aware.

When Jacqueline learned the issue of the trial, and that Victor had falsified his faith, her first impulse was to fly, that she might never see his face again.  For, the instant she heard his choice, her heart told her what she had been hoping during these days of suspense.  She had tried to see Martial Mazurier, but without success, since he conveyed, or promised to convey, her message to the prisoner.  Of purpose he had avoided her.  He guessed what strength she would by this time have attained, and he was determined to save both to each other, though it might be against their will.

XI.

Victor Le Roy’s first endeavor, on being liberated, was—­of course to find Jacqueline?  Not so.  That was far from his first design.  His impulse was to avoid the girl he had dared to love.  Mazurier had, indeed, conveyed to his mind an impression that would have satisfied him, if anything of this character could do so.  But this was impossible.  The secret of his disquiet was far too profound for such easy removal.

He had not in himself the witness that he had fulfilled the will of God.  He was disquieted, humiliated, wretched.  He could not think of Leclerc, nor upon his protestations, except with shame and remorse,—­remorse, already.  In his heart, in spite of the impression Mazurier had contrived to convey, he believed not that Jacqueline would bless him to such work as he could henceforth perform, no longer a free man,—­no longer possessed of liberty of speech and thought.