The coffee warmed Raymond Latour, but there was unusual excitement in his movements.  As the light increased he sat down and tried to read.  It was a volume of Plutarch’s “Lives,” a book which had done much to influence many revolutionaries; but he could not read with any understanding.  To-day there was so much to be done, so many things to think of.  There were his own affairs, and they must take first place, but in Paris the excitement would be at fever pitch to-day.  Louis Capet was to die, the voting had decided; but when?  There was to be more voting, and Raymond Latour must take his part in it.  It was no wonder that he could not read.

The hours had dragged through the night, yet when a knock came at his door, it seemed to him that he had had little time to mature his plans, that it was only a very little while since he had carried the woman up the stairs.  He opened the door quickly.

“The citizeness is awake and dressed.  She is anxious to see you.”

“What have you told her?”

“Only that the man who brought her last night would come and explain.”

“I will go to her.”

But Latour did not go immediately.  He must have a few moments for thought, and he paced his room excitedly, pausing more than once to look at himself in a little mirror which hung upon the wall.  His followers would hardly have recognized in him the calm, calculating man with whom they were accustomed to deal.  It was with a great effort that he steadied his nerves and went quietly up the stairs.

Jeanne rose from her chair as he entered, but Latour could not know how her heart beat as the door opened.  She looked at him steadily, inquiringly, waiting for him to speak.

“Mademoiselle has slept, I trust?”

It seemed to Latour that he looked at her for a long time without speaking, such a whirl of thoughts swept through his brain as he entered the room and saw the woman standing there.  He remembered the other woman who had occupied this apartment until he had let her go two or three days since.  He had hated her for being there.  This room had not been fashioned with such infinite care for such a woman as Pauline Vaison, but for this very woman who now stood before him.  How strangely natural it seemed that she should be there!  This was the moment which had been constantly in his dreams waking and sleeping.

“I do not know you,” she said.  “Why am I here?  Indeed, where am I?”

“Mademoiselle, I have come to explain.  It is a long explanation, and you must bear with me a little.”

“Tell me first, where is Monsieur Barrington?” said Jeanne.

“In safety.  You have my word for it.”

“Whose word?”

“You shall have the whole story, mademoiselle, and you shall presently see Monsieur Barrington.”

Jeanne sat down, and Raymond Latour moved to the window and stood there.