“If it doesn’t mean that it means nothing.”

“Then, sir, being what I am, you may be sure that I shall not stay here to await Prince Karl of Auersperg, and his unsought honors.”

“You are the judge, Julie, after all, and I believed it was the decision you would make.  Yet, it was only fair to lay the full facts before you.”

John knew that the attempt to escape southward through the mountains would be attended by great danger, not only from the Austrians, but from the risks of the road itself, when the great automobile, slipping on melting snow and ice, might go crashing at any moment into a gorge.  Yet it must be done.  Another day brought home the extreme necessity of it.  All the mountains thundered with the sliding snow, and the prince’s men would certainly come soon.

The garage contained an ample supply of gasoline and extra tires, and John saw that the machine was in perfect order.  He also stored in it clothing, food for many days, two rifles and many cartridges.  It was thus at once a carriage, a home and a fortress.  Then he told Julie that they must start the next morning.  Enough snow was gone to disclose the road leading southward, and he believed that he could drive the limousine down the mountain.

“Are you willing to trust yourself to me, Julie?” he asked.

“Through everything,” she replied.

Suzanne also was eager to go, and, in her character now as a full member of the little company, she did not hesitate to say so.

“Our comfort here may cause us to linger too long, sir,” she said to John, when Julie was not present.  “My mistress has been twice in the hands of the Prince of Auersperg and twice through you she has escaped him.  There is certain death for you if he finds you and I know not what for my mistress if she should be taken by him once more.  Hardened by his years and her resistance he would seek to break her.  It has seemed to me sometimes, sir, that you were sent by God to save us.”

The woman’s faith, which had so completely replaced her original distrust and hostility, moved John.

“Suzanne,” he said, “she shall never again be in the power of that man.  I don’t know what the future holds for us, but I think I can promise her escape from Auersperg.”

“And others will come to help us,” said Suzanne, with all the intensity of a prophetess.  “You left word, you have said, which way you were going, and it will reach Monsieur Philip.  It will not be so hard to trace us to Zillenstein, and he will surely follow.  He flies in the air like the eagle, and we will see him some day black against the sky.”

The two by the same impulse looked up.  But there was nothing showing in the blue vault, save feathery white clouds.  Nevertheless the faith of neither was dimmed.

“I feel the certainty of it, too,” said John.  “Philip and the Arrow will answer to our call.”

“And my father,” said Suzanne in the same tones of unshakable faith.  “He was left a prisoner in Munich, but few prisons can hold Antoine Picard.  He will surely seek us through all the mountains.”