And there I waited for the end.

What an eternity that was!

I strained my ears to hear approaching steps.  I beard the gurgle of the stream and the slow drip of water from the rocks, but nothing more.  The star-light was just bright enough to prevent an absolute surprize.

But I was utterly fatigued.  My eyes alone, which bore the burden of the defence, remained awake; the rest of me was dead, from heavy hands to feet, and the body which I could hardly have dragged down to the stream again.

I waited for the end.  I sat beside Jacqueline, holding her hand with one of mine, and my revolver in the other.  There was a faint flutter at her wrist.  I fancied that it had grown stronger during the past half-hour.

But I was unprepared to hear her whisper to me, and when she spoke I was alert in a moment.

“Paul!” she said faintly.

“Jacqueline!”

“Paul!  Bend down.  I want to speak to you.  Do you know I have been conscious for a long time, my dear?  I have been thinking.  Are you distressed because of me?”

“My dear!” I said; and that was all that I could say.  I clasped her cold little hand tightly in mine.

“I don’t know whether I shall live, Paul,” she went on.  “But now things have become much clearer than they were.  When you wanted to take me through the tunnel I knew that you were wrong.  I knew that even if we found my father I must still send you away, my dear.  God does not mean for us to be for one another.  Don’t you see why?  It is because there is the blood of a dead man between us that cannot be wiped away.

“That is the cause of our misfortunes here, and they will never end, even if you can beat Leroux—­because of that.  So it could never have been.  Yes, I knew that last night when I lay by you, and I was thinking of it and praying hard that I might see clearly.”

Her voice broke off from weakness, and for a long time she lay there, and I clasped her hand and waited, and my eyes searched the space beyond the bags.  How long would they delay?

Presently Jacqueline spoke again.

“Do you know, Paul, I don’t think life is such a good thing as it used to seem,” she said.  “I think that I could bear a great deal that I would once have thought impossible.  I think I could yield to Leroux and be his wife to save your life, Paul.”

“No, Jacqueline.”

“Yes, Paul.  If I live, my duty is with my father.  He needs me, and he would never leave the chateau now that his fears have grown so strong.  And, though he might come to no harm, I cannot leave him.  And you must leave me, Paul, because—­because of what is between us.  You must go to Leroux and tell him so.  You love me, Paul?”

“Always, Jacqueline,” I whispered.

She put her arms about my neck.

“I love you, Paul,” she said.  “It seems so easy to say it in the dark, and it used to be so hard.  And I want to tell you something.  I have always remembered a good deal more than you believed.  Only it was so dear, that comradeship of ours, that I would not let myself remember anything except that I had you.