“’"And who are you?” I asked, feeling for the speaker’s hand, for her arm was inside the sleeve of a soldier’s uniform.

“’"I am my lady’s waiting-woman,” said she, “and ready to reward you with my own person if you show yourself gallant and helpful in our necessities.”

“’"Gladly,” said I, seeing that I was inevitably started on a perilous adventure.

“’Under favor of the darkness, I felt whether the person and figure of the girl were in keeping with the idea I had formed of her from her tone of voice.  The good soul had, no doubt, made up her mind from the first to accept all the chances of this strange act of kidnapping, for she kept silence very obligingly, and the coach had not been more than ten minutes on the way when she accepted and returned a very satisfactory kiss.  The lover, who sat opposite to me, took no offence at an occasional quite involuntary kick; as he did not understand French, I conclude he paid no heed to them.

“’"I can be your mistress on one condition only,” said the woman, in reply to the nonsense I poured into her ear, carried away by the fervor of an improvised passion, to which everything was unpropitious.

“’"And what is it?”

“’"That you will never attempt to find out whose servant I am.  If I am to go to you, it must be at night, and you must receive me in the dark.”

“’"Very good,” said I.

“’We had got as far as this, when the carriage drew up under a garden wall.

“’"You must allow me to bandage your eyes,” said the maid.  “You can lean on my arm, and I will lead you.”

“’She tied a handkerchief over my eyes, fastening it in a tight knot at the back of my head.  I heard the sound of a key being cautiously fitted to the lock of a little side door by the speechless lover who had sat opposite to me.  In a moment the waiting-woman, whose shape was slender, and who walked with an elegant jauntiness’—­meneho, as they call it,” Monsieur Gravier explained in a superior tone, “a word which describes the swing which women contrive to give a certain part of their dress that shall be nameless.—­’The waiting-woman’—­it is the surgeon-major who is speaking,” the narrator went on—­“’led me along the gravel walks of a large garden, till at a certain spot she stopped.  From the louder sound of our footsteps, I concluded that we were close to the house.  “Now silence!” said she in a whisper, “and mind what you are about.  Do not overlook any of my signals; I cannot speak without terrible danger for both of us, and at this moment your life is of the first importance.”  Then she added:  “My mistress is in a room on the ground floor.  To get into it we must pass through her husband’s room and close to his bed.  Do not cough, walk softly, and follow me closely, so as not to knock against the furniture or tread anywhere but on the carpets I laid down.”

“’Here the lover gave an impatient growl, as a man annoyed by so much delay.