“Said she nothing else?” interrupted De Thou, supporting Cinq-Mars, who grew visibly paler.

“Nothing more,” said the old man.

“And no one else spoke of me?” inquired the master of the horse.

“No one,” said the Abbe.

“If she had but written to me!” murmured Henri.

“Remember, my father, that you were sent here as a confessor,” said De Thou.

Here old Grandchamp, who had been kneeling before Cinq-Mars, and dragging him by his clothes to the other side of the terrace, exclaimed in a broken voice: 

“Monseigneur—­my master—­my good master—­do you see them?  Look there—­’tis they! ’tis they—­all of them!”

“Who, my old friend?” asked his master.

“Who?  Great Heaven! look at that window!  Do you not recognize them?  Your mother, your sisters, and your brother.”

And the day, now fairly broken, showed him in the distance several women waving their handkerchiefs; and there, dressed all in black, stretching out her arms toward the prison, sustained by those about her, Cinq-Mars recognized his mother, with his family, and his strength failed him for a moment.  He leaned his head upon his friend’s breast and wept.

“How many times must I, then, die?” he murmured; then, with a gesture, returning from the top of the tower the salutations of his family, “Let us descend quickly, my father!” he said to the old Abbe.  “You will tell me at the tribunal of penitence, and before God, whether the remainder of my life is worth my shedding more blood to preserve it.”

It was there that Cinq-Mars confessed to God what he alone and Marie de Mantua knew of their secret and unfortunate love.  “He gave to his confessor,” says Father Daniel, “a portrait of a noble lady, set in diamonds, which were to be sold, and the money employed in pious works.”

M. de Thou, after having confessed, wrote a letter;—­[See the copy of this letter to Madame la Princesse de Guemenee, in the notes at the end of the volume.]—­after which (according to the account given by his confessor) he said, “This is the last thought I will bestow upon this world; let us depart for heaven!” and walking up and down the room with long strides, he recited aloud the psalm, ‘Miserere mei, Deus’, with an incredible ardor of spirit, his whole frame trembling so violently it seemed as if he did not touch the earth, and that the soul was about to make its exit from his body.  The guards were mute at this spectacle, which made them all shudder with respect and horror.

Meanwhile, all was calm in the city of Lyons, when to the great astonishment of its inhabitants, they beheld the entrance through all its gates of troops of infantry and cavalry, which they knew were encamped at a great distance.  The French and the Swiss guards, the regiment of Pompadours, the men-at-arms of Maurevert, and the carabineers of La Roque, all defiled in silence.  The cavalry, with their muskets on the pommel of the saddle, silently drew up round the chateau of Pierre-Encise; the infantry formed a line upon the banks of the Saone from the gate of the fortress to the Place des Terreaux.  It was the usual spot for execution.