Then, suddenly seized by a horrible dread, she added: 

“Do not attempt to deceive me.  Are you not trying to delude me with false hopes?  That would be cruel!”

“I am not deceiving you, Madame, Chanlouineau has given me a weapon, which, I hope and believe, places the Duc de Sairmeuse in our power.  He is omnipotent in Montaignac; the only man who could oppose him, Monsieur de Courtornieu, is his friend.  I believe that Monsieur d’Escorval can be saved.”

“Speak!” cried Maurice; “what must we do?”

“Pray and wait, Maurice.  I must act alone in this matter, but be assured that I—­the cause of all your misfortune—­will leave nothing undone which is possible for mortal to do.”

Absorbed in the task which she had imposed upon herself, Marie-Anne had failed to remark a stranger who had arrived during her absence—­an old white-haired peasant.

The abbe called her attention to him.

“Here is a courageous friend,” said he, “who since morning, has been searching for you everywhere, in, order to give you news of your father.”

Marie-Anne was so overcome that she could scarcely falter her gratitude.

“Oh, you need not thank me,” answered the brave peasant.  “I said to myself:  ’The poor girl must be terribly anxious.  I ought to relieve her of her misery.’  So I came to tell you that Monsieur Lacheneur is safe and well, except for a wound in the leg, which causes him considerable suffering, but which will be healed in two or three weeks.  My son-in-law, who was hunting yesterday in the mountains, met him near the frontier in company with two of his friends.  By this time he must be in Piedmont, beyond the reach of the gendarmes.”

“Let us hope now,” said the abbe, “that we shall soon hear what has become of Jean.”

“I know, already, Monsieur,” responded Marie-Anne; “my brother has been badly wounded, and he is now under the protection of kind friends.”

She bowed her head, almost crushed beneath her burden of sorrow, but soon rallying, she exclaimed: 

“What am I doing!  What right have I to think of my friends, when upon my promptness and upon my courage depends the life of an innocent man compromised by them?”

Maurice, the abbe, and the officers surrounded the brave young girl.  They wished to know what she was about to attempt, and to dissuade her from incurring useless danger.

She refused to reply to their pressing questions.  They wished to accompany her, or, at least, to follow her at a distance, but she declared that she must go alone.

“I will return in less than two hours, and then we can decide what must be done,” said she, as she hastened away.

To obtain an audience with the Duc de Sairmeuse was certainly a difficult matter; Maurice and the abbe had proved that only too well the previous day.  Besieged by weeping and heart-broken families, he shut himself up securely, fearing, perhaps, that he might be moved by their entreaties.