‘Why have you saved me, if you will not pity me?’ she murmured.

’I will not pity, because I respect my kinswoman who has save our lives,’ he said steadying his voice with difficulty.  ’The priests of Nissard will aid me in sparing your name and fame.’

‘Ah!’ she cried, sitting up with a start of joy, ’but he would make too many inquiries!  Take me to England first.’

Berenger started as he saw how he had been misunderstood.

’Neither here nor in England could my marriage be set aside, cousin.  No; not priest shall take charge of you, and place you in safety and honour.’

‘He shall not!’ she cried hotly.  ’Why—­why will you drive me from you—­me who ask only to follow you as a menial servant?’

‘That has become impossible,’ he answered; ’to say nothing of my brother, my servant and the guide have seen;’ and, as she remembered her streaming hair, and tried, in dawning confusion, to gather it together, he continued:  ’You shrank from the eye of the King of Navarre.  You cannot continue as you have done; you have not even strength.’

‘Ah! have you sailed for England,’ she murmured.

‘It had only been greater shame,’ he said.  ’Cousin, I am head of your family, husband of your kinswoman, and bound to respect the reputation you have risked for me.  I shall, therefore, place you in charge of the priest till you can either return to your aunt or to some other convent.  You can ride now.  We will not wait longer in these wet garments.’

He raised her from the ground, threw his own dry cloak round her shoulders and unmanageable hair, and lifted her on his horse; but, as she would have leant against him, he drew himself away, beckoned Philip, and put the bridle into his hands, saying, ’Take care of her.  I shall ride on and warm the priest.’

‘The rock of diamond,’ she murmured, not aware that the diamond had been almost melting.  That youthful gravity and resolution, with the mixture of respect and protection, imposed as usual upon her passionate nature, and daunted her into meekly riding beside Philip without a word—­only now and then he heard a low moan, and knew that she was weeping bitterly.

At first the lad had been shocked beyond measure, and would have held aloof as from a kind of monster, but Madame de Selinville had been the first woman to touch his fancy, and when he heard how piteously she was weeping, and recollected where he should have been but for her, as well as all his own harshness to her as a cowardly boy, he felt himself brutally ungrateful, and spoke:  ’Don’t weep so, Madame; I am sorry I was rude to you, but you see, how should I take you for a woman?’

Perhaps she heard, but she heeded not.

‘My brother will take good care to shield you,’ Philip added.  ’He will take care you are safe in one of your nunneries;’ and as she only wept the more, he added, with a sudden thought, ’You would not go there; you would embrace the Protestant faith?’