Madame placed her hand upon the back of the chair and the ends of her fingers grew white from the pressure.

"The great Beaufort has scrawled negligently across this paper; the sly, astute Gaston. My name is here, and so is yours, Madame. My name would never have been here but for your beauty, which was a fine lure.

Listen. As for my name, there lives in the Rue Saint Martin a friend who plays at alchemy. He has a liquid which will dissolve ink, erase it, obliterate it, leaving the paper spotless. Thus it will be easy for me to subst.i.tute another in place of mine. Mazarin seeks you, Madame, either to place your beautiful neck upon the block or to immure you for life in prison. Madame, this paper represents two things: your death-warrant or your marriage contract. Which shall it be?"

CHAPTER XXI

AN INGENIOUS IDEA AND A WOMAN'S WIT

Madame sat down. There was an interval of silence, during which the candles seemed to move strangely from side to side, and the dark face beyond was blurred and indistinct; all save the eyes, which, like the lidless...o...b.. of a snake, held and fascinated her. Vaguely she comprehended the peril of a confused mind, and strove to draw upon that secret inward strength which discovers itself in crises.

"How did you obtain that paper, Monsieur?"

The calm of her voice, though he knew it to be forced, surprised him.

"How did I obtain it? By strategy."

"Ah! not by the sword, then?" leaning upon the table, her fingers alone betraying her agitation. "Not by the sword, and the mask, and the grey cloak?"

As if the question afforded him infinite amus.e.m.e.nt, the vicomte laughed.

"Would I be here?" he said. "Would I have ventured into this desert?

Rather would I not have spoken yonder in France? I shall tell you how I obtained it . . . after we are married."

Madame raised a hand and nervously tapped a knuckle against her teeth.

"Which is it to be, Madame?" caressing the paper.

"Monsieur, you are not without foresight and reason. Have you contemplated what I should become in time, forced into a marriage with a man whom I should not love, with whom I should always a.s.sociate the sword, and the mask, and the grey cloak?"

"I have speculated upon that side of it," easily, "and am willing to take the risk. In time you would forget all about the sword and the cloak, since they can in no wise be a.s.sociated with me. Eventually you would grow to love me."

"Either you understand nothing about women, or you are guilty of gross fatuity."

"I understand woman tolerably well, and I have rubbed against too many edges to be fatuous."

"Indeed, I believe you have much to learn."

"If I showed this paper to the governor of Quebec . . ."

"Which you will not do, there being no magic liquid this side of France."

"It would be simple to cut out the name."

"You would still have to explain to Monsieur de Lauson how you came into possession of it."

"Madame, the more I listen to you, the more determined I am that you shall become my wife. I admire the versatility of your mind, the coolness of your logic. Not one woman in a thousand could talk to so much effect, when imprisonment or death . . ."

"Or marriage!"

". . . faced her as surely as it faces you."

"Permit me to see the paper, Monsieur."

Some men would have surrendered to the seductiveness of her voice; not so the vicomte.

"Scarcely, Madame," smiling.

"How am I to know that it is genuine? Allow me to glance at it?"

"And witness you tear it up, or . . . burn it like a love-letter?"

shrewdly.

Madame stiffened in her chair.

"Have you ever burned a love-letter, Madame?" asked the vicomte.

Madame turned pale from rage and shame. The rage nearly overcame the fear and terror which she was so admirably concealing.

"Have you?" pitilessly.

"You . . . ?"

"Yes," intuitively. He touched the particles of burnt paper and laughed.

"You were in this room?"

"I was. It was not intentional eavesdropping; my word of honor, as to that. I came in here, having an unimportant engagement with a friend.

He was late. While I waited, in walked Monsieur le Chevalier, then yourself."

"Monsieur, you might have made known your presence."

"It is true that I might; but I should have missed a very fine comedy.

Madame, I compliment you. How well you have kept undiscovered, even undreamt of, this charming intrigue!"

Madame gazed at the door and wondered if she could reach it before he could.

"So, sometimes you are called 'Diane'? You are no longer the huntress; you are Daphne!"

"Monsieur!"

"And you would turn into a laurel tree! My faith, Madame, it was a charming scene! You are as erudite as a student fresh from the Sorbonne."

"Monsieur, this is far away from the subject."

"Let me see; there was a line worthy of Monsieur de Saumaise at his best. Ah, yes! 'I kiss your handsome grey eyes a thousand times'! Ah well, let us give the Chevalier credit; he certainly has a handsome pair of eyes, as many a dame and demoiselle at court will attest. It was truly a delightful letter; only the music of it was somewhat inharmonious to my ears."