With an effort he spoke.  “It is nothing, cherie.  You are the same.  But with me—­all is changed.”

“Changed, Bertie?  But how?”

He looked at her.  His eyes dwelt upon the vivid, happy face, but all the spontaneous gladness had died out of his own; it held only an infinite melancholy.

“He—­Mr. Mordaunt—­has not told you?”

“No one has told me anything,” she said.  “What is it, Bertie?  Have things gone wrong with you?  Tell me!  Was it—­was it the gun?”

He bent his head.

“Oh, but I’m so sorry,” she said.  “Was it a failure, after all?”

She drew near to him.  She laid a sympathetic hand upon his arm.

A sharp tremor went through him.  He stooped very low and kissed it.  “It was—­worse than that,” he said, his voice choked, barely audible.  “It was—­it was—­dishonour.”

“Dishonour!” She echoed the word, uncomprehending, unbelieving.

He remained bent over her hand.  She could not see his face.  “Have you never heard,” he said, “of ex-Lieutenant de Montville—­the man whom all France execrated three years ago as a traitor?”

“Yes,” said Chris.  “I’ve heard of him, of course.  But”—­doubtfully—­“I don’t read the papers much.  I didn’t know what he was supposed to have done.  I only knew that everyone in England said he hadn’t.”

The Frenchman sighed heavily.  “The people in England did not know,” he said.

“No?  Then you think he was guilty?”

He stood up sharply and faced her.  “I know that he was innocent,” he said.  “But it could not be proved.  That is what the English could never realize.  And—­cherie—­I was that man.  I was Lieutenant de Montville.”

Chris was gazing at him in amazement.  “You!” she said incredulously.

“I,” he said.  “They accused me of treason.  They thought that I would sell my own gun—­my own gun.  They sent me to prison—­mon Dieu!  I know not how I survived.  I suffered until it seemed that I could suffer no more.  And then they gave me my liberty—­they banished me from France.  I came to England—­and I starved.”

“You starved, Bertie!” Her blue eyes widened with horrified pity.  “You!” she said.  “You!”

He smiled with wistful humour.  “Men more worthy than I have done the same,” he said.

“Oh, but you, my own preux chevalier!” Chris’s voice trembled upon the words.

He made a quick, restraining gesture.  “But no—­not that!” he said.  “Your friend always, petite, but your preux chevalier—­never again!”

Chris smiled, with quivering lips.  “You will never be anything but my preux chevalier so long as you live,” she said.  “Oh, Bertie, I’m so distressed—­so grieved—­to think of all you have had to bear.  I never dreamt of its being you.  You know, I never heard your name.  We went away so suddenly from Valpre.  I had no time to think of anything.  I—­I was very miserable—­afterwards.”  Her voice sank; her eyes were full of tears.  “I knew you would think I had forgotten, but indeed, indeed it wasn’t that!”