He winced, and from red grew pale.  “What do you mean?” he stammered; and, averting his eyes in shame, seeing now all the littleness, all the baseness of his position, “Has he—­married her?” he continued.

“Ho, ho!” she cried in triumph.  “I’ve hit you now, have I, Monsieur?  I’ve hit you!” And mocking him, “Has he—­married her?” she lisped.  “No; but he will marry her, have no fear of that!  He will marry her.  He waits but to get a priest.  Would you like to see what he says?” she continued, playing with him as a cat plays with a mouse.  “I had a note from him yesterday.  Would you like to see how welcome you’ll be at the wedding?” And she flaunted a piece of paper before his eyes.

“Give it me,” he said.

She let him seize it the while she shrugged her shoulders.  “It’s your affair, not mine,” she said.  “See it if you like, and keep it if you like.  Cousin Hannibal wastes few words.”

That was true, for the paper contained but a dozen or fifteen words, and an initial by way of signature.

“I may need your shaveling to-morrow afternoon.  Send him, and Tignonville in safeguard if he come.—­H.”

“I can guess what use he has for a priest,” she said.  “It is not to confess him, I warrant.  It’s long, I fear, since Hannibal told his beads.”

M. de Tignonville swore.  “I would I had the confessing of him!” he said between his teeth.

She clapped her hands in glee.  “Why should you not?” she cried.  “Why should you not?  ’Tis time yet, since I am to send to-day and have not sent.  Will you be the shaveling to go confess or marry him?” And she laughed recklessly.  “Will you, M. de Tignonville?  The cowl will mask you as well as another, and pass you through the streets better than a cut sleeve.  He will have both his wishes, lover and clerk in one then.  And it will be pull monk, pull Hannibal with a vengeance.”

Tignonville gazed at her, and as he gazed courage and hope awoke in his eyes.  What if, after all, he could undo the past?  What if, after all, he could retrace the false step he had taken, and place himself again where he had been—­by her side?

“If you meant it!” he exclaimed, his breath coming fast.  “If you only meant what you say, Madame.”

“If?” she answered, opening her eyes.  “And why should I not mean it?”

“Because,” he replied slowly, “cowl or no cowl, when I meet your cousin—­”

“’Twill go hard with him?” she cried, with a mocking laugh.  “And you think I fear for him.  That is it, is it?”

He nodded.

“I fear just so much for him!” she retorted with contempt.  “Just so much!” And coming a step nearer to Tignonville she snapped her small white fingers under his nose.  “Do you see?  No, M. de Tignonville,” she continued, “you do not know Count Hannibal if you think that he fears, or that any fear for him.  If you will beard the lion in his den, the risk will be yours, not his!”