“‘Not so, Your Majesty,’ I said.  ’I owe her return to no repentance on his part, but to the gallantry of a young officer who, passing the house where she was confined, heard her cries for aid, and, with his soldier servant, climbed the gate of the enclosure, and was there attacked by the man who had charge of her, with four others.  The young gentleman and his servant killed four of them, and bound the other; and then, entering the house, compelled the woman who had been appointed to act as her servant to lead the way to her chamber.  Fortunately, the carriage in which she had been taken there was still in the stables, with its horses.  The gallant young gentleman at once got the carriage in readiness, placed my daughter in it, with the woman who had been attending on her.  The servant drove, and he rode by the side of the carriage, and in that way brought her home this morning.’

“In spite of his efforts to appear indifferent, it was evident that the king was greatly annoyed.  However, he only said: 

“’You did quite right to come to me, Baron.  It is outrageous, indeed, that a young lady of my court should be thus carried off, and I will see that justice is done.  And who is this officer, who has rendered your daughter such a service?’

“’His name is Kennedy, Sire.  He is an ensign in O’Brien’s Irish regiment.’

“‘I will myself send for him,’ he said, ’and thank him for having defeated this disgraceful plot of the Vicomte de Tulle.  I suppose you are quite sure of all the circumstances, as you have told them to me?’

“‘It is impossible that there can be any mistake, Sire,’ I said.  ’In the first place, I have my daughter’s account.  This is entirely corroborated by the old woman she had brought with her, and whose only hope of escaping from punishment lay in telling the truth.  In every respect, she fully confirmed my daughter’s account.’

“’But the vicomte has not been absent from Versailles, for the past month.  He has been at my morning levee, and on all other occasions at my breakfasts and dinners.  He has walked with me in the gardens, and been always present at the evening receptions.’

“‘That is so, Sire,’ I said.  ’My daughter, happily, saw him but once; namely, on the morning after she was captured.  He then told her, frankly, that she would remain a prisoner until she consented to marry him, however long the time might be.  He said he would return in a month, and hoped by that time to find that, seeing the hopelessness of her position, she would be more inclined to accept his suit.

“’It was on the eve of his coming again that my daughter, in her desperation, made the attempt to escape.  She was foiled in her effort, but this, nevertheless, brought about her rescue, for her cries, as her guards dragged her into the house, attracted the attention of Monsieur Kennedy, who forthwith, as I have told you, stormed the house, killed her guards, and brought her home to me.’