Plessis shrugged up his shoulders, bowed his head low, and with a look which said as plainly as any look could say, “I see there is never any use of opposing a woman,” he suffered the fair lady to pass out, while her friend remained sitting thoughtfully at the table.

The lady whom we have called Caroline walked quietly along one of the corridors of the house till she came to a spot where a man in the garb of a sailor was sitting on a large chest, with his elbows on his two knees, and his chin on his two hands, looking very much wearied with his watch, and swinging one of his feet backwards and forwards disconsolately.  There was a door farther on, and towards it the lady walked, but found that it was locked, though the key was on the outside.  The sailor personage had started up as she passed, and then gazed at her proceedings with no small surprise; but as she laid her hand upon the lock, he came forward, saying, “Ma’am, what do you want there?”.

“I want,” replied the lady, turning round, and looking at him from head to foot, “I merely to call this young lady to breakfast.  Be so good as to open the door:  the lock is rather stiff.”

She spoke so completely with the tone of calm authority, that the man did not even hesitate, but opened the door wide, taking it for granted that she had some right to enter.  The lady was about to go in; but suddenly a feeling of apprehension seized her, lest the man should shut the door and lock it upon her also; and pausing in the doorway, she addressed Lady Laura, who we need scarcely tell the reader was within,—­“I have come to ask you,” she said, “if you will go with me to breakfast.”

“Oh gladly, gladly!” cried the poor girl, darting forward, and holding out her hands to her; and Caroline, drawing one fair arm through her own, led her onward to the room where she had left the Lady Helen.

The man paused and hesitated, and then followed the two ladies along the passage; but before he was near enough to hear what was said, Caroline had whispered to her companion, “It is already done:  I have had an answer to my note, which went in the same packet, so that the place of your detention is now certainly known to those who will not fail to send you aid.”

The bright joy that came up in the eyes of Laura might very well have betrayed to the man who guarded her, had he seen her face, that she has received more intelligence than his employers could have wished.  He followed, however, at some distance, without taking any notice; and seeming to think it enough to watch her movements, and prevent her egress from the house, he seated himself again near the door of the chamber where breakfast had been prepared, while Laura and her fair companion entered the room.