'_Mon ami_,' she said surprised, 'I ask nothing, except that you should take a little rest and spare thyself.' Then she added, with haste, what I knew she would say, 'Unless it were this, _mon ami_. If I were permitted, I would go into the city--I would ask those who are there what is their meaning: and if no way can be found--no act of penitence.--Oh! do not answer in haste! I have no fear; and it would be to save thee.' A strong throb of anger came into my throat. Figure to yourself that I looked at my wife with anger, with the same feeling which had moved me when the deserters left us; but far more hot and sharp. I seized her soft hands and crushed them in mine. 'You would leave me!' I said. 'You would desert your husband. You would go over to our enemies!' 'O Martin, say not so,' she cried, with tears. 'Not enemies. There is our little Marie, and my mother, who died when I was born.' 'You love these dead tyrants. Yes,' I said, 'you love them best. You will go to--the majority, to the strongest. Do not speak to me! Because your God is on their side, you will forsake us too.' Then she threw herself upon me and encircled me with her arms. The touch of them stilled my passion; but yet I held her, clutching her gown, so terrible a fear came over me that she would go and come back no more. 'Forsake thee!' she breathed out over me with a moan. Then, putting her cool cheek to mine, which burned, 'But I would die for thee, Martin.' 'Silence, my wife: that is what you shall not do,' I cried, beside myself. I rose up; I put her away from me. That is, I know it, what has been done. Their God does this, they do not hesitate to say--takes from you what you love best, to make you better--_you!_ and they ask you to love Him when He has thus despoiled you! 'Go home, Agnès,' I said, hoarse with terror. 'Let us face them as we may; you shall not go among them, or put thyself in peril. Die for me! _Mon Dieu!_ and what then, what should I do then? Turn your face from them; turn from them; go! go! and let me not see thee here again.' My wife did not understand the terror that seized me. She obeyed me, as she always does, but, with the tears falling from her white cheeks, fixed upon me the most piteous look. '_Mon ami_,' she said, 'you are disturbed, you are not in possession of yourself; this cannot be what you mean.' 'Let me not see thee here again!' I cried. 'Would you make me mad in the midst of my trouble? No! I will not have you look that way. Go home! go home!' Then I took her into my arms and wept, though I am not a man given to tears. 'Oh! my Agnès,' I said, 'give me thy counsel. What you tell me I will do; but rather than risk thee, I would live thus for ever, and defy them.'