“That which made me wish for you, good Denys. I had visited poor old Jacques Boulanger and was returning through the market place just when the heralds had proclaimed this new and shameful ordinance of the Governor’s--a tax so cruel that it makes my blood boil. A terrible thing occurred. Babillon, the smith, sprang forward to protest, and the Governor, holding him for a rebel, had him done to death there on the spot by his brutal soldiers.” “How horrible!” exclaimed Lucette. “But you, mademoiselle?” asked Denys. “I had just heard the news when his wife came rushing through the place like one distraught, and I was seeking to comfort her in her anguish when the soldiers--oh, they are fiends, those men!--attacked the citizens who had lifted the smith’s body to bear it home, flung the dead on the ground, and when, burning with indignation, I ordered them to desist, they turned on me, one of them thrust me violently aside, and would have done I know not what next, had not a cavalier, a stranger, rushed up to help me.” “Would I had been there, mademoiselle!” exclaimed Denys angrily. “Would you know the fellow again?” “Do you mean the stranger cavalier?” asked Lucette, with a light of mischief in her eyes. “Nay, Lucette, do not jest,” said Gabrielle earnestly. “The man was punished for his act, Denys. The cavalier struck him to the ground and faced the whole of them fearlessly; and I dreaded for a moment that a conflict would follow, for there are not many in Morvaix who would see me harmed. But a monk intervened then and the danger was averted. Babillon’s body was carried away, and I went with the wretched woman whom I have but now left, all desolate, broken and whelmed by her sorrow. These are ill days indeed for Morvaix.” “But the men who maltreated you, mademoiselle, can be found, nay, must be found and punished,” cried Denys warmly. “It is of no matter now, Denys. It is over; beside the cruel wrongs done to the people, my little hurt is nothing. These soldiers, moreover, are but hirelings, and do no more than hirelings’ work. But there is one quest--you must find the cavalier who served me.” Lucette looked up. “You learnt his name, Gabrielle?” she asked quickly. “Nay, for I left the place with Babillon’s wife--wife alas! no more, but widow, poor soul.” “The cavalier, Gabrielle, was he handsome as well as brave?” asked Lucette after a pause. A faint tinge of colour tinted Gabrielle’s cheeks as she answered.