Much relieved at the turn the conversation had taken, I now undertook to continue it to my advantage. After some bantering, maintained with gaiety on her part, she said that she must return to the Louvre. Then, as she would not have me accompany her in the streets, I begged her to appoint another meeting. She evaded my petition at first, but, when I took her hand and refused to release it until she should grant my request, she said, after a little submissive shrug of her shoulders: "Very well. Follow me, at a distance, from this church, and observe a house before which I shall stop for a moment as if to adjust my cloak. It is a house that has been taken by a friend of mine, one of the Queen-mother's ladies. I shall be there tomorrow afternoon." "Alas! To-morrow I shall be on duty till six in the evening." "Then come at seven. Knock three times on the street door." And with that she slipped her hand from mine, and hastened lightly out of the church. I stood alone by the font, delighted and bewildered. There was so much to mystify me that I did not even search my mind for explanations. I thought my happiness about to be attained, and left it for the future to explain,--as it did! CHAPTER IV. HOW LA TOURNOIRE WAS ENLIGHTENED IN THE DARK It was already dark when I started, on the evening appointed, for the house indicated by Mlle. d'Arency. I went without attendance, as was my custom, relying on my sword, my alertness of eye, and my nimbleness of foot. I had engaged a lackey, for whose honesty De Rilly had vouched, but he was now absent on a journey to La Tournoire, whither I had sent him with a message to my old steward. I have often wondered at the good fortune which preserved me from being waylaid, by thieving rascals, on my peregrinations, by night, through Paris streets. About this very time several gentlemen, who went well attended, were set upon and robbed almost within sight of the quarters of the provost's watch; and some of these lost their lives as well as the goods upon their persons. Yet I went fearlessly, and was never even threatened with attack.