When de Sigognac, the tyrant and Scapin reached the _Armes de France_, after having overcome the serious obstacles in their way, they found the others in a terrible state of alarm about them. In the stillness of the night they had distinctly heard the loud cries of the duke’s ruffians, and the noise of the fierce combat, and feared that their poor friends were being murdered. Isabelle, nearly frantic in her terror lest her lover should be overpowered and slain, tried to rush back to him, never remembering that she would be more of a hindrance than a help; but at the first step she had again almost fainted away, and would have fallen upon the rough pavement but for Blazius and Zerbine, who, each taking an arm, supported her between them the rest of the way to the hotel When they reached it at last, she refused to go to her own room, but waited with the others at the outer door for news of their comrades, fearing the worst, yet prayerfully striving to hope for the best. At sight of de Sigognac—who, alarmed at her extreme pallor, hastened anxiously to her side—she impetuously raised her arms to heaven, as a low cry of thanksgiving escaped her lips, and letting them fall around his neck, for one moment hid her streaming eyes against his shoulder; but quickly regaining her self-control, she withdrew herself gently from the detaining arm that had fondly encircled her slender, yielding form, and stepping back from him a little, resumed with a strong effort her usual reserve and quiet dignity. “And you are not wounded or hurt?” she asked, in her sweetest tones, her face glowing with happiness as she caught his reassuring gesture; he could not speak yet for emotion. The clasp of her arms round his neck had been like a glimpse of heaven to him a moment of divine ecstasy. “Ah! if he could only snatch her to his breast and hold her there forever,” he was thinking, “close to the heart that beat for her alone,” as she continued: “If the slightest harm had befallen you, because of me, I should have died of grief. But, oh! how imprudent you were, to defy that handsome, wicked duke, who has the assurance and the pride of Lucifer himself, for the sake of a poor, insignificant girl like me. You were not reasonable, de Sigognac! Now that you are a comedian, like the rest of us, you must learn to put up with certain impertinences and annoyances, without attempting to resent them.” “I never will,” said de Sigognac, finding his voice at last, “I swear it, I never will permit an affront to be offered to the adorable Isabelle in my presence even when I have on my player’s mask.”