“The minister wrote bidding him defer action till March. That was really the end of everything. The confederates dispersed, and I, too, could delay no longer. I started homewards. Then came my accident. I was nursed at the _manoir_ where it happened, in the family of an old gentleman, a M. de Saint-Gervais, who had just been sheltering La Rouërie himself. That was why I dared not give you the name. As soon as I was fit to travel I started again—and here I am.” “Then where is La Rouërie now?” asked both his hearers in a breath. “Somewhere in the heart of Brittany. He absolutely refused to seek safety in Jersey. I understand that he left the château of La Fosse-Hingant, near Saint Malo, at the beginning of October. If Chalons had fallen he and his Bretons would be in Paris now; perhaps the King would be back at the Tuileries.” Gilbert spoke with a fire new to him, and the priest looked at him in a contemplative silence. Yet the recital, whose beginning had been full of promising description, had disappointingly tailed off when it came to the real issue. Both men were conscious of this, but Louis’ attempts to extract more particulars met with small success. “Then what,” asked the Curé at last, “do you consider to be the result of your journey?” “To be frank,” replied the Marquis, “nothing at all.” But the priest did not believe him. He was more mystified than ever. He had re-entered the room that evening—he had paused at the door with a prayer on his lips—strung up to a most uncomfortable pitch of expectation, prepared to see he knew not what menacing interview going forward within. Instead of that he had beheld Louis, his depression banished, sitting laughing on the arm of his cousin’s chair, in amiable converse with the kinsman whom he had (perhaps) deeply wronged, and who (perhaps) knew it. It was more than M. des Graves could fathom. Must he accuse Louis of being, besides a traitor, the most consummate of hypocrites? No; the most finished acting in the world could not simulate so well. He _was_ pleased to see the Marquis back; his spirits _were_ genuine. And Gilbert . . . what of his past bearing? M. des Graves knew the Marquis’ power of concealing his feelings, his reserve, his mastery of himself; but he did not credit him with adding to these gifts that of pretending to an emotion which he did not feel. Therefore the ease which he displayed in Louis’ presence must be real. What had happened to him? Did he know nothing, after all? Or—blessed supposition—was there nothing to know?