"I fear I must ask you to go on," replied the Duke. "What you have now to tell me is the most important part of all to me at the present moment, for by it must my conduct be regulated, in regard to the measures for rescuing our poor Marie from the hands of that----." He checked himself suddenly, and then added, "the King, in short. A single word may cause a difference in our view of the matter; and therefore I would fain hear you tell it, if you will do me that favour." "All that I know, my Lord, I will tell," replied the Count; "but of my own knowledge I have little to tell, for the principal part of my information was derived from the boy with whom you have already spoken. All then that I personally know is, that, having slept long from great fatigue, I was roused by the boy in the morning; that he told me my brother was about to depart; and that, on descending, I found his report true. My brother was already on horseback, and his troop in the act of setting out; but he was accompanied by a gentleman whom I had never seen before, whose name is Colombel, and who, I found afterwards, is an officer in the service of the King." "Oh yes," said the Duke of Guise; "I have heard him named; a person of no great repute, but some cunning." "My conversation with my brother," continued the Count, "was not the most agreeable. On his side it was all taunts; but the only part of which it is needful to inform your Highness, was, that when I asked tidings of Mademoiselle de Clairvaut, he would afford me no information, except that she was in safe hands. I am grieved, also, to be compelled to say that he told me, if I did not join you before he did, I should be long parted from you." "We have lost an ally," replied the Duke; "but one which, to say sooth, I do not covet. If he be not treacherous, he is at best unsteady; but I cannot help fearing, Charles of Montsoreau, that your brother himself, apprehending that my regard for you might not suit his purposes, has had some share in suffering Marie to fall into the hands of Henry." "Oh no, my Lord, oh no!" exclaimed Charles of Montsoreau; "you do him wrong, believe me. My Lord, a few words will explain to you the cause of his conduct. He is possessed with a passion for Mademoiselle de Clairvaut, so strong, so vehement, so intense, as to have a portion of madness in it,--a sufficient portion to make him cast away his former nature altogether, to hate his brother, to abandon his friends, to abjure all the thoughts and feelings of his youth, and to follow her still where-ever she goes, seeking to obtain her by means which the very blindness of his passion prevents him from seeing are those which must insure his losing her."