With these thoughts and feelings he returned to the door of the room where he had slept so long, and knocked for admission, which was given at once. "She is getting quite well now," said the good landlady, "but you will have to stay here to-night, for she is too tired to go farther." Edward explained that he had sent for a coach, which could not arrive till the following morning, and, sitting down beside Lucette, began to converse with her in English, while the landlady continued at the table listening to the strange language, and apparently trying if she could make any thing of it. In that tongue Lucette, whose sweet lips had regained their color and her beautiful eyes their sparkle, told him all that had happened to her since he had left her,--how, with anxiety and fear, she had remained in her place of concealment hour after hour till near the dawn of day,--how good Jacques Beaupré had tried to console and comfort her in vain, till at length suspense became unendurable, and she had determined to go forth and try to pass the royalist lines herself,--how Jacques had remonstrated,--how she had persisted, and how she had not gone three hundred yards before she was challenged, stopped, and taken to the little house occupied by Monsieur de Lude, who commanded in that quarter. Her companion, she said, had disappeared at the very moment of her own arrest, and she did not know what had become of him. Monsieur de Lude, however, was an elderly man and very courteous, who asked her a number of questions. "And what, in Heaven's name, did you tell him, dear Lucette?" asked Edward. "Not much," replied the sweet girl. "I determined at once that I would speak no French; and, as he could speak no English, he gained nothing from me. At length he put pen and paper before me, and made signs to me to write down who and what I was. I then wrote that I was your page, who had remained behind you, being frightened, but who, repenting of my cowardice, had come on, thinking to overtake you. The old gentleman sent for some of his officers who knew a little English; and between them they made out what I had written." "Did you write my own name, dear girl?" asked Edward, with some anxiety. "Nay," replied Lucette, "I wrote the name you told us was in your pass,--Sir Peter Apsley,--and I described you as well as I could. Then, to my great joy, I heard Monsieur de Lude say to the officers, 'I am afraid we have made a mistake in stopping him. That was clearly the cardinal's safe-conduct; and we must send the page after him. Richelieu dislikes too much as well as too little zeal; and, on my life, it is likely we shall be scolded for not having properly reverenced his signature.' I do think, dear Edward, I could have persuaded him to let us all go on our way, if I had dared to speak French to him; but, after having pretended not to understand a word, I was afraid."