"My darling, you cannot dream what it costs me to leave you now; but duty claims me. I must obey." Duty! Hertha had heard the word often enough from the general's lips, and she comprehended its significance. Her eyes filled with tears, but she made no further effort to detain her lover. Once more he pressed his lips to hers. "Farewell! One thing more,--Raoul is here. Possibly he may attempt to see you if he should hear of your presence in the house. Promise me neither to see him nor to speak with him." A contemptuous expression flitted across the young girl's face. "_Her_ presence would forbid on his part any such attempt as you fear." "Whose presence? Whom do you mean?" asked Michael, with intense eagerness. "Héloïse von Nérac!" "What? here? And Clermont----" "He is with her." "Thank God! Where--where are they?" "Just above us, in the gable-room. But tell me----" "I cannot! Do not ask me, do not follow me. _Everything_ depends upon my finding them, and then--then I can stay with you." He hurried from the room, past the priest, who looked after him in dismayed surprise; nor could Hertha in the least understand this scene, although she clung for comfort to Michael's last words,--'Then I can stay with you.' The gable-room, in which a single candle was burning, was even more scantily furnished than were the other rooms in the house, but the strangers occupying it, who had arrived by the noonday train, had taken possession of it without complaint, since they needed it for only a few hours. They were each in travelling-dress, apparently waiting impatiently for the signal for departure. Henri Clermont was pacing the room restlessly, whilst Héloïse sat leaning back in an old arm-chair. "What a delay this is!" she exclaimed, in despair. "It seems as if we never should get away from here. It will be impossible for us to cross the borders tomorrow morning as we hoped." "And it is entirely your fault," Henri interposed, irritably. "How could you be guilty of such imprudence as to speak French just as we were about to change cars? You might have known that the excited crowd at the station would insult us." "How could I know that the German mob was so irritable? And after all there were only two or three who were insulting; the better sort took our part. There was no need for the police to interfere as they did." "True, but while matters were being adjusted the train moved off, and we, hemmed in on every side, could not get to it. We have lost half a day, when every minute is full of peril for us. Moreover, we have attracted attention, and may be glad that we could disappear in this wretched inn. We must not venture to show ourselves again at the station until just before the train starts. They may be even now upon our track." "Impossible! Even if the discovery has been made, Raoul will be silent."