No one in Le Crépuscule slept that night. Laure was called to help her mother; and the three women were alone in the bedroom of dead Gerault. The demoiselles, all dressed, had assembled in the spinning-room, and clustered there in the torchlight, whispering nervously together, and listening with strained ears for any sounds coming from Madame Lenore’s bedchamber. In the hall below were a company of servants, women and men, and a half-dozen henchmen, who quaffed occasional flagons of beer, but spoke not a word through the hours. David and Alixe sat in a corner playing at chess together; and a wondrous game it was, for neither knew when the other was in check, nor paid attention to a queen in jeopardy. Lastly, Courtoise was there, pacing up and down the hall, his hands clenched behind him, and the beads of sweat rolling off his face. And how many miles he walked that night, he never knew. The hours passed solemnly away, and there was no sign from the holy room above. Time dragged by, slowly and yet more slowly, till the hours became as years; and it seemed that ages had gone when finally the dawn came creeping from beyond the distant hills, and a pale light glimmered across the moving waters. By the time the torches were flaring high in their mingling with the daybreak, there came, from above, the sound of a door softly opening and then closing again. In the hall below, no one breathed. Courtoise paused beside a table, and trembled and shook with cold. Alixe, very pale and white, moved slowly toward the stairs. There was a faint sound of rustling garments across the stones of the upper hall, and then, descending step by step in the wavering light, came Laure, great-eyed and deathly white, after the night’s terrible toil. She came alone, carrying nothing in her arms; and on the fifth step from the floor she stopped still, and looked down upon the motionless company. Once she tried to speak, and her throat failed her. “Mademoiselle—in the name of God!” pleaded Courtoise, hoarsely. Laure trembled a little. “Good friends,” she said, “Madame Lenore is safely delivered; and there is—a new daughter in Le Crépuscule.” [Illustration] _CHAPTER FOURTEEN_ ELEANORE [Illustration]