“What sort of an old woman?” he asked pleasantly; “you look as if you had seen a witch, mademoiselle.” “And so I have,” retorted the girl; “a witch with a string of fish.” He started; he too had unpleasant associations with an apparition with a basket of fish. He remembered the terrible tent at the fair, and the encounter opposite the Sign of the Golden Cup. “Which way did she go?” he asked, and as Rosaline pointed, he went to the gate, and looked in both directions but saw nothing. “She has vanished,” he said reassuringly. “I trust that she did not annoy you, mademoiselle.” “She was teasing me to buy her fish, and finally pushed into the garden,” Rosaline replied, “and then she caught hold of my skirt in her eagerness to arrest my attention. I was foolish, I know, but, I couldn’t help it, I cried out--such a horror came over me! Then Truffe sprang on her, and she drew a knife on my dog! I saved Truffe and ordered her away, but I know she was fearfully angry, and--and I fear her; I can’t tell why, but I fear her!” “Put her from your thoughts, mademoiselle,” he said soothingly; “’tis not in the power of such a wretched creature to hurt you.” “I do not know,” she replied, still excited; “we are concealing so much, and she wanted to get to the house. I was afraid she would see--” she broke off, her face flushing. “See me,” finished d’Aguesseau quietly. “Mademoiselle, I pray that you will not let my presence add to your anxieties. I fear I have indeed exposed this house to peril by accepting Madame de St. Cyr’s beautiful friendship. If I believed so, I would quit it at once. My lot would indeed be a miserable one if I should bring misfortune to the roof that shelters me.” He spoke gloomily, standing with folded arms and bent head, his eyes on the ground. Rosaline loosened her hold on Truffe, who wriggled herself free and fled away along the hedge barking angrily. Neither of them heeded the poodle, however, for their thoughts were of more serious matters. “Have no fear, monsieur,” Rosaline said; “our peril could scarcely be increased. We are all members of a proscribed religion, and it is natural that we should all suffer together. It has been a pleasure to my grandmother to be able to have you as her guest. We have been so situated that we could do nothing for our fellow-religionists, and it is much to her to do even so little for you.” “So much,” he corrected gravely. “I was friendless and homeless, when madame asked me to stay here, and I wish from my heart that I could be of real service to you, instead of merely assuming a steward’s place as a temporary disguise.” He paused an instant, watching the young girl’s downcast face intently, and then he spoke again, with yet more earnestness. “I have been urging Madame de St. Cyr to leave this neighborhood,” he said,--“to go to England. No one is safe here, and I cannot hope much from this insurrection, when I think of the mighty force that the king can hurl against these poor peasants.”