Here the girl felt with swift fingers the edge of the molding. More and more rapidly she moved as the sound of hurrying footsteps resounded through the castle. “What is wrong?” asked Norman of Torn, noticing her increasing perturbation. “Mon Dieu!” she cried. “Can I be wrong! Surely this is the room. Oh, my friend, that I should have brought you to all this by my willfulness and vanity; and now when I might save you, my wits leave me and I forget the way.” “Do not worry about me,” laughed the Devil of Torn. “Methought that it was I who was trying to save you, and may heaven forgive me else, for surely, that be my only excuse for running away from a handful of swords. I could not take chances when thou wert at stake, Joan,” he added more gravely. The sound of pursuit was now quite close, in fact the reflection from flickering torches could be seen in nearby chambers. At last the girl, with a little cry of “stupid,” seized De Conde and rushed him to the far side of the room. “Here it is,” she whispered joyously, “here it has been all the time.” Running her fingers along the molding until she found a little hidden spring, she pushed it, and one of the great panels swung slowly in, revealing the yawning mouth of a black opening behind. Quickly the girl entered, pulling De Conde after her, and as the panel swung quietly into place, the Earl of Buckingham with a dozen men entered the apartment. “The devil take them,” cried De Fulm. “Where can they have gone? Surely we were right behind them.” “It is passing strange, My Lord,” replied one of the men. “Let us try the floor above, and the towers; for of a surety they have not come this way.” And the party retraced its steps, leaving the apartment empty. Behind the panel, the girl stood shrinking close to De Conde, her hand still in his. “Where now?” he asked. “Or do we stay hidden here like frightened chicks until the war is over and the Baron returns to let us out of this musty hole?” “Wait,” she answered, “until I quiet my nerves a little. I am all unstrung.” He felt her body tremble as it pressed against his. With the spirit of protection strong within him, what wonder that his arm fell about her shoulder as though to say, fear not, for I be brave and powerful; naught can harm you while I am here. Presently she reached her hands up to his face, made brave to do it by the sheltering darkness. “Roger,” she whispered, her tongue halting over the familiar name. “I thought that they had killed you, and all for me, for my foolish stubbornness. Canst forgive me?” “Forgive?” he asked, smiling to himself. “Forgive being given an opportunity to fight? There be nothing to forgive, Joan, unless it be that I should ask forgiveness for protecting thee so poorly.” “Do not say that,” she commanded. “Never was such bravery or such swordsmanship in all the world before; never such a man.”