Then, as my eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, I saw with astonishment that the cavern was empty. What was it that had happened? Who was it had fired that shot at me? What was the obstruction which had brought me down? I could just discern it on the floor before me--a dim, huddled mass. I went to it, bent over it, peered down at it--and in a sudden panic terror saw that it was Charlotte! The fiends had been watching then; they had seen me leave the cavern; they had seen me desert her--fool that I was!--they had waited till I was safely away; then they had crept in upon her, surprised her as she slept, secure in the thought that I was watching over her! With a groan of agony I groped for her wrist and found myself clutching a pistol whose barrel was still warm. In a flash I understood, and my heart bounded again with joy, the while I cursed my carelessness. It was she who had fired at me! How was she to know me in this garb? She had been watching for me outside the cave, and had seen a brigand approaching her. She had slipped behind the curtain, and a moment later I had burst in upon her without a word of warning. Fool that I was! Fool! Fool! And yet my heart was singing with joy and thankfulness--joy that she had escaped; thankfulness that she had turned the pistol against me and not against herself! Had she done that!--but I shook the thought from me lest I break down completely. I drew her to the entrance of the cavern that the cool air of the evening might play upon her face. At the end of a moment her lips parted in a faint sigh, her bosom rose and fell convulsively and she opened her eyes and stared up at me with a gaze in which horror grew and deepened. “Do you not know me, my love?” I asked. “It is Tavernay. See!” and I snatched off Pasdeloup’s knotted headgear. The warm color flooded her face, and she sat suddenly upright. “Then it was you!” she gasped. “It was you!” “Yes;” and I laughed with the sheer joy of seeing her again so full of life. “It was I at whom you discharged your pistol. An inch to the right, and I should not be talking to you now;” and I placed my finger on the still smarting scratch across my cheek. She gave one glance at it, then fell forward, sobbing, her face between her hands. What would I not have given to take her in my arms--to hold her close against my heart--to kiss away those tears! But even in that moment there was about her something which held me back; something which recalled the promise I had made her; something which bade me remember that she was in my care, defenseless. So I stilled the hot pulsing of my blood as far as in me lay, and even succeeded in speaking with a certain coldness.