“No,” she murmured; “and yet I hope that you will not be long.” “No,” I said; “no;” and not daring to trust myself further, I turned and strode away through the darkness. Only the biting need for prompt and well-directed action enabled me to master the sweet emotion which those words, so softly uttered, had awakened. But I managed to crush it down, to put it behind me, and to address myself wholly to the task in hand. I must get food at once, and at any price. But food in such a wilderness! Yet fortune favored me,--or perhaps the country was not such a wilderness as I imagined,--for at the end of ten minutes’ brisk walking I collided with a hedge, and too rejoiced at the discovery to heed the scratches I had sustained, I felt my way along it and came at last to a gate. It was not even latched, so I pushed it open and passed through. Once on the other side of it, I found myself in what seemed an orchard. Arguing that where there was a hedge, a gate, and an orchard, there must also be a house, I pushed forward among the trees and came out at last into the clear air beyond. At the first glance I perceived a light just ahead of me, and made my way toward it with a deep thankfulness readily imagined. As I drew nearer I saw that the light proceeded from the window of a small house which I was evidently approaching from the rear. I advanced cautiously and looked within. Three men were sitting about a table on which was a bottle of wine and the remains of a meal. They were talking together with great earnestness. There was no time for hesitation or the weighing of risks, so I waited to see no more, but hastened around the house. It fronted upon a road which seemed wide and well kept--undoubtedly a high-road, and not a mere country lane. A creaking sign proclaimed the place an inn. I raised the latch and entered, and without pausing to look about me sat down at the nearest table and rapped loudly. One of the three men whom I had observed through the window arose and came to me. “You are the inn-keeper?” I asked. “Yes,” he answered gruffly, his brows drawn close with annoyance, not in the least in the manner of a man welcoming a customer. “Well, citizen,” I continued, “I am in great haste--I am on an errand of importance; I must be off at once. Can I have some food to take with me--a fowl, say, and whatever else is at hand; together with two bottles of wine?” “All that may no doubt be had, citizen,” he answered, relaxing nothing of his sinister expression. “But there are certain difficulties in the way.” “Money you mean?” and I laughed and threw two silver crowns upon the table. “Well, there it is, and you cannot quarrel with it. I don’t offer you assignats, mind you--and one doesn’t often hear the ring of honest coin nowadays.” “That is true,” he admitted; and his face relaxed a little as he eyed the money. “But there is yet another difficulty.” “And what is it?” I demanded.