Thus by accident did she stumble upon the very weapon wherewith to make an utter rout of all Caron's resolutions. For knowing nothing of the fountain from which those tears were springing, and deeming them the expression of a grief pure and unalloyed--saving, perhaps, by a worthy penitence--he stepped swiftly to her side. “Mademoiselle,” he murmured, and his tone was as gentle and beseeching as it had lately been imperious. “Nay, Mademoiselle, I implore you!” But her tears continued, and her sobs shook the slender frame as if to shatter it. He dropped upon his knees. Scarcely knowing what he did, he set his arm about her waist in a caress of protection. A long curl of her black, unpowdered hair lay against his cheek. “Mademoiselle,” he murmured, and she took comfort at the soothing tone. From it she judged him malleable now, that had been so stern and unyielding before. She raised her eyes, and through her tears she turned their heavenly blue full upon the grey depths of his. “You will not believe me, Monsieur,” she complained softly. “You will not believe that I can have changed with the times; that I see things differently now. If you were to come to me again as in the woods at Bellecour--” She paused abruptly, her cheeks flamed scarlet, and she covered them with her hands. “Suzanne!” he cried, seeking to draw those hands away. “Is it true, this? You care, beloved!” She uncovered her face at last. Again their eyes met. “I was right,” she whispered. “Love never dies, you see.” “And you will marry me, Suzanne?” he asked incredulously. She inclined her head, smiling through her tears, and he would have caught her to him but that she rose of a sudden. “Hist!” she cried, raising her finger: “someone is coming.” He listened, holding his breath, but no sound stirred. He went to the door and peered out. All was still. But the interruption served to impress him with the fact that time was speeding, and that all unsuspicious though Guyot might be as yet, it was more than possible that his suspicions would be aroused if she remained there much longer. He mentioned this, and he was beginning to refer to his plan for their escape when she thrust it aside, insisting that they must depart in their coach, so that their treasure might also be saved. “Be reasonable, Suzanne,” he cried. “It is impossible.” A cloud of vexation swept across her averted face. “Nay, surely not impossible,” she answered. “Listen, Caron, there are two treasures in that coach. One is in money and in gold and silver plate; the other is in gems, and amounts to thrice the value of the rest. This latter is my dowry. It is a fortune with which we can quit France and betake ourselves wherever our fancy leads us. Would you ask me to abandon that and come to you penniless, compelled thereby to live in perpetual terror in a country where at any moment an enemy might cast at me the word aristocrate, and thereby ruin me?”