"En joûte, en amour, cettuy touchera Le front du roy, Et cornes ou bien trou sanglant mettra Au front du roy. Mais le veuille ou non, toujours blessera Le front du roy. Enfin, l'aimera, puis, las! le tuera Dame du roy." Gabriel reflected that curious prediction had already been fulfilled from point to point in his father's case; for the Comte de Montgommery in his youth had wounded King François I. in the face with a burning brand, and had afterward been King Henri's rival in love, and had been slain only the evening before by that very "lady of the king," who had loved him. Up to that time Gabriel also had been loved by a queen,--Catherine de Médicis. Would his destiny too be realized to the end? Would his vengeance or his fate decree that he should overthrow and wound the king "in the tilting-field?" If that should happen, it would be a matter of indifference to Gabriel whether the king's lady who had loved him should slay him sooner or later. CHAPTER XXXII THE KNIGHT-ERRANT Poor Aloyse, whose life for many years had been passed in waiting, in solitude, and in suffering, again sat two or three endless hours at the window, to see if she could not catch a glimpse of her beloved young master. When the laborer to whom Gabriel had intrusted the letter knocked at the door, Aloyse rushed to open it. "News at last!" she thought. News at last, indeed, and terrible news! Aloyse, after the first few lines, felt a mist coming before her eyes, and to conceal her emotion hastened to return to her own room, where she finished with much difficulty the perusal of the fatal missive, the tears streaming from her eyes the while. However, hers was a stout heart and a valiant soul; so she collected her energies, wiped away her tears, and left her room to say to the messenger,-- "It is well! Until this evening, when I shall expect you and your companions." André the page questioned her anxiously, but she bade him wait till the following day for answers to his questions. Until then she had enough to think of and to do. When evening had fallen, she sent the people of the household to bed in good season. "The master will surely not return to-night," she told them. But when she was left alone she thought,-- "Ah! the master will return; but, alas! it will be the old master, not the young one,--it will be the dead, and not the living. For what body would he command me to see entombed in the vault of the counts of Montgommery, unless it were that of the Comte de Montgommery himself? Oh, my noble lord, for whom my poor Perrot died, have you at last gone to join your faithful servant? But have you carried your secret with you to the tomb? Oh, mystery of mysteries!--mystery and terror everywhere! But no matter! Though I know and understand nothing, though I hope not, still will I obey; it is my duty, and I will do it. Oh, my God!"