"But take care, young man," said the stern La Renaudie, in his familiar and yet noble language,--"take care, when once we have called you our brother, to be worthy of the name. We may admit a private devotion into our ranks; but the heart sometimes deceives itself. Are you perfectly certain, young man, that when you believe yourself to be entirely devoted to thoughts of another, no personal consideration whatever has its influence on your actions? In the object which you are striving to accomplish, are you absolutely and truly disinterested? Are you, in short, urged on by no passion of your own, though it may be the most generous and worthy of passions?" "Yes," added Theodore de Bèze, "we do not ask for your secrets; but search your heart, and tell us that if you were justified in revealing to us all its feelings and all its plans, you would not feel the least embarrassment in so doing, and we will believe your word." "In speaking thus, my dear friend," said the admiral, in his turn, "it is to impress upon you that a pure cause must be upheld with clean hands; otherwise one would only bring misfortune upon his cause and himself." Gabriel listened to and looked at the three men one after another, who were as stern to others as to themselves, and who, standing around with keen, serious mien, were questioning him as friends and judges at once. At their words he turned pale and red by turns. He questioned his own conscience. Being a man of impulse and action, he was doubtless too little accustomed to reflect and inquire into his own motives. At this moment he asked himself in alarm, whether in his filial devotion his love for Madame de Castro was not an element of very great weight; whether he was not at heart as anxious to learn the secret of Diane's birth as to procure the old count's liberty; whether, in short, in this matter of life or death he was really as unselfish as he must be according to Coligny to deserve God's favor. Fearful doubt!--whether by some selfish mental reservation he might not compromise his father's welfare in the sight of God. He shuddered in anxious uncertainty. A circumstance, seemingly unimportant, awoke his nature to action once more. Eleven o'clock struck from the church of St. Severin. In an hour he would be in the king's presence. With a firm voice he said to the leaders of the Reformed sect:--