"As free as the air." "Oh, my God!" cried Cauvignac. Without adding a word to that eloquent exclamation, without looking to right or left, without thought as to whether his companion was following him, he darted to the river, and plunged in more rapidly than a hunted otter. The jailer imitated him, and after a quarter of an hour of silent efforts to stem the current, they both were within hailing distance of the boat. The jailer whistled three times; the oarsmen, recognizing the pre-concerted signal, rowed toward them, promptly lifted them into the boat, bent to their oars without a word, and in less than five minutes set them both ashore upon the other bank. "Ouf!" said Cauvignac, who had not uttered a single word from the moment that he threw himself into the stream. "Ouf! I am really saved! Dear jailer of my heart, God will reward you!" "I have already received forty thousand livres," said the jailer, "which will help me to wait patiently for the reward God has in store for me." "Forty thousand livres!" cried Cauvignac in utter stupefaction. "Who the devil can have put out forty thousand livres for me?" THE ABBEY OF PEYSSAC. I. A word of explanation becomes necessary at this point, after which we will resume the thread of our narrative. Indeed, it is high time for us to return to Nanon de Lartigues, who, at the sight of poor ill-fated Richon expiring on the market-place at Libourne, uttered a shriek and fell in a swoon. Nanon, however, as our readers must ere this have discovered, was not a woman of a weak and shrinking temperament. Despite her slender stature she had borne long and bitter sorrows, had endured crushing fatigue, and defied danger of the most appalling kind; and her sturdy, loving heart, of more than ordinary steadfastness, could bend as circumstances required, and rebound more stanch and courageous than ever after every fillip of destiny. The Duc d'Épernon, who knew her, or who thought that he knew her, was naturally amazed therefore to see her so completely crushed by the sight of mere physical suffering,--the same woman who, when her palace at Agen was destroyed by fire, never uttered a cry (although she was within an ace of being burned alive) lest she should give pleasure to her enemies, who were thirsty for a sight of the torture which one of them, more vindictive than the others, sought to inflict upon the mistress of the detested governor; and who had looked on without winking while two of her women were murdered by mistake for her.