"Are you there, Nanon?" Canolles asked. A stifled "Yes" reached his ears. At that moment he heard steps in the corridor. The sentinel presented arms; the messenger entered and followed his introducer with his eyes, until he was, or thought he was, alone with Canolles. Then he removed his hat and threw back his cloak; immediately a mass of blond locks fell down over a pair of shapely shoulders, the graceful, willowy form of a woman appeared under the gold baldric, and Canolles, by the sad, sweet expression of her face, recognized the Vicomtesse de Cambes. "I told you that I would seek you," she said, "and I keep my word; here I am." Canolles clasped his hands and fell upon a chair in speechless amazement, and an agony of fear. "You! you!" he muttered. "_Mon Dieu!_ why are you here; what seek you here?" "I have come to ask you, monsieur, if you still remember me." Canolles heaved a heart-breaking sigh, and put his hands before his eyes, seeking to banish the ravishing but fatal apparition. Everything was made clear to him in an instant; Nanon's alarm, her pallor, her trembling, and, above all, her desire to be present at the interview. Nanon, with the keen eyes of jealousy, had detected a woman in the flag of truce. "I have come to ask you," continued Claire, "if you are ready to carry out the engagement you entered into with me in the little room at Jaulnay,--to send your resignation to the queen, and enter the service of the princes." "Oh! silence! silence!" cried Canolles. Claire shuddered at the accent of utter dismay in the commandant's voice, and glanced uneasily about the room. "Are we not alone here?" she asked. "We are, madame; but may not some one hear us through the walls?" "I thought that the walls of Fort Saint-Georges were more solid than that," said Claire with a smile. Canolles made no reply. "I have come to ask you," Claire resumed, "how it happens that I have heard nothing of you during the eight or ten days you have been here,--so that I should still know nothing as to who is governor of Île Saint-Georges, had not chance, or public rumor, informed me that it is the man who swore to me, barely twelve days since, that his disgrace was the best of good fortune, since it enabled him to devote his arm, his courage, his life, to the party to which I belong." Nanon could not repress a movement, which made Canolles jump and Madame de Cambes turn her head. "Pray, what was that?" she demanded. "Nothing," Canolles replied; "one of the regular noises of this old room. There is no end to the dismal creaking and groaning here." "If it is anything else," said Claire, laying her hand upon Canolles' arm, "be frank with me, baron, for you must realize the importance of this interview between us, when I decided to come myself to seek you." Canolles wiped the perspiration from his brow, and tried to smile. "Say on," said he. "I reminded you a moment since of your promise, and asked you if you were ready to keep it."