Would she have to go back the way she came and leave her project unaccomplished? Her arms were growing very tired; the murmuring of the Morelle, far down below, was beginning to make her dizzy. Then she broke off bits of plaster from the wall and threw them against Dominique’s window. He did not hear; perhaps he was asleep. Again she crumbled fragments from the wall, until the skin was peeled from her fingers. Her strength was exhausted; she felt that she was about to fall backward into the stream, when at last Dominique softly raised his sash. “It is I,” she murmured. “Take me quick; I am about to fall.” Leaning from the window he grasped her and drew her into the room, where she had a paroxysm of weeping, stifling her sobs in order that she might not be heard. Then, by a supreme effort of the will she overcame her emotion. “Are you guarded?” she asked in a low voice. Dominique, not yet recovered from his stupefaction at seeing her there, made answer by simply pointing toward his door. There was a sound of snoring audible on the outside; it was evident that the sentinel had been overpowered by sleep and had thrown himself upon the floor close against the door in such a way that it could not be opened without arousing him. “You must fly,” she continued earnestly. “I came here to bid you fly and say farewell.” But he seemed not to hear her. He kept repeating: “What, is it you, is it you? Oh, what a fright you gave me! You might have killed yourself.” He took her hands, he kissed them again and again. “How I love you, Françoise! You are as courageous as you are good. The only thing I feared was that I might die without seeing you again; but you are here, and now they may shoot me when they will. Let me but have a quarter of an hour with you and I am ready.” He had gradually drawn her to him; her head was resting on his shoulder. The peril that was so near at hand brought them closer to each other, and they forgot everything in that long embrace. “Ah, Françoise!” Dominique went on in low, caressing tones, “to-day is the fête of Saint Louis, our wedding-day, that we have been waiting for so long. Nothing has been able to keep us apart, for we are both here, faithful to our appointment, are we not? It is now our wedding morning.” “Yes, yes,” she repeated after him, “our wedding morning.” They shuddered as they exchanged a kiss. But suddenly she tore herself from his arms; the terrible reality arose before her eyes. “You must fly, you must fly,” she murmured breathlessly. “There is not a moment to lose.” And as he stretched out his arms in the darkness to draw her to him again, she went on in tender, beseeching tones: “Oh! listen to me, I entreat you. If you die, I shall die. In an hour it will be daylight. Go, go at once; I command you to go.”