In an hour, however, he returned out of breath and with a face white from despair. Wogan was still writing at his table, but at his first glance towards Gaydon he started quickly to his feet, and altogether forgot to cover over his sheet of paper. He carefully shut the door.
"You have bad news," said he.
"There was never worse," answered Gaydon. He had run so fast, he was so discomposed, that he could with difficulty speak. But he gasped his bad news out in the end.
"I went to my brother major to report my return. He was entertaining his friends. He had a letter this morning from Strasbourg and he read it aloud. The letter said a rumour was running through the town that the Chevalier Wogan had already rescued the Princess and was being hotly pursued on the road to Trent."
If Wogan felt any disquietude he was careful to hide it. He sat comfortably down upon the sofa.
"I expected rumour would be busy with us," said he, "but never that it would take so favourable a shape."
"Favourable!" exclaimed Gaydon.
[pg 148]
"To be sure, for its falsity will be established to-morrow, and ridicule cast upon those who spread and believed it. False alarms are the proper strategy to conceal the real assault. The rumour does us a service. Our secret is very well kept, for here am I in Schlestadt, and people living in Schlestadt believe me on the road to Trent. I will go back with you to the major's and have a laugh at his correspondent. Courage, my friend. We will give our enemies a month. Let them cry wolf as often as they will during that month, we'll get into the fold all the more easily in the end."