This document, for obvious reasons, remained a secret; nor has it since been found. It occupied more than two hours in being drawn up; and just as it was finished the jailor announced that a female wished to see the Marchioness. It was the first request of the kind that had been made since her imprisonment; but she gave orders that the stranger should be admitted; whilst Pirot, remaining at her own request, retired into a corner of the chamber and occupied himself at prayer. The man of the prison ushered in a woman, with her face carefully concealed. Marie advanced to receive her; when the other threw back her veil and discovered the features of Louise Gauthier.
The Marchioness recoiled a step or two as she recognised the stranger, and her face underwent a rapid and fearful change.
‘You have done well,’ she said in irony, ‘to let me see you enjoy this last triumph. A sight of me to-morrow, in the streets, was not enough; you must come to gloat upon me here.’
‘By your hopes of heaven, speak not thus!’ cried Louise earnestly, as she advanced towards her. ‘You are mistaken. I have come in all good feeling—if you will but receive me.’
‘What would you do?’ asked Marie; ‘am I to believe you?’
‘By all that one who is not utterly lost can call to strengthen her asseverations, you may,’ replied the Languedocian. ‘By the memory of him whom we both loved—in the name of Gaudin de Sainte-Croix, do not believe my nature to be so base.’
The Marchioness gazed at the girl for a minute with a glance of most intense scrutiny. Then she said coldly, once more gaining a command over her temper—
‘Well, mademoiselle, you can continue.’
‘At this terrible moment,’ said Louise, in a low impressive accent, ‘when your life is reckoned in the past, and the future is as nothing on this side of the grave, you will perhaps listen to me, and believe that I have come to you in charity and peace. I forget all that has been; I have thought only that Gaudin loved you—and though—heaven knows—you crushed my heart for ever in encouraging his attachment, I have come at this fearful hour to seek you, and let you know that there is one of your own sex who, for his sake, will undertake any mission or pilgrimage that will serve you.’
Marie made no answer: her pride was struggling with her will, and she could not speak.