"Ah, madame!" continued the Baronne de Sauve, without replying to these attacks, or even seeming to comprehend them, "ah, would to Heaven he were here!"
"And why so?"
"Eh, mon Dieu! madame, because they are murdering the Huguenots, and the King of Navarre is the chief of the Huguenots."
"Oh!" cried Marguerite, seizing Madame de Sauve by the hand, and compelling her to rise; "ah! I had forgotten; besides, I did not think a king could run the same dangers as other men."
"More, madame,—a thousand times more!" cried Charlotte.
"In fact, Madame de Lorraine had warned me; I had begged him not to leave the Louvre. Has he done so?"
"No, no, madame, he is in the Louvre; but if he is not here"—
"He is not here!"
"Oh!" cried Madame de Sauve, with an outburst of agony, "then he is a dead man, for the queen mother has sworn his destruction!"
"His destruction! ah," said Marguerite, "you terrify me—impossible!"