"Who?" asked Madame de Sauve.
"The King of Navarre."
"No, madame; but I am expecting him, and when I heard the key turn in the lock, I firmly believed it was he."
At this answer, which indicated either perfect confidence or deep dissimulation on Madame de Sauve's part, Catharine could not repress a slight shiver. She clinched her short plump hand.
"And yet you knew perfectly well," said she with her evil smile, "you knew perfectly well, Carlotta, that the King of Navarre would not come to-night."
"I, madame? I knew that?" exclaimed Charlotte, with a tone of surprise perfectly well assumed.
"Yes, you knew it!"
"If he does not come, he must be dead!" replied the young woman, shuddering at the mere supposition.
What gave Charlotte the courage to lie so was the certainty that she would suffer from a terrible vengeance if her little treason should be discovered.
"But did you not write to the king, Carlotta mia?" inquired Catharine, with the same cruel and silent laugh.