"'Monseigneur—I have deserved death—I know it, and I do not ask you for life. I am ready to die at the day and hour appointed; but it depends on your highness to make this death sweeter to me. I love a young girl whom I should have married if I had lived; grant that she may be my wife before I die. In leaving her forever alone and friendless in the world, let me at least have the consolation of giving her the safeguard of my name and fortune. On leaving the church, monseigneur, I will walk to the scaffold. This is my last wish, my sole desire. Do not refuse the prayer of a dying man.
"'Raoul d'Harmental.'
"Oh, monseigneur," said Bathilde, sobbing, "you see that while I thought of him, he thought of me. Am I not right to love him, when he loves me so much?"
"Yes," said the regent, "and I grant his request, it is just; may it, as he says, sweeten his last moments."
"Monseigneur," cried the young girl, "is that all you grant him?"
"You see," said the regent, "he is just; he asks nothing else."
"Oh, it is cruel! it is frightful! to see him again, and lose him directly; his life, monseigneur, his life, I beg; and let me never see him again—better so."
"Mademoiselle," said the regent, in a tone which admitted of no reply, and writing some lines on a paper which he sealed, "here is a letter to Monsieur de Launay, the governor of the Bastille; it contains my instructions with regard to the prisoner. My captain of the guards will go with you, and see that my instructions are followed."
"Oh! his life, monseigneur, his life; on my knees, and in the name of Heaven, I implore you."
The regent rang the bell; a valet entered.