"It was my intention to do so this morning; but since then events have happened which lay upon you a duty more pressing still."
"A duty!" exclaimed Bertha, astonished. "What duty?"
"That of going to Nantes immediately; for I doubt if poor Jean Oullier, exhausted as he is, can possibly do what Maître Jacques requests of him."
"What am I to do in Nantes?"
"Tell him, or her, whom you call Petit-Pierre that the secret of her present hiding-place has been sold and bought, and she must leave it instantly. Any place is safer than the one she is now in. Betrayal is close upon her; God grant you may get there in time!"
"Betrayed!" cried Bertha, "betrayed by whom?"
"By the man who once before sent the soldiers to my house to capture her,--by Courtin, the mayor of La Logerie."
"Courtin! Have you seen him?"
"Yes," replied Marianne, laconically.
"Oh!" cried Bertha, clasping her hands, "let me see him!"