Clarisse looked at him. A new thought had dawned on her mind, a horrible thought!
What if Robespierre should have Olivier arrested without knowing who he was?
She interrupted him.
"Is the house where you lodge quite safe?"
As Olivier replied in the affirmative, and was continuing the narrative of his adventures, she took up the thread of his thoughts. Suddenly a gleam of hope shone in her eyes, as if her mental speculations had assured her.
"Ah! I did well to write to him!" she thought.
To him, to Robespierre! For she had written to the Incorruptible that very morning.
She now turned this letter over in her mind, in which she had informed him of her imprisonment, telling him her fears about her son, whose age she particularly mentioned as nineteen years. It was a hint for Robespierre, who would understand, and perhaps be touched to pity, and set her and Marie Thérèse at liberty, and spare the lad who was her son and his own.
Clarisse had confided this letter to a prisoner set at liberty, whom she earnestly entreated to see it safely delivered.
"It will be the easiest thing in the world," the man had replied; "you can be quite at rest."