“No, no!” exclaimed Sir Andrew quickly.
Suzanne put her loving arms round her friend and drew her down into the chair by the fire. She knelt at her feet on the hearthrug, and pressed her own burning lips on Marguerite’s icy-cold hands. Sir Andrew stood silently by, a world of loving friendship, of heart-broken sorrow, in his eyes.
There was silence in the pretty white-panelled room for a while. Marguerite sat with her eyes closed, bringing the whole armoury of her will power to bear her up outwardly now.
“Tell me!” she said at last, and her voice was toneless and dull, like one that came from the depths of a grave—“tell me—exactly—everything. Don’t be afraid. I can bear it. Don’t be afraid.”
Sir Andrew remained standing, with bowed head and one hand resting on the table. In a firm, clear voice he told her the events of the past few days as they were known to him. All that he tried to hide was Armand’s disobedience, which, in his heart, he felt was the primary cause of the catastrophe. He told of the rescue of the Dauphin from the Temple, the midnight drive in the coal-cart, the meeting with Hastings and Tony in the spinney. He only gave vague explanations of Armand’s stay in Paris which caused Percy to go back to the city, even at the moment when his most daring plan had been so successfully carried through.
“Armand, I understand, has fallen in love with a beautiful woman in Paris, Lady Blakeney,” he said, seeing that a strange, puzzled look had appeared in Marguerite’s pale face. “She was arrested the day before the rescue of the Dauphin from the Temple. Armand could not join us. He felt that he could not leave her. I am sure that you will understand.”
Then as she made no comment, he resumed his narrative:
“I had been ordered to go back to La Villette, and there to resume my duties as a labourer in the day-time, and to wait for Percy during the night. The fact that I had received no message from him for two days had made me somewhat worried, but I have such faith in him, such belief in his good luck and his ingenuity, that I would not allow myself to be really anxious. Then on the third day I heard the news.”
“What news?” asked Marguerite mechanically.
“That the Englishman who was known as the Scarlet Pimpernel had been captured in a house in the Rue de la Croix Blanche, and had been imprisoned in the Conciergerie.”