“Enter, M. de Brancas,” cried the duchess, seeing me pause upon the threshold. “You are not intruding. In fact, you come most fortunately and just at the moment when Mlle. de Launay and I were wishing for some one like yourself, who could be trusted.”
“Thank you, madame,” I said. “I shall try to merit your trust,” and I entered and bowed to both the ladies. “I had scarcely expected to find you at work so early.”
“Ah! it seems to me that we never have time for repose,” exclaimed the duchess. “There is so much to be done and so few whom I can trust to do it. But tell me, monsieur, what has become of Richelieu? I have not seen him for an age.”
I related briefly the adventures of the duke and myself, taking care to say nothing of my last conversation with the regent, and adding that as Richelieu was en route for Bayonne, I believed it best for him to remain there for a time.
“Yes,” said the duchess, thoughtfully, when I had finished, “I believe so myself. The match will soon be applied here, and then he would have to be at Bayonne in any case. But this morning, M. de Brancas, I wish to ask your company for Mlle. de Launay, who has an errand to do which will not permit the use of a carriage and who finds it impossible to thread these crowded streets without an escort.”
“I shall be only too happy to be of service,” I answered, and at a sign from the duchess her companion withdrew to make ready for the street.
“You can judge to what straits we are reduced, monsieur,” continued madame, with a note of sadness and discouragement in her voice, the first I had ever heard there, “when I tell you that Mlle. de Launay is the only one there is to whom I can intrust missions which require a certain courage and finesse. There are many, it is true, who offer their services, but none upon whom I can rely as upon this girl.”
I could think of nothing to say that would not be mere banality, and as she busied herself carefully tying up a bundle of papers, I looked at her more attentively. I was not surprised to find her face pale and careworn, and I did not doubt that she was passing sleepless nights and harassing days in the endeavor to get all the threads of this conspiracy straightened out and properly arranged,—that she worked while others merely talked. Mlle. de Launay soon returned, and the duchess handed her the packet of papers which I had seen her arrange.
“You will find all the needed information there,” she said, “and remember that you cannot urge too strongly the need of haste. Every moment I fear that something will happen to render all our work useless. There, hasten,” she continued, dismissing us with a gesture, “and do not keep me waiting longer than necessary for your report.”
“We will not make ourselves unnecessarily conspicuous, monsieur,” said my companion, as we left the room, and she led the way along a wide hall running to the rear of the building. We descended into a small court, bounded on one side by a high wall and on the other by a row of buildings, and passed across this to a gate in the wall at the end. She opened the gate with a key she took from her pocket, and locked it after us. We found ourselves in a narrow little street which opened into the Rue de l’Echelle.