"It's something in you that seems to have opened her mind and unloosed her tongue," said Catherine, speaking with a sort of regal composure down at Peyrol, like a chieftainess of a tribe. "I often used to look from afar at you two talking and wonder what she . . ."
"She talked like a child," struck in Peyrol abruptly. "And so you were going to speak to me before your last hour came. Why, you are not making ready to die yet?"
"Listen, Peyrol. If anybody's last hour is near it isn't mine. You just look about you a little. It was time I spoke to you."
"Why, I am not going to kill anybody," muttered Peyrol. "You are getting strange ideas into your head."
"It is as I said," insisted Catherine without animation. "Death seems to cling to her skirts. She has been running with it madly. Let us keep her feet out of more human blood."
Peyrol, who had let his head fall on his breast, jerked it up suddenly. "What on earth are you talking about?" he cried angrily. "I don't understand you at all."
"You have not seen the state she was in when I got her back into my hands," remarked Catherine. . . . "I suppose you know where the lieutenant is. What made him go off like that? Where did he go to?"
"I know," said Peyrol. "And he may be back to-night."
"You know where he is! And of course you know why he has gone away and why he is coming back," pronounced Catherine in an ominous voice. "Well, you had better tell him that unless he has a pair of eyes at the back of his head he had better not return here – not return at all; for if he does, nothing can save him from a treacherous blow."
"No man was ever safe from treachery," opined Peyrol after a moment's silence. "I won't pretend not to understand what you mean."