Raven came close up to her, and fixed a keen, searching gaze on her countenance.
"What was the meaning of those warning words which you whispered to me yesterday, as we drove home? How did you know that I was in any way threatened, and why did you start and turn deadly pale when that courier from the capital was announced? Speak; I insist upon an answer."
Gabrielle listened with growing consternation. She began to suspect whither these questions tended, but was quite in the dark as to the event that had prompted them. Raven must have seen that she did not understand him, for he drew the pamphlet from his breast-pocket and threw it on the table.
"This little book will perhaps help your memory. It is the most contumelious, the most astounding attack which has ever been made upon me. You probably read it in an unfinished state; it has, no doubt, been completed, perfected in the capital, in the Ministerial bureaux. Do not look at me as though I were speaking in some foreign tongue. This name, which stands on the title-page, is, I think, not unknown to you."
Gabrielle had taken up the pamphlet mechanically. Her eye fell on the page mentioned, on the name inscribed thereon. She started: "From George? He has kept his word!"
"Kept his word?" repeated Raven, with a bitter laugh. "So you had his word for it. You were his confidante, his confederate? But, indeed, how could I doubt it for an instant? It was clear from the first--clear as the noonday sun."
The young girl was too stunned and confused to defend herself with skill or energy. The unfortunate exclamation which had escaped her could but confirm the Baron in his suspicion that she had been an accomplice.
"I had a presentiment of some coming evil," she replied, summoning up all her courage; "but I knew nothing decided. I thought----"
Raven did not let her finish. He grasped her hand, and held it tightly.
"Had you really no suspicion that there was some scheme on foot to injure me? Were the hints you let fall yesterday purely accidental and devoid of any special aim? Did it not occur to you, when those despatches were brought in upon us in hot haste, that perhaps 'some one had kept his word?' Look me in the face, and say it was not so. I will try to believe you."