“Poor Dionysia!” they whispered.
The girl heard them, however; and, drawing herself up, she said,—
“But we are behaving shamefully. What would Jacques say, if he could see us from his prison! Why should we be so sad? Is he not innocent?”
Her eyes shone with unusual brilliancy: her voice had a ring which moved Manuel Folgat deeply.
“I can at least, in justice to myself,” she went on saying, “assure you that I have never doubted him for a moment. And how should I ever have dared to doubt? The very night on which the fire broke out, Jacques wrote me a letter of four pages, which he sent me by one of his tenants, and which reached me at nine o’clock. I showed it to grandpapa. He read it, and then he said I was a thousand times right, because a man who had been meditating such a crime could never have written that letter.”
“I said so, and I still think so,” added M. de Chandore; “and every sensible man will think so too; but”—
His granddaughter did not let him finish.
“It is evident therefore, that Jacques is the victim of an abominable intrigue; and we must unravel it. We have cried enough: now let us act!”
Then, turning to the marchioness, she said,—
“And my dear mother, I sent for you, because we want you to help us in this great work.”