"Then Master Marcel is exposed to new perils?"
"My presentiments did not deceive me. What I have just learned by myself confirms them. A plot is hatching against Marcel and his partisans. Perhaps his own life and the lives of his friends are at stake. Let the worst come! At the hour of danger Marcel will do his duty and I mine.... I shall stand by my husband unto death."
Marguerite pronounced these last words in an accent of such mournful determination that a cry of astonishment and fright escaped from Denise.
"My resolution astonishes you, poor child!" resumed Marcel's wife. "To-day you see me full of courage! And yet last year ... even as late as yesterday ... I admitted to you my agony and the fears that every day beset me at the mere thought of the dangers that my husband ran. I then minded only his fatigue, I then only objected to the overwhelming labors that barely left him two hours of rest a night, I then looked back regretfully to the days when, a stranger to political affairs, he busied himself only with the affairs of our own cloth business. Our then obscurity at least saved us the sad spectacle of the hatreds and the envy that have since been unchained against Marcel's glory and popularity."
"Oh, aunt, you speak truly! Do you remember that wicked and envious Petronille Maillart? Thank God she never came back since the day of the funeral of Perrin Macé! We have been spared her presence!"
"I now have no doubt that her husband is one of the leaders in the plot that is hatching against Marcel."
"Master Maillart!... Uncle's childhood friend! He who only the other day was so loudly protesting his affection for him!"
"Maillart is a weak man; he yields to his wife's influence over him, and she is consumed with envy. She envied in me the wife of the man whom the idolizing people called the King of Paris. In those days I would have sacrificed Marcel's glory to his repose ... his genius to his safety! The slightest popular commotion made me fear for him.... I was then weak and cowardly.... But to-day, when he is pursued by hatred, ingratitude and iniquity, I feel strong, brave and withal proud of being the wife of that great citizen. I feel capable of proving to him my devotion unto death."
"Oh, may heaven prevent that your devotion be put to so terrible a test! But how did you learn about the plot?"
"I determined this evening to put an end to my suspense, and to ascertain the actual facts regarding the popular sentiment towards Marcel. I wrapped myself in that mantle to prevent being discovered, and moved among numerous groups that gathered in our quarter."