"No!"
"Even if it were about—" she looked toward the door that led to the garden.
"The Lady Elise?" he said quickly.
"Oh, you are interested? 'A mon beau'—" a moment she hummed. "You do not urge me?"
"Wherefore," laconically, although his eyes flashed, "when you have made up your mind to tell!"
"You are right!" She threw back her head. "I have made up my mind! How well you understand women! Almost as well," she laughed mockingly, "as a ship!" He made no response. "When you thanked me once, mon capitaine, for all it pleased you to say I did for you, you may remember," her voice was defiant, "I did not once gainsay you!" More curiously he regarded her. "Perhaps it pleased me," her hand on her hip, "to be thought such a fine heroine. But now," her tone grew a little fierce, "I am tired of hearing people say: 'Nanette risked so much!' 'Nanette did this!—did that!'—when it was she who risked—did it all, one might say."
"She? What do you mean?" The black eyes probed hers now with sudden, fierce questioning.
"That 'twas the Lady Elise saved you. Went knowingly—willingly—as hostage—"
"The Lady Elise!" he cried, an abrupt glow on the dark face.
Nanette's eyes noted and fell, but she went on hurriedly: "She knew of the ambush in the forest; saw part of the note I dropped on the beach—it was brought to her by my aunt who warned her." And in a quick rush of words, as if desirous to be done with it, Nanette told all that had transpired at the Mount.