So Mario's cheeks were pale, and he became pensive. He worked desperately to perfect his education, and it was a great pleasure to him to keep Lauriane informed concerning his studies, imparting to her his most recently acquired scraps of knowledge. It was an excellent way of killing time in their daily interviews; for there is no more painful restraint than that caused by the impossibility of talking freely before witnesses with the persons one loves.
The Jesuits, who were already to be found everywhere with their fingers in every pie, tried to persuade the marquis to entrust that charming child's education to them. He so contrived his reply as to give them some ground for hope, realizing that it would not be well to have an open rupture with them.
They were not deceived by his craft, and took alarm at Mario's mysterious visits to the faubourg. They followed him, and thereupon were much distressed concerning Master Jovelin. But Monsieur Poulain arranged everything, declaring that he knew Master Jovelin to be an orthodox Catholic, and that he, Poulain, was present at the young gentleman's lessons. The ex-rector feared them more than he loved them, but he was adroit enough to fool them.
Meanwhile the war drew rapidly to a close. The news of the peace of Montpellier arrived, and gave rise to magnificent projects for rejoicing in honor of Monsieur le Prince, on the part of his good city of Bourges. But the projects had to be abandoned; the prince arrived unexpectedly, in very bad humor, feeling that his rôle was at an end.
The king had cheated him: in the first place, he had refused to die; in the second place, he had negotiated the peace without his knowledge. And then the queen-mother had regained some measure of influence. Richelieu had obtained the cardinal's hat, and despite all monsieur le prince's endeavors, was insensibly drawing near to the centre of power.
Condé simply passed through the province and the city. He no longer believed in astrology; he was becoming pious from disappointment. He had made a vow to Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.
He started for Italy without giving the slightest attention to the affairs of the province. Monsieur Biet, feeling that the Huguenots were about to recover liberty of conscience, and that it would ill become him to require Lauriane's release to be extorted from him, went himself to the convent with the marquis, to set her free.
The nuns parted from her with regret, testifying freely to her gentleness and courtesy.
Lauriane had suffered much during those five months of mental constraint; she too had lost color and flesh; she had attended, without a murmur, all the religious services, maintaining a dignified and respectful demeanor, praying to God with all her soul before the Catholic altars, and abstaining from any reflection that might have wounded the saintlike maidens of the Annunciation. But when they urged her to renounce her faith, she bowed, as if to say: I understand, and met all the questions that were put to her with an obstinate silence. It was no time for her to assert her liberty of conscience when it might be that her father was prostrate under the headsman's axe. So she held her peace and submitted to their importunities with the stoicism of a sufferer who, with his hands bound, listens to the flies buzzing about his head, unable to brush them away, but unwilling even to wink.
On all other occasions she treated the sisters with the greatest respect, and won their hearts by the most delicate attentions. Luckily, a truly Christian spirit reigned among them. They prayed for her conversion, they prayed for her salvation, and they left her in peace. It was a miracle; elsewhere Lauriane, might, in desperation, have been accused of witchcraft and condemned to perish by earthly flames; that was the last resource when the persecuted heretics had the courage to refuse to be convicted of heresy by their own admissions.