"Now, Carbourd, what is the matter? Faugh! this place smells musty.
What's that—a tomb? Speak out, Citizen Carbourd."
"It is this: Mademoiselle Wyndham is blind." Carbourd told the story with a great anxiety in his words.
"The poor mademoiselle—is it so? A thousand pities! So kind, so young, so beautiful. Ah, I am distressed, and I finished her portrait yesterday! Yes, I remember her eyes looked too bright, and then again too dull: but I thought that it was excitement, and so—that!"
Laflamme's regret was real enough up to a certain point, but, in sincerity and value, it was chasms below that of Hugh Tryon, who, even now, was getting two horses ready to give the Frenchmen their chance.
After a pause Laflamme said: "She will not come here again, Carbourd? No? Ah, well, perhaps it is better so; but I should have liked to speak my thanks to her."
That night Marie sat by the window of the sitting-room, with the light burning, and Angers asleep in a chair beside her—sat till long after midnight, in the thought that Laflamme, if he had reached the Cave, would, perhaps, dare something to see her and bid her good-bye. She would of course have told him not to come, but he was chivalrous, and then her blindness would touch him. Yet as the hours went by the thought came: was he, was he so chivalrous? was he altogether true? . . . He did not come. The next morning Angers took her to where the boat had been, but it was gone, and no oars were left behind. So, both had sought escape in it.
She went to the Cave. She took Angers with her now. Upon the wall a paper was found. It was a note from M. Laflamme. She asked Angers to give it to her without reading it. She put it in her pocket and kept it there until she should see Hugh Tryon. He should read it to her. She said to herself as she felt the letter in her pocket: "He loved me. It was the least that I could do. I am so glad." Yet she was not altogether glad either, and disturbing thoughts crossed the parallels of her pleasure.
The Governor and Madame Solde first brought news of the complete escape of the prisoners. The two had fled through the hills by the Brocken Path, and though pursued after crossing, had reached the coast, and were taken aboard the Parroquet, which sailed away towards Australia. It is probable that Marie's visitors had their suspicions regarding the escape, but they said nothing, and did not make her uncomfortable. Just now they were most concerned for her bitter misfortune. Madame Solde said to her: "My poor Marie—does it feel so dreadful, so dark?"
"No, madame, it is not so bad. There are so many things which one does not wish to see, and one is spared the pain."
"But you will see again. When you go to England, to great physicians there."