Her voice was barely audible.
“It is true,” cried the priest, thrusting himself so abruptly betwixt the cousins as to compel Gabriel to drop the hand of the girl, “she has promised to return to the true fold, and as the daughter of mother church the touch of the heretic is defilement.”
Gabriel lifted his fair head with the old fearless air that had ever exasperated the priest, while winning his reluctant admiration.
“It may be that I am no longer a boy,” he said coolly, “at least I am no longer of your church; and by all laws human and divine, she being my next of kin, this maiden has a right to my protection. Also, M. l’Abbé, you are upon English ground.”
He pointed to the thin line of redcoats deploying upon a low hill some distance away.
The face of Le Loutre was convulsed with hatred.
“The more reason that we swiftly depart,” he said. “Come, daughter, bear in mind thy vow.”
Gabriel’s blue eyes flashed as Margot had so often seen them do in the past. She pressed by the abbé, and taking her cousin’s outstretched hands, said in a low, persuasive voice:
“Gabriel, mon ami, it is even so. I promised to go with M. l’Abbé in order to save his life; there was no other way. But the promise was only for the day; I would make no further vow.”
Le Loutre watched the girl uneasily, for had she not refused to swear upon the cross, and what was a mere promise without some appeal to superstition? He could not comprehend the force of a higher influence than that of mere symbolism.