Marthe quivered when she saw Laurence, who had followed Gothard, standing beside her.
“What is it?” asked Laurence, quietly.
“The conspiracy against the First Consul is discovered,” replied Marthe, in a whisper. “My husband, who seeks to save your two cousins, sends me to ask you to come and speak to him.”
Laurence drew back and looked at Marthe. “Who are you?” she said.
“Marthe Michu.”
“I do not know what you want of me,” replied the countess, coldly.
“Take care, you will kill them. Come with me, I implore you in the Simeuse name,” said Marthe, clasping her hands and stretching them towards Laurence. “Have you papers here which may compromise you? If so, destroy them. From the heights over there my husband has just seen the silver-laced hats and the muskets of the gendarmerie.”
Gothard had already clambered to the hay-loft and seen the same sight; he heard in the stillness of the evening the sound of their horses’ hoofs. Down he slipped into the stable and saddled his mistress’s mare, whose feet Catherine, at a word from the lad, muffled in linen.
“Where am I to go?” said Laurence to Marthe, whose look and language bore the unmistakable signs of sincerity.
“Through the breach,” she replied; “my noble husband is there. You shall learn the value of a ‘Judas’!”