Then she paused, leaving the last word unsaid as she saw again his calm, sad eyes fixed on her. Once more she pleaded for pardon.
"Forgive, forgive me," she said. "I am vile, ungenerous to speak thus. Yet we must part at last. They have no charge against you."
"We part," he replied, "when you--when both--are safe."
They knew not why at such a time as this, when action should have been everything and no moment wasted, in spite of the girl's fatigue and prostration, silence should fall upon them; why they should sit there as though courting a fate that might come at any moment, for at any moment, above the hum of the near river, there might be heard the voices of the revolted Cévenoles. Beneath the branches of the acacias that o'erhung the dusty white road would perhaps be seen the unbrowned barrels of their guns or the scythes with which, since many of them had as yet no weapons, they were armed.
A silence between these two broken only by the twitter of birds in the branches, or by a sigh that rose unchecked from the girl's breast as, in the starlit dark, she turned her eyes on the features of the man by her side.
"Come," he said at last, rousing himself, "come. It is madness to remain here. We must move on even though we encounter death by doing so. It is not likely that all have returned to the mountains after their victory; they may pass by here at any moment. Can you proceed at all, mademoiselle?"
"I can at least try. Yet to where? To where?"
"I do not know the land very well," he answered, speaking in the slow, calm voice which had impressed her so much a month ago when the Intendant had, with strange indifference (as it seemed to both of them), presented Martin to Urbaine and left them to pass some hours in the orange garden of the Intendancy, he contenting himself with telling the girl that her new acquaintance was from the north and was not of their faith. "I do not know the land very well. Yet is there not a garrison near here? I think so. Called the--the château of--the fortress of--Servas."
"Ah, yes!" Urbaine cried, clasping her hands, "the Château de Servas. Between Alais and Uzès; not far from here. If we could reach that we should be safe. The commandant is known to my father--to De Broglie. He would protect us."
"We must attempt it," Martin replied. "It is our chance, mademoiselle," he exclaimed, breaking off as he heard a gasp from her lips, "What is it? What! What new terror?"