A hundred questions were in her eyes.
"No, I am not dead, dear love, dear love."
He spoke the last words hungrily, wistfully, longing for response, yet scarcely daring to hope for it.
The colour had not come to her cheeks at his words; she was still staring up in that same wonder.
Yet he saw another thought dawning behind it.
"If you are alive, what does it mean?" she asked, then shuddered violently. "They told me you were a traitor," she said.
"A traitor? And so I was, Cécile—a black and dishonoured traitor. But I repented."
"Repented!"
Her voice rang harshly.
"Ay. God grant before too late."