“Pierre started up joyfully, ‘Let me speak to him,’ he said. And in his heart he added, ‘Here will be some one to give me counsel.’”
Chapter Eleven.
“Pierre opened the door, but in an instant he saw it was not the priest. A woman in dark clothing, her face half concealed by a veil or handkerchief of some kind, which she had muffled round her head, stood before him. She was coming forward as if to enter without speaking, when, glancing upwards, she perceived that he was not, as she had imagined, Edmond. She fell back startled, but instantly recovering herself.
”‘Who may you be, citizen?’ she said, in a hard, cold tone, which had little gentleness in it, and then she added in a lower voice, ‘Mind you, if you are another aristocrat in disguise, come to take refuge here, I will have nothing to do with you. I have enough on my hands, and so have they,’ nodding towards the door, where the poor dead lady was lying, ‘in there.’
“Pierre looked at her quietly.
”‘I am Pierre Germain,’ he said. ‘I have seen you once before, Marguerite Ribou.’
“The girl, or woman rather, for she had grown tall, and was finely proportioned, threw back her veil. Her beautiful dark face grew deathly pale, and she staggered back against the wall.