"Yes, yes, Monsieur, set out at once!" said the king, who, notwithstanding Diane's warning glances, had great difficulty in mastering his distress; "set out at once! Do what you have promised; and I give you my word as king and gentleman that I will do what you wish."
Gabriel, with joy at his heart, bent low before the king and duchess, and took his leave without another word, as if, having obtained his desire, he had not a moment more to lose.
"At last! He is not here now!" said the king, breathing deeply, as if relieved of a heavy burden.
"Sire," said Madame de Poitiers, "be calm, and try to regain your self-command. You came very near betraying yourself before that man."
"That is no man, Madame," said the king, as one dreaming; "that is my ever-living remorse: it is my reproachful conscience."
"Well, Sire," said Diane, who was herself again, "you have done very well to accede to this Gabriel's request, and to send him where he is now going; for I am very much mistaken, or your remorse will soon die before St. Quentin, and you will then be rid of your conscience."
The Cardinal de Lorraine returned at this moment with the letter he had been writing to his brother, and the king had no time to reply.
Meanwhile Gabriel, leaving the king with a light heart, had only one thought and one wish in the world: it was to see once more, with hope beating high in his breast, her whom he had left with death in his soul; to say to Diane de Castro all that he hoped from the future, and to draw from her loved glances the courage of which he should stand so much in need.
He knew that she had gone into a convent; but into what convent? It might be that her women had not gone with her; and he turned his steps in the direction of her former apartment at the Louvre, to question Jacinthe.
Jacinthe was with her mistress; but Denise, the second waiting-maid, had stayed behind; and it was she who received Gabriel.