"You will find me as immovable as Mathilde," said I.
She looked from one to the other of us, and put forth her hands pleadingly; then broke down into weeping.
"Oh, will you make my duty the harder?" she said. "God knows I would gladly die to save you."
"It is not dying that will save us. The only way is to save yourself."
"Monsieur, you shall not drive me to sin by your temptations! Heaven will save you both in spite of yourselves. That will be my reward for putting this sin from me."
"You persist in calling it a sin, Madame: very well. But is it not selfish to go free from sin at the expense of others? If one can save others by a sin of one's own, is it not nobler to take that sin upon one's soul? Nay, is it not the greater sin to let others suffer, that one's own hands may be clean?"
"Oh, you tempt me with worldly reasoning, Monsieur. Kind mother of Christ," she said, fixing her eyes upon the image of Mary, "what shall I do? Be thou my guide—speak to my soul—tell me what to do!"
After a moment, the Countess again turned to me, still perplexed, agitated, unpersuaded.
"Madame," said I, "when one considers how soon the Count de Lavardin must surely suffer for crimes of which you know nothing, your death at his hands seems the more grievous a fate. Do you know that he is a traitor?—that his treason will soon be known to the King's ministers? If his jealousy had only waited a short while, or if my discovery had occurred a little earlier, his death would have spared you all this. But now, if you are not starved or slain before he is arrested, he will surely kill you when he finds himself about to be taken.—My God, I had not thought of that when I resolved to go to Paris at once! Oh, Madame, fly now while there is chance! I assure you that doom is hovering over the Count's head; if you stay here, I cannot go to Paris; but Hugues shall go with this paper in my stead."
"What is the paper, Monsieur? What do you mean by this talk of the Count and treason?" she asked in sheer wonder.