I put Elsin up, then swung astride my roan, following her out into the road—a rod or two only ere she wheeled into the honeysuckle lane, reining in so that I came abreast of her.
"Now ride!" she said in an unsteady voice. "I know the man you have to deal with. There is no mercy in him, I tell you, and no safety now for you until you make the rebel lines."
"I know it," I said; "but what of you?"
"What of me?" She laughed a bitter laugh, striking her horse so that he bounded forward down the sandy lane, I abreast of her, stride for stride. "What of me? Why, I lied to him, that is all, Mr. Renault. And he knew it!"
"Is that all?" I asked.
"No, not all. He told the truth to you and to Sir Peter. And I knew it."
"In what did he tell the truth?"
"In what he said about—his mistress." Her face crimsoned, but she held her head steady and high, nor faltered at the word.
"How is it that you know?"
"How does a woman know? Tell me and I'll confess it. I know because a woman knows such things. Let it rest there—a matter scarcely fitted for discussion between a maid and a man—though I am being soundly schooled, God wot, in every branch of infamy."