So saying, he took a glass of water from the table and dashed it on the face of the Lady Sybilla.
"Awake," he said, "you have done well. Go now and repose that you may again be ready when I have need of you."
A flicker of conscious life appeared under the purple-veined eyelids of the Lady Sybilla. Her long, dark lashes quivered, tried to rise, and again lay still.
The marshal took the illuminated copy of the Evangelists from the table and fanned her with the thin parchment leaves.
"Awake!" he cried harshly and sternly.
The eyes of the girl slowly opened their pupils dark and dilated. She carried her hand to her head, but wearily, as if even that slight movement pained her. The golden cross swung unseen under the silken folds of her apron.
"I am so tired—so tired," the girl murmured to herself as Gilles de Retz assisted her to rise. Then hastily handing her over to Poitou, he bade him conduct her to her own chamber.
But as she went through the door of the marshal's laboratory she looked upon the floor and smiled almost joyously.
"His devil has indeed departed from him," she murmured to herself. "I thank the God of Righteousness who this night hath enabled me to baffle him with a woman's poor wit, and to lie to him that he may be led quick to destruction, and fall himself into the pit which he hath prepared for the feet of the innocent."