‘Child!’ Isodore returned with some marked emphasis on her words, ‘she is my friend—the friend of Isodore should need no welcome here.’
A deep blush spread over the features of Lucrece at these words, as she walked across the room to Valerie’s side. Her smile was one of consolation and welcome as she stooped and kissed the other woman lightly. ‘Welcome!’ she said. ‘We see both friends and foes here, and it is hard sometimes to tell the grain from the chaff. You are henceforward the friend of Lucrece too.’
‘Your kindness almost hurts me,’ Valerie replied in some agitation. ‘I have so few friends, that a word of sympathy is strange to me. Whatever you may want or desire, either of you, command me, and Valerie le Gautier will not say you nay.’
‘Lucrece, listen to me,’ said Isodore in a voice of stern command. ‘To-morrow, we cross to London, and the time has come when you must be prepared to assist in the cause.—See what I have here!’ Without another word, she placed the gold moidore in her sister’s hand.
Lucrece regarded it with a puzzled air. To her simple mind, it merely represented the badge of the Brotherhood.
‘You do not understand,’ Isodore continued, noticing the look of bewilderment. ‘That coin, as you know, is the token of the Order, and to part with it knowingly is serious’——
‘Yes,’ Lucrece interrupted; ‘the penalty is death.’
‘You are right, my sister. That is Le Gautier’s token. He staked it yonder at the Kursaal, giving it to his own wife, though he did not know it, to put upon the colour. The coin is in my hands, as you see. Strange, how man becomes fortune’s fool!’
‘Then your revenge will be complete,’ Lucrece suggested simply. ‘You have only to hand it over to the Council of Three, or even the Crimson Nine, and in one hour’——
‘A dagger’s thrust will rid the world of a scoundrel.—Pah! you do not seem to understand such feeling as mine. No, no; I have another punishment for him. He shall live; he shall carry on his mad passion for the fair-haired Enid till the last; and when his cup of joy shall seem full, I will dash it from his lips.’