"Oh, be careful," Cyrène gasped, pulling back the arm. "Have they seen you?"
"I fear so," was the answer, as dismayed as her question; and a number of blows and thrusts sounded against the door below. But it was only a momentary diversion; the crowd had work cut out for it somewhere else and the drum drew them onwards.
"Oh, Germain," she said hysterically, "why do you risk your life so?"
"Because it is worthless," replied the apparent woman, pulling off his hood and throwing aside the rest of his disguise. But I am a fool to endanger you that way. Oh my darling, you who saved my life, is it not rather to comfort you at times like this that I live?" and he knelt and kissed her hand.
"Dearest," she answered softly, "you make my life happy in the very midst of horrors."
"I am unworthy of your love," he returned mournfully, rising to his feet.
"You say that too often; but have not the old reasons lost their force? Even here we could make a home. Let us defer our marriage no longer."
"We cannot marry," he said slowly.
She thought he spoke of the prohibition of Christian rites by the law, and said—"But Dominique knows of a priest, who is hidden in a cellar at his cousin's."
He shook his head and she read a soul of infinite sorrow in his eyes as they rested on her face.