THE JESTING OF LA MEFFRAYE It was in the White Tower of Machecoul that the Scottish maidens were held at the mercy of the Lord of Retz.

At their first arrival in the country they had been taken to the quiet Chateau of Pouzauges, the birthplace of Poitou, the marshal's most cruel and remorseless confidant.

Here, as the marshal had very truly informed the Lady Sybilla, they had been under the care of--or, rather, fellow-prisoners with--the neglected wife of Gilles de Retz, and at Pouzauges they had spent some days of comparative peace and security in the society of her daughter.
But at the first breath of the coming of the three strangers to the district they had been seized and securely conveyed to Machecoul itself--there to be interned behind the vast walls and triple bastions of that fortress prison.
"I wonder, Maudie," said Margaret Douglas, as they sat on the flat roof of the White Tower of Machecoul and looked over the battlements upon the green pine glades and wide seaward Landes, "I wonder whether we shall ever again see the water of Dee and our mother--and Sholto MacKim." It is to be feared that the last part of the problem exceeded in interest all others in the eyes of Maud Lindesay.
"It seems as if we never could again behold any one we loved or wished to see--here in this horrible place," sighed Maud Lindesay.

"If ever I get back to the dear land and see Solway side, I will be a different girl." "But, Maud," said the little maid, reproachfully, "you were always good and kind.

It is not well done of you to speak against yourself in that fashion." Maud Lindesay shook her pretty head mournfully.
"Ah, Margaret, you will know some day," she said.