"My husband, who seeks to save your two cousins, sends me to ask you to come and speak to him." Laurence drew back and looked at Marthe.

"Who are you ?" she said.
"Marthe Michu." "I do not know what you want of me," replied the countess, coldly.
"Take care, you will kill them.

Come with me, I implore you in the Simeuse name," said Marthe, clasping her hands and stretching them towards Laurence.

"Have you papers here which may compromise you?
If so, destroy them.

From the heights over there my husband has just seen the silver-laced hats and the muskets of the gendarmerie." Gothard had already clambered to the hay-loft and seen the same sight; he heard in the stillness of the evening the sound of their horses' hoofs.