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264 Her sharp wits read him like an open book, and with a dexterous change of tone and manner she said as if speaking her thoughts aloud—

"A thousand crowns! And for a scoundrel like this Gerard de Cobalt!"

"Miladi is infatuated with him and should be saved from him," said Dauban, with a cunning glance. "Else she may be ruined."

"No, no, Jacques; don't tempt me with such thoughts. Yet, how true, how shrewdly true! No, no, it would be vile baseness."

"You would save her from a villain," he urged.

"And for my reward she would never look at me again. Oh, Gabrielle, Gabrielle!"

"Our reward would be a thousand crowns, Lucette. A thousand crowns would be a fortune for us."

"A million crowns would not tempt me to such treachery. How dare you, Jacques! I am not thinking of money, but of Gabrielle. Oh, if she is now in his power!"

"The money is on his head, not hers," he said. "If he were taken, miladi could be left free—and she would be saved from him. You know where she is?" He put the question very gently.

"Yes, no; oh, I am longing to go to her. I don't know what I am saying, or whom I can trust. Oh, Jacques, if I could but trust you!" and she clung to him again in her distress and looked wistfully into his face.

"I swear on my life I am true to you, Lucette. Let us go to her. She is in the city?" he asked, pushing his point a little further.

"When I think what she must be suffering I am mad. If I could but get to her with what she needs from Malincourt, I might save her yet. I could take her some disguise and fly with her. But I am a prisoner.