Page:Stanley Weyman--Count Hannibal.djvu/378

366 Flèche and Angers—the ride during which he had played with her fears and hugged himself on the figure he would make on the morrow. The figure? Alas! of all his plans for dazzling her had come—this! Angers had defeated him, a priest had worsted him. In place of releasing Tignonville after the fashion of Bayard and the Paladins, and in the teeth of snarling thousands, he had come near to releasing him after another fashion and at his own expense. Instead of dazzling her by his mastery and winning her by his magnanimity, he lay here, owing her his life, and so weak, so broken, that the tears of childhood welled up in his eyes.

Out of the darkness a hand, cool and firm, slid into his, clasped it tightly, drew it to warm lips, carried it to a woman’s bosom.

“My lord,” she murmured, “I was the captive of your sword, and you spared me. Him I loved you took and spared him too—not once or twice. Angers, also, and my people you would have saved for my sake. And you thought I could do this! Oh! shame, shame!” But her hand held his always.

“You loved him,” he muttered.

“Yes, I loved him,” she answered slowly and thoughtfully. “I loved him.” And she fell silent a minute. Then, “And I feared you,” she added, her voice low. “Oh, how I feared you—and hated you!”

“And now?”

“I do not fear him,” she answered, smiling in the darkness. “Nor hate him. And for you, my lord, I am your wife and must do your bidding, whether I will or no. I have no choice.”

He was silent.

“Is that not so?” she asked.

He tried weakly to withdraw his hand.

But she clung to it. “I must bear your blows or your