This earned me a stab in the back from the butt-end of the pike of one of my guards.
"What ails you now ?" quoth the man irritably.

"Forward, Monsieur le traite!" I moved on, scarce remarking the fellow's roughness; my eyes were still upon that face--the white, piteous face of Roxalanne.

I smiled reassurance and encouragement, but even as I smiled the horror in her countenance seemed to increase.

Then, as I passed on, she vanished from my sight, and I was left to conjecture the motives that had occasioned her return to Toulouse.

Had the message that Marsac would yesterday have conveyed to her caused her to retrace her steps that she might be near me in my extremity; or had some weightier reason influenced her return?
Did she hope to undo some of the evil she had done?
Alas, poor child! If such were her hopes, I sorely feared me they would prove very idle.
Of my trial I should say but little did not the exigencies of my story render it necessary to say much.