No sight could have been more dreadful to Mademoiselle; for it set at
naught the conditions which she had so hardly exacted. What if Count
Hannibal were behind, were even now mounting the stairs, prepared to
force her to a marriage before this shaveling? Or ready to proceed, if
she refused, to the last extremity? Sudden terror taking her by the
throat choked her; her colour fled, her hand flew to her breast. Yet,
before the door had closed on Bigot, she had recovered herself.
"This intrusion is not by M. de Tavannes' orders!" she cried, stepping
forward haughtily. "This person has no business here. How dare you
admit him?"
The Norman showed his bearded visage a moment at the door.
"My lord's orders," he muttered sullenly. And he closed the door on
them.
She had a Huguenot's hatred of a cowl; and, in this crisis, her reasons
for fearing it. Her eyes blazed with indignation.
"Enough!" she cried, pointing, with a gesture of dismissal, to the door.
"Go back to him who sent you! If he will insult me, let him do it to my
face! If he will perjure himself, let him forswear himself in person.
Or, if you come on your own account," she continued, flinging prudence to
the winds, "as your brethren came to Philippa de Luns, to offer me the
choice you offered her, I give you her answer! If I had thought of
myself only, I had not lived so long! And rather than bear your presence
or hear your arguments--"
She came to a sudden, odd, quavering pause on the word; her lips remained
parted, she swayed an instant on her feet.
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