The priest rose to welcome them, and Mercier drew chairs to the table for them.
"You came through the city safely?" said Father Bertrand.
"Ay; hurrying like a couple of bourgeois bent on doing their marketing cheaply and expeditiously," said Count Felix, undoing his cloak; and turning to his companion, he helped her to loosen her wraps. It was the Countess Elisabeth.
"Since you came to the Place Beauvoisin the other night you have been constantly in my thoughts, Father Bertrand," Felix went on. "Your reason for supporting this traitor puzzles me more and more."
"And why do you now plot against him?" said the Countess. It was clear that she distrusted the priest. It was her love for Felix which had brought her to the Rue St. Romain to-night. If treachery were intended she would be there to defend him or die with him.
The priest had not expected to see her, but he did not show his surprise in any way. He knew that the Count was everything to her, knew that she was prepared to make any sacrifice for him. There was no danger in her presence; indeed, she might prove a useful tool ready to his hand.
"Are we not here to talk of the future rather than the past?" he said. "If I must defend myself," and he turned to the Countess, "it must be remembered that I was not in Count Felix's confidence. Had I known everything, I might have acted differently."
"We will not quarrel, father," Felix returned. "The past is past for all of us, and many a man's future has served to obliterate the past from the remembrance of his generation. You shall not find us ungrateful."
"To obliterate the past we all have to make sacrifices," answered the priest.
Again there were heavy steps in the passage, and after a knock and a pause the door was opened, and Gerard de Bornais entered. He too had been closely muffled up, but had unfastened his cloak on his way to the room. It seemed certain that he knew who he was to meet there. He saluted Felix and bowed to the Countess. Father Bertrand welcomed him with cordiality, and himself drew forward a chair to the table for his guest.