"I hardly know," Maurice answered. "He would send for me presently to come to Vayenne, he said, but for a little while I was to return to Passey. I was glad to be back in the dear old place, to have my books about me again, but somehow, Christine, they had lost part of their charm for me. The scholar of Passey has changed. Side by side with Roger Herrick I had struck a good blow that day at the clearing in the forest, and after my rescue from the tower at Larne I rode by his side again, fighting, and a different man. I wanted to prove to him that I was a man, and a fighter, something more than a pale student. In his presence I felt all the spirit of my fathers rise in me, bubbling up joyously like water from a newly tapped spring. No one else's opinion counted to me but his. There were few who knew even who I was. I have not been a prominent person in Vayenne."
"And now, Maurice?" questioned Christine.
"Do I look only a scholar now?" said Maurice, drawing himself up, and standing before her. "I shall have some place about the Duke, high place, I doubt not, since I intend to make myself worthy of it."
"And the last time I came to Passey it was to persuade you to go to Vayenne to be crowned," mused Christine.
"I have no quarrel with Duke Roger," laughed Maurice. "I recognize his claim, and I know that Montvilliers is ruled by the right man, the man who will make history for her."
"Yes; I feel that too," said Christine.
"So again you come to Passey on an important mission," Maurice went on. "You come to summon me to Vayenne to prove myself a man."
"What are you saying, Maurice? You have been misled. You are wrong, indeed; you are wrong. I come to Passey a prisoner."
"A prisoner! You!"