From his ravings she learned that he was in danger and feared
pursuers; and with the peasant's instinct for caution, she had not dared
to send for help.
"It was yesterday," the duke told us, "that my mind came back. I knew
then what must be thought of me, what must be said of me, all over
France." He was leaning on the wall now, exhausted and white, but
dauntless. "No matter for that--I have the papers. You recall the
hiding-place?"
He smiled as he asked the question, and Miss Falconer smiled back at
him. Getting to her feet, she ran her fingers across the oak panel over
his head, where for centuries a huntsman had been riding across a forest
glade and blowing his horn. The bundle of his hunting-knife protruded
just a little; and as the girl pressed it, the panel glided silently
open, revealing a space, square and dark and cobwebby.
Something was lying there, a thin, wafer-like packet of papers, the
papers for which the Firefly of France had shed his blood. She held them
up in triumph. But the duke was still smiling faintly. He thrust one
hand into his shirt and drew out a duplicate package, which he raised
for us to see.
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