"Perhaps Elise will enlighten us?" Of one accord her guests now crowded around the girl.
"Does the Governor intend to take us prisoners?"
"You imply it is necessary to do that--to keep you?" answered my lady.
Her expression, as perplexed as theirs, answered.
The Governor's servitor, who was passing, with an anxious, inquiring look upon his face, glanced around.
"Beppo!" she repeated, and beckoned again.
The man approached. "Your Ladyship wishes to speak with me?" he asked in a voice he endeavored to make unconcerned.
"I do." In her manner the old antipathy she had felt toward him as a child again became manifest. "What do the soldiers want? Why have they come down?"
His eyes shifted. "I--my Lady--" he stammered.
The little foot struck the strand. "Why don't you answer? You heard my question?"
"I am sorry, my Lady--" Again he hesitated: "_Le Seigneur Noir_ has been seen on the beach!"
"Yes, my Lady. He was caught sight of among the peasants, at the time the barrels were opened, in accordance with your Ladyship's command. I assure your Ladyship," with growing eagerness, "there can be no mistake, as--"
"Who," interrupted my lady sharply, "_is_ this Black Seigneur?"
Beppo's manner changed. "A man," he said solemnly, "his Excellency, the Governor, has long been most anxious to capture."
The girl's eyes flashed with impatience, and then she began to laugh. "Saw you ever, my Lords and Ladies, his equal for equivocation? You put to him the question direct, and he answers--"
The loud report of a carbine from the other side of the Mount, followed by a desultory volley, interrupted her. The laughter died on her lips; the color left her cheek.
"What--" The startled look in her eyes completed the sentence.
Beppo rubbed his hands softly. "His Excellency takes no chances!" he murmured.
"So you failed to capture him, Monsieur le Commandant?"
The speaker, the Marquis de Beauvillers, leaned more comfortably back in his chair in the small, rather barely furnished barracks' sitting-room in which he found himself later that night and languidly surveyed the florid, irate countenance of the man in uniform before him.
"No, Monsieur le Marquis," said the latter, endeavoring to conceal any evidence of mortification or ill humor in the presence of a visitor so distinguished; "we didn't. But," as if to turn the conversation, with a gesture toward a well-laden table, "I should feel honored if--"