Not unnaturally Bertrand Flammecœur had taken on the state of mind of the whole Castle. Mademoiselle was coming home on the morrow. Every one knew it, for a message had arrived on the previous day from Monseigneur the Bishop of St. Nazaire, and Le Crépuscule was in a state of unwonted excitement. The word came to madame as less of a surprise than as an overwhelming relief, and a joy that had some bitterness in it. It had rested with St. Nazaire whether her child should come home to see her twice in the month! Ah, well, she was coming; she would lie in her mother’s arms; the Castle would echo again to the music of her voice! Thus through the whole day madame sat dreaming of the morrow, nor noticed the tardy arrival of Alixe in the spinning-room, nor how, all morning, Isabelle and Viviane whispered and smiled and idled over their tasks.
Now, if Madame Eleanore’s heart and brain were full to overflowing with the dreams of Laure, how feverish with longing came the thought of home, home though for one little hour, to the prisoner herself! On the night before her going, as, indeed, on many nights of late, Laure could not sleep. Her eyes stared wide open into the night, while her mind traced outlines of Le Crépuscule in the soft darkness. Ah! the dearly loved halls and their blessed company, all that she had not seen for nearly nine months, and on the morrow should see again! Her brain burned with impatience. She tossed and tumbled on her hard and narrow bed. Finally, long ere the hour for matins, she rose and went to sit at the window of her cell, looking out upon the clear and frosty winter’s night. How the hours passed till prime she scarcely knew. But at a quarter to five, when matins were over, she went down into the church for first service, wearing short riding-shoes under her white robe, with her hair bound tight beneath her coif and veil, for galloping. During the simple prayer-service, she got twenty penitential Aves for inattention, and read added reproof in the eyes of Mère Piteuse. At length, however, it came to be the hour for the breaking of the fast, and Laure found opportunity to speak to the Sœur Eloise, who was to follow her as attendant and protectress on the road to Crépuscule. Stupid, stolid, faithful, low of birth and therefore much in awe of Laure, was this little nun; and had the Mother-prioress been worldly wise, it had not been she that followed Laure into the world this bright and bitter January morning.