Which? Part 32

"Enough," replied Coursegol. "Dolores and myself will leave for the refuge this very night!"

Madame Bridoul was summoned and acquainted with the decision that had been reached. She reported that Dolores had recovered consciousness and strength and would be ready for the departure when required.

"One thing more," said Coursegol to Bridoul and his wife. "Neither Philip nor Antoinette must know that we have escaped the guillotine until they find us alive and well in the Chevreuse valley!"

This was agreed to, and, at nightfall, Coursegol and Dolores, provided with the requisite pa.s.sports, quitted Paris. In due time they reached the little cottage in the Chevreuse valley in safety.

About a fortnight after the supposed execution of Dolores and Coursegol, Philip and Antoinette, with the aid of Bridoul and the order of release wrested from Vauquelas, succeeded in obtaining their freedom. No sooner were they out of the Conciergerie than they hastened to the refuge provided for them in the Chevreuse valley. What pen can describe their joy and grat.i.tude to G.o.d when, on their arrival, they found that the little cottage contained two other tenants, and that those tenants were their beloved friends whom they had mourned as victims of the hideous guillotine?

Dolores, after the first transports of delight at the reunion were over, endeavored to continue her role of martyr and to induce Philip to keep his promise to her to marry Antoinette, but the latter had greatly changed since that dreadful parting at the Conciergerie. She had become capable of as great a sacrifice as Dolores, and firmly refused to stand longer between Philip and the woman he had loved for so many years. She still loved Philip, it is true, but her love had grown pure and unselfish--it was now a sister's love, not that of a woman who wished to be his wife.

To say that Philip was overjoyed by this unexpected turn of affairs is only to state the simple truth.

Dolores at first demurred, urging the wish of the late Marquis, also that she was devoted to G.o.d, but Antoinette's only reply was to join their hands and bless them, and Dolores finally consented to the marriage that at her heart's core she so ardently desired.

Philip and Dolores were quietly united in wedlock a few weeks later.

Coursegol, the Bridouls and Antoinette were the only persons present at the ceremony besides the bride and groom and the officiating priest.

Shortly afterwards the Marquis de Chamondrin and his wife, accompanied by Coursegol, Antoinette and the Bridouls, the latter having sold their wine-shop, went to England and from there to Louisiana, where Mlle. de Mirandol owned extensive estates. Antoinette decided to remain in Louisiana, having persuaded Madame Bridoul to take charge of her house and Bridoul to a.s.sume the management of her business.

Philip and Dolores spent ten years in America and then returned to France. They had two children, a son and a daughter, the latter named Antoinette, and their life, though always slightly tinged with melancholy, was serene and peaceful. After his return to his native land, Philip rebuilt the Chateau de Chamondrin and took up his permanent abode there, determined to lead the life of a country gentleman and student and to take no part in the political controversies of the time, nor could he be induced to reconsider this decision though he was twice offered a seat in the Chamber of Deputies. After the exciting and terrible scenes of the Reign of Terror through which he had pa.s.sed, he longed for quiet and repose. Coursegol was made the steward of his estate and managed it with such shrewdness and intelligence that Philip became rich and all the prestige of the Chamondrins was restored.

In the month of May, 1822, while in Paris, to which city he had been called by important business, the Marquis de Chamondrin met an old n.o.bleman who had been a fellow prisoner in the Conciergerie. They talked together a long time over the past and the frenzy, perils and heroism which had stamped those eventful days, and a chance word, let fall by his companion, first acquainted Philip with the fact that Dolores had endeavored to sacrifice her own life in order to save that of Antoinette de Mirandol. The Marquis de Chamondrin turned pale as death and pressed his hand convulsively against his heart, but he speedily recovered his color and self-possession and the old n.o.bleman did not even suspect the emotion to which his revelation had given rise.

Philip never mentioned the knowledge he had acquired to his wife, but his love and reverence for her were vastly augmented by it, and, whenever he thought of the sacrifice that G.o.d in His mercy had not permitted to be made, he murmured to himself:

"Dolores has a n.o.ble and heroic soul! An angel from Heaven could not have acted more grandly!"

THE END.