initial commit of ebook 2640HEADmain

11 files changed, 44820 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6833f05
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitattributes
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+* text=auto
+*.txt text
+*.md text
diff --git a/2640-0.txt b/2640-0.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..be78bee
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2640-0.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,10612 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Martin’s Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost
+no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use
+it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
+eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: St. Martin’s Summer
+
+Author: Rafael Sabatini
+
+Release Date: January 2, 2009 [EBook #2640]
+Last Updated: October 13, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. MARTIN’S SUMMER ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Project Gutenberg Volunteer, and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ST. MARTIN’S SUMMER
+
+By Rafael Sabatini
+
+
+Originally published in 1921
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER I.   THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+
+CHAPTER II.   MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+
+CHAPTER III.   THE DOWAGER’S COMPLIANCE
+
+CHAPTER IV.   THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+
+CHAPTER V.   MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+
+CHAPTER VI.   MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+
+CHAPTER VII.   THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+
+CHAPTER VIII.   THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+
+CHAPTER IX.   THE SENESCHAL’S ADVICE
+
+CHAPTER X.   THE RECRUIT
+
+CHAPTER XI.   VALERIE’S GAOLER
+
+CHAPTER XII.   A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+
+CHAPTER XIII.   THE COURIER
+
+CHAPTER XIV.   FLORIMOND’S LETTER
+
+CHAPTER XV.   THE CONFERENCE
+
+CHAPTER XVI.   THE UNEXPECTED
+
+CHAPTER XVII.   HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.   IN THE MOAT
+
+CHAPTER XIX.   THROUGH THE NIGHT
+
+CHAPTER XX.   FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+
+CHAPTER XXI.   THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+
+CHAPTER XXII.   THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.     THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.   SAINT MARTIN’S EVE
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+SAINT MARTIN’S SUMMER
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+
+My Lord of Tressan, His Majesty’s Seneschal of Dauphiny, sat at his
+ease, his purple doublet all undone, to yield greater freedom to his
+vast bulk, a yellow silken undergarment visible through the gap, as is
+visible the flesh of some fruit that, swollen with over-ripeness, has
+burst its skin.
+
+His wig--imposed upon him by necessity, not fashion--lay on the table
+amid a confusion of dusty papers, and on his little fat nose, round
+and red as a cherry at its end, rested the bridge of his horn-rimmed
+spectacles. His bald head--so bald and shining that it conveyed an
+unpleasant sense of nakedness, suggesting that its uncovering had been
+an act of indelicacy on the owner’s part--rested on the back of his
+great chair, and hid from sight the gaudy escutcheon wrought upon the
+crimson leather. His eyes were closed, his mouth open, and whether from
+that mouth or from his nose--or, perhaps, conflicting for issue between
+both--there came a snorting, rumbling sound to proclaim that my Lord the
+Seneschal was hard at work upon the King’s business.
+
+Yonder, at a meaner table, in an angle between two windows, a pale-faced
+thread-bare secretary was performing for a yearly pittance the
+duties for which my Lord the Seneschal was rewarded by emoluments
+disproportionately large.
+
+The air of that vast apartment was disturbed by the sounds of Monsieur
+de Tressan’s slumbers, the scratch and splutter of the secretary’s
+pen, and the occasional hiss and crackle of the logs that burned in the
+great, cavern-like fireplace. Suddenly to these another sound was added.
+With a rasp and rattle the heavy curtains of blue velvet flecked with
+silver fleurs-de-lys were swept from the doorway, and the master of
+Monsieur de Tressan’s household, in a well filled suit of black relieved
+by his heavy chain of office, stepped pompously forward.
+
+The secretary dropped his pen, and shot a frightened glance at his
+slumbering master; then raised his hands above his head, and shook them
+wildly at the head lackey.
+
+“Sh!” he whispered tragically. “Doucement, Monsieur Anselme.”
+
+Anselme paused. He appreciated the gravity of the situation. His bearing
+lost some of its dignity; his face underwent a change. Then with a
+recovery of some part of his erstwhile resolution:
+
+“Nevertheless, he must be awakened,” he announced, but in an undertone,
+as if afraid to do the thing he said must needs be done.
+
+The horror in the secretary’s eyes increased, but Anselme’s reflected
+none of it. It was a grave thing, he knew by former experience, to
+arouse His Majesty’s Seneschal of Dauphiny from his after-dinner
+nap; but it was an almost graver thing to fail in obedience to that
+black-eyed woman below who was demanding an audience.
+
+Anselme realized that he was between the sword and the wall. He was,
+however, a man of a deliberate habit that was begotten of inherent
+indolence and nurtured among the good things that fell to his share as
+master of the Tressan household. Thoughtfully he caressed his tuft of
+red beard, puffed out his cheeks, and raised his eyes to the ceiling
+in appeal or denunciation to the heaven which he believed was somewhere
+beyond it.
+
+“Nevertheless, he must be awakened,” he repeated.
+
+And then Fate came to his assistance. Somewhere in the house a door
+banged like a cannon-shot. Perspiration broke upon the secretary’s brow.
+He sank limply back in his chair, giving himself up for lost. Anselme
+started and bit the knuckle of his forefinger in a manner suggesting an
+inarticulate imprecation.
+
+My Lord the Seneschal moved. The noise of his slumbers culminated in a
+sudden, choking grunt, and abruptly ceased. His eyelids rolled slowly
+back, like an owl’s, revealing pale blue eyes, which fixed themselves
+first upon the ceiling, then upon Anselme. Instantly he sat up, puffing
+and scowling, his hands shuffling his papers.
+
+“A thousand devils! Anselme, why am I interrupted?” he grumbled
+querulously, still half-asleep. “What the plague do you want? Have you
+no thought for the King’s affairs? Babylas”--this to his secretary--“did
+I not tell you that I had much to do; that I must not be disturbed?”
+
+It was the great vanity of the life of this man, who did nothing, to
+appear the busiest fellow in all France, and no audience--not even that
+of his own lackeys--was too mean for him to take the stage to in that
+predilect role.
+
+“Monsieur le Comte,” said Anselme, in tones of abject self-effacement,
+“I had never dared intrude had the matter been of less urgency.
+But Madame the Dowager of Condillac is below. She begs to see Your
+Excellency instantly.”
+
+At once there was a change. Tressan became wide-awake upon the instant.
+His first act was to pass one hand over the wax-like surface of his
+bald head, whilst his other snatched at his wig. Then he heaved himself
+ponderously out of his great chair. He donned his wig, awry in his
+haste, and lurched forward towards Anselme, his fat fingers straining at
+his open doublet and drawing it together.
+
+“Madame la Douairiere here?” he cried. “Make fast these buttons, rascal!
+Quick! Am I to receive a lady thus? Am I--? Babylas,” he snapped,
+interrupting himself and turning aside even as Anselme put forth hands
+to do his bidding. “A mirror, from my closet! Dispatch!”
+
+The secretary was gone in a flash, and in a flash returned, even as
+Anselme completed his master’s toilet. But clearly Monsieur de Tressan
+had awakened in a peevish humour, for no sooner were the buttons of
+his doublet secured than with his own fingers he tore them loose again,
+cursing his majordomo the while with vigour.
+
+“You dog, Anselme, have you no sense of fitness, no discrimination? Am
+I to appear in this garment of the mode of a half-century ago before
+Madame la Marquise? Take it off; take it off, man! Get me the coat that
+came last month from Paris--the yellow one with the hanging sleeves and
+the gold buttons, and a sash--the crimson sash I had from Taillemant.
+Can you move no quicker, animal? Are you still here?”
+
+Anselme, thus enjoined, lent an unwonted alacrity to his movements,
+waddling grotesquely like a hastening waterfowl. Between him and the
+secretary they dressed my Lord the Seneschal, and decked him out till he
+was fit to compare with a bird of paradise for gorgeousness of colouring
+if not for harmony of hues and elegance of outline.
+
+Babylas held the mirror, and Anselme adjusted the Seneschal’s wig,
+whilst Tressan himself twisted his black mustachios--how they kept their
+colour was a mystery to his acquaintance--and combed the tuft of beard
+that sprouted from one of his several chins.
+
+He took a last look at his reflection, rehearsed a smile, and bade
+Anselme introduce his visitor. He desired his secretary to go to the
+devil, but, thinking better of it, he recalled him as he reached the
+door. His cherished vanity craved expression.
+
+“Wait!” said he. “There is a letter must be written. The King’s business
+may not suffer postponement--not for all the dowagers in France. Sit
+down.”
+
+Babylas obeyed him. Tressan stood with his back to the open door. His
+ears, strained to listen, had caught the swish of a woman’s gown. He
+cleared his throat, and began to dictate:
+
+“To Her Majesty the Queen-Regent--” He paused, and stood with knitted
+brows, deep in thought. Then he ponderously repeated--“To Her Majesty
+the Queen Regent--Have you got that?”
+
+“Yes, Monsieur le Comte. ‘To Her Majesty the Queen Regent.’”
+
+There was a step, and a throat-clearing cough behind him.
+
+“Monsieur de Tressan,” said a woman’s voice, a rich, melodious voice, if
+haughty and arrogant of intonation.
+
+On the instant he turned, advanced a step, and bowed.
+
+“Your humblest servant, madame,” said he, his hand upon his heart. “This
+is an honour which--”
+
+“Which necessity thrusts upon you,” she broke in imperiously. “Dismiss
+that fellow.”
+
+The secretary, pale and shy, had risen. His eyes dilated at the woman’s
+speech. He looked for a catastrophe as the natural result of her taking
+such a tone with this man who was the terror of his household and of
+all Grenoble. Instead, the Lord Seneschal’s meekness left him breathless
+with surprise.
+
+“He is my secretary, madame. We were at work as you came. I was on the
+point of inditing a letter to Her Majesty. The office of Seneschal in
+a province such as Dauphiny is helas!--no sinecure.” He sighed like
+one whose brain is weary. “It leaves a man little time even to eat or
+sleep.”
+
+“You will be needing a holiday, then,” said she, with cool insolence.
+“Take one for once, and let the King’s business give place for half an
+hour to mine.”
+
+The secretary’s horror grew by leaps and bounds.
+
+Surely the storm would burst at last about this audacious woman’s head.
+But the Lord Seneschal--usually so fiery and tempestuous--did no more
+than make her another of his absurd bows.
+
+“You anticipate, madame, the very words I was about to utter. Babylas,
+vanish!” And he waved the scribbler doorwards with a contemptuous hand.
+“Take your papers with you--into my closet there. We will resume that
+letter to Her Majesty when madame shall have left me.”
+
+The secretary gathered up his papers, his quills, and his inkhorn, and
+went his way, accounting the end of the world at hand.
+
+When the door had closed upon him, the Seneschal, with another bow and
+a simper, placed a chair at his visitor’s disposal. She looked at the
+chair, then looked at the man much as she had looked at the chair,
+and turning her back contemptuously on both, she sauntered towards the
+fireplace. She stood before the blaze, with her whip tucked under her
+arm, drawing off her stout riding-gloves. She was a tall, splendidly
+proportioned woman, of a superb beauty of countenance, for all that she
+was well past the spring of life.
+
+In the waning light of that October afternoon none would have guessed
+her age to be so much as thirty, though in the sunlight you might have
+set it at a little more. But in no light at all would you have guessed
+the truth, that her next would be her forty-second birthday. Her face
+was pale, of an ivory pallor that gleamed in sharp contrast with the
+ebony of her lustrous hair. Under the long lashes of low lids a pair of
+eyes black and insolent set off the haughty lines of her scarlet lips.
+Her nose was thin and straight, her neck an ivory pillar splendidly
+upright upon her handsome shoulders.
+
+She was dressed for riding, in a gown of sapphire velvet, handsomely
+laced in gold across the stomacher, and surmounted at the neck, where
+it was cut low and square, by the starched band of fine linen which in
+France was already replacing the more elaborate ruff. On her head, over
+a linen coif, she wore a tall-crowned grey beaver, swathed with a scarf
+of blue and gold.
+
+Standing by the hearth, one foot on the stone kerb, one elbow leaning
+lightly on the overmantel, she proceeded leisurely to remove her gloves.
+
+The Seneschal observed her with eyes that held an odd mixture of
+furtiveness and admiration, his fingers--plump, indolent-looking
+stumps--plucking at his beard.
+
+“Did you but know, Marquise, with what joy, with what a--”
+
+“I will imagine it, whatever it may be,” she broke in, with that brusque
+arrogance that marked her bearing. “The time for flowers of rhetoric is
+not now. There is trouble coming, man; trouble, dire trouble.”
+
+Up went the Seneschal’s brows; his eyes grew wider.
+
+“Trouble?” quoth he. And, having opened his mouth to give exit to that
+single word, open he left it.
+
+She laughed lazily, her lip curling, her face twisting oddly, and
+mechanically she began to draw on again the glove she had drawn off.
+
+“By your face I see how well you understand me,” she sneered. “The
+trouble concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.”
+
+“From Paris--does it come from Court?” His voice was sunk.
+
+She nodded. “You are a miracle of intuition today, Tressan.”
+
+He thrust his tiny tuft of beard between his teeth--a trick he had when
+perplexed or thoughtful. “Ah!” he exclaimed at last, and it sounded like
+an indrawn breath of apprehension. “Tell me more.”
+
+“What more is there to tell? You have the epitome of the story.”
+
+“But what is the nature of the trouble? What form does it take, and by
+whom are you advised of it?”
+
+“A friend in Paris sent me word, and his messenger did his work well,
+else had Monsieur de Garnache been here before him, and I had not so
+much as had the mercy of this forewarning.”
+
+“Garnache?” quoth the Count. “Who is Garnache?”
+
+“The emissary of the Queen-Regent. He has been dispatched hither by her
+to see that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye has justice and enlargement.”
+
+Tressan fell suddenly to groaning and wringing his hands a pathetic
+figure had it been less absurd.
+
+“I warned you, madame! I warned you how it would end,” he cried. “I told
+you--”
+
+“Oh, I remember the things you told me,” she cut in, scorn in her voice.
+“You may spare yourself their repetition. What is done is done, and I’ll
+not--I would not--have it undone. Queen-Regent or no Queen-Regent, I
+am mistress at Condillac; my word is the only law we know, and I intend
+that so it shall continue.”
+
+Tressan looked at her in surprise. This unreasoning, feminine obstinacy
+so wrought upon him that he permitted himself a smile and a lapse into
+irony and banter.
+
+“Parfaitement,” said he, spreading his hands, and bowing. “Why speak of
+trouble, then?”
+
+She beat her whip impatiently against her gown, her eyes staring into
+the fire. “Because, my attitude being such as it is, trouble will there
+be.”
+
+The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and moved a step towards her. He
+was cast down to think that he might have spared himself the trouble
+of donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris. She had eyes for no
+finery that afternoon. He was cast down, too, to think how things might
+go with him when this trouble came. It entered his thoughts that he had
+lain long on a bed of roses in this pleasant corner of Dauphiny, and
+he was smitten now with fear lest of the roses he should find nothing
+remaining but the thorns.
+
+“How came the Queen-Regent to hear of--of
+mademoiselle’s--ah--situation?” he inquired.
+
+The Marquise swung round upon him in a passion.
+
+“The girl found a dog of a traitor to bear a letter for her. That is
+enough. If ever chance or fate should bring him my way, by God! he shall
+hang without shrift.”
+
+Then she put her anger from her; put from her, too, the insolence and
+scorn with which so lavishly she had addressed him hitherto. Instead she
+assumed a suppliant air, her beautiful eyes meltingly set upon his face.
+
+“Tressan,” said she in her altered voice, “I am beset by enemies. But
+you will not forsake me? You will stand by me to the end--will you not,
+my friend? I can count upon you, at least?”
+
+“In all things, madame,” he answered, under the spell of her gaze. “What
+force does this man Garnache bring with him? Have you ascertained?”
+
+“He brings none,” she answered, triumph in her glance.
+
+“None?” he echoed, horror in his. “None? Then--then--”
+
+He tossed his arms to heaven, and stood a limp and shaken thing. She
+leaned forward, and regarded him stricken in surprise.
+
+“Diable! What ails you?” she snapped. “Could I have given you better
+news?”
+
+“If you could have given me worse, I cannot think what it might have
+been,” he groaned. Then, as if smitten by a sudden notion that flashed a
+gleam of hope into this terrifying darkness that was settling down upon
+him, he suddenly looked up. “You mean to resist him?” he inquired.
+
+She stared at him a second, then laughed, a thought unpleasantly.
+
+“Pish! But you are mad,” she scorned him. “Do you need ask if I intend
+to resist--I, with the strongest castle in Dauphiny? By God! sir, if you
+need to hear me say it, hear me then say that I shall resist him and
+as many as the Queen may send after him, for as long as one stone of
+Condillac shall stand upon another.”
+
+The Seneschal blew out his lips, and fell once more to the chewing of
+his beard.
+
+“What did you mean when you said I could have given you no worse news
+than that of his coming alone?” she questioned suddenly.
+
+“Madame,” said he, “if this man comes without force, and you resist the
+orders of which he is the bearer, what think you will betide?”
+
+“He will appeal to you for the men he needs that he may batter down my
+walls,” she answered calmly.
+
+He looked at her incredulously. “You realize it?” he ejaculated. “You
+realize it?”
+
+“What is there in it that should puzzle a babe?”
+
+Her callousness was like a gust of wind upon the living embers of his
+fears. It blew them into a blaze of wrath, sudden and terrific as that
+of such a man at bay could be. He advanced upon her with the rolling
+gait of the obese, his cheeks purple, his arms waving wildly, his dyed
+mustachios bristling.
+
+“And what of me, madame?” he spluttered. “What of me? Am I to be ruined,
+gaoled, and hanged, maybe, for refusing him men?--for that is what is
+in your mind. Am I to make myself an outlaw? Am I, who have been Lord
+Seneschal of Dauphiny these fifteen years, to end my days in degradation
+in the cause of a woman’s matrimonial projects for a simpering
+school-girl? Seigneur du Ciel!” he roared, “I think you are gone
+mad--mad, mad! over this affair. You would not think it too much to set
+the whole province in flames so that you could have your way with this
+wretched child. But, Ventregris! to ruin me--to--to--”
+
+He fell silent for very want of words; just gaped and gasped, and then,
+with hands folded upon his paunch, he set himself to pace the chamber.
+
+Madame de Condillac stood watching him, her face composed, her glance
+cold. She was like some stalwart oak, weathering with unshaken front
+a hurricane. When he had done, she moved away from the fireplace, and,
+beating her side gently with her whip, she stepped to the door.
+
+“Au revoir, Monsieur de Tressan,” said she, mighty cool, her back
+towards him.
+
+At that he halted in his feverish stride, stood still and threw up his
+head. His anger went out, as a candle is extinguished by a puff of wind.
+And in its place a new fear crept into his heart.
+
+“Madame, madame!” he cried. “Wait! Hear me.”
+
+She paused, half-turned, and looked at him over her shoulder, scorn in
+her glance, a sneer on her scarlet mouth, insolence in every line of
+her.
+
+“I think, monsieur, that I have heard a little more than enough,” said
+she. “I am assured, at least, that in you I have but a fair-weather
+friend, a poor lipserver.”
+
+“Ah, not that, madame,” he cried, and his voice was stricken. “Say not
+that. I would serve you as would none other in all this world--you know
+it, Marquise; you know it.”
+
+She faced about, and confronted him, her smile a trifle broader, as if
+amusement were now blending with her scorn.
+
+“It is easy to protest. Easy to say, ‘I will die for you,’ so long as
+the need for such a sacrifice be remote. But let me do no more than
+ask a favour, and it is, ‘What of my good name, madame? What of my
+seneschalship? Am I to be gaoled or hanged to pleasure you?’ Faugh!” she
+ended, with a toss of her splendid head. “The world is peopled with your
+kind, and I--alas! for a woman’s intuitions--had held you different from
+the rest.”
+
+Her words were to his soul as a sword of fire might have been to his
+flesh. They scorched and shrivelled it. He saw himself as she would have
+him see himself--a mean, contemptible craven; a coward who made big talk
+in times of peace, but faced about and vanished into hiding at the first
+sign of danger. He felt himself the meanest, vilest thing a-crawl upon
+this sinful earth, and she--dear God!--had thought him different from
+the ruck. She had held him in high esteem, and behold, how short had he
+not fallen of all her expectations! Shame and vanity combined to work a
+sudden, sharp revulsion in his feelings.
+
+“Marquise,” he cried, “you say no more than what is just. But punish
+me no further. I meant not what I said. I was beside myself. Let me
+atone--let my future actions make amends for that odious departure from
+my true self.”
+
+There was no scorn now in her smile; only an ineffable tenderness,
+beholding which he felt it in his heart to hang if need be that he might
+continue high in her regard. He sprang forward, and took the hand she
+extended to him.
+
+“I knew, Tressan,” said she, “that you were not yourself, and that when
+you bethought you of what you had said, my valiant, faithful friend
+would not desert me.”
+
+He stooped over her hand, and slobbered kisses upon her unresponsive
+glove.
+
+“Madame,” said he, “you may count upon me. This fellow out of Paris
+shall have no men from me, depend upon it.”
+
+She caught him by the shoulders, and held him so, before her. Her face
+was radiant, alluring; and her eyes dwelt on his with a kindness he had
+never seen there save in some wild daydream of his.
+
+“I will not refuse a service you offer me so gallantly,” said she. “It
+were an ill thing to wound you by so refusing it.”
+
+“Marquise,” he cried, “it is as nothing to what I would do did the
+occasion serve. But when this thing ‘tis done; when you have had your
+way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and the nuptials shall have been
+celebrated, then--dare I hope--?”
+
+He said no more in words, but his little blue eyes had an eloquence that
+left nothing to mere speech.
+
+Their glances met, she holding him always at arm’s length by that grip
+upon his shoulders, a grip that was firm and nervous.
+
+In the Seneschal of Dauphiny, as she now gazed upon him, she beheld a
+very toad of a man, and the soul of her shuddered at the sight of him
+combining with the thing that he suggested. But her glance was steady
+and her lips maintained their smile, just as if that ugliness of his
+had been invested with some abstract beauty existing only to her gaze; a
+little colour crept into her cheeks, and red being the colour of love’s
+livery, Tressan misread its meaning.
+
+She nodded to him across the little distance of her outstretched arms,
+then smothered a laugh that drove him crazed with hope, and breaking
+from him she sped swiftly, shyly it almost seemed to him, to the door.
+
+There she paused a moment looking back at him with a coyness that might
+have become a girl of half her years, yet which her splendid beauty
+saved from being unbecoming even in her.
+
+One adorable smile she gave him, and before he could advance to hold the
+door for her, she had opened it and passed out.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+
+To promise rashly, particularly where a woman is the suppliant, and
+afterwards, if not positively to repent the promise, at least to regret
+that one did not hedge it with a few conditions, is a proceeding
+not uncommon to youth. In a man of advanced age, such as Monsieur de
+Tressan, it never should have place; and, indeed, it seldom has, unless
+that man has come again under the sway of the influences by which youth,
+for good or ill, is governed.
+
+Whilst the flush of his adoration was upon him, hot from the contact
+of her presence, he knew no repentance, found room in his mind for no
+regrets. He crossed to the window, and pressed his huge round face to
+the pane, in a futile effort to watch her mount and ride out of the
+courtyard with her little troop of attendants. Finding that he might
+not--the window being placed too high--gratify his wishes in that
+connection, he dropped into his chair, and sat in the fast-deepening
+gloom, reviewing, fondly here, hurriedly there, the interview that had
+but ended.
+
+Thus night fell, and darkness settled down about him, relieved only
+by the red glow of the logs smouldering on the hearth. In the gloom
+inspiration visited him. He called for lights and Babylas. Both came,
+and he dispatched the lackey that lighted the tapers to summon Monsieur
+d’Aubran, the commander of the garrison of Grenoble.
+
+In the interval before the soldier’s coming he conferred with Babylas
+concerning what he had in mind, but he found his secretary singularly
+dull and unimaginative. So that, perforce, he must fall back upon
+himself. He sat glum and thoughtful, his mind in unproductive travail,
+until the captain was announced.
+
+Still without any definite plan, he blundered headlong, nevertheless,
+into the necessary first step towards the fulfilment of his purpose.
+
+“Captain,” said he, looking mighty grave, “I have cause to believe that
+all is not as it should be in the hills in the district of Montelimar.”
+
+“Is there trouble, monsieur?” inquired the captain, startled.
+
+“Maybe there is, maybe there is not,” returned the Seneschal
+mysteriously. “You shall have your full orders in the morning.
+Meanwhile, make ready to repair to the neighbourhood of Montelimar
+to-morrow with a couple of hundred men.”
+
+“A couple of hundred, monsieur!” exclaimed d’Aubran. “But that will be
+to empty Grenoble of soldiers.”
+
+“What of it? We are not likely to require them here. Let your orders for
+preparation go round tonight, so that your knaves may be ready to set
+out betimes to-morrow. If you will be so good as to wait upon me early
+you shall have your instructions.”
+
+Mystified, Monsieur d’Aubran departed on his errand, and my Lord
+Seneschal went down to supper well pleased with the cunning device by
+which he was to leave Grenoble without a garrison. It was an astute way
+of escape from the awkward situation into which his attachment to the
+interests of the dowager of Condillac was likely to place him.
+
+But when the morning came he was less pleased with the idea, chiefly
+because he had been unable to invent any details that should lend it the
+necessary colour, and d’Aubran--worse luck--was an intelligent officer
+who might evince a pardonable but embarrassing curiosity. A leader of
+soldiers has a right to know something at least of the enterprise upon
+which he leads them. By morning, too, Tressan found that the intervening
+space of the night, since he had seen Madame de Condillac, had cooled
+his ardour very considerably.
+
+He had reached the incipient stages of regret of his rash promise.
+
+When Captain d’Aubran was announced to him, he bade them ask him to come
+again in an hour’s time. From mere regrets he was passing now, through
+dismay, into utter repentance of his promise. He sat in his study,
+at his littered writing-table, his head in his hands, a confusion of
+thoughts, a wild, frenzied striving after invention in his brain.
+
+Thus Anselme found him when he thrust aside the portiere to announce
+that a Monsieur de Garnache, from Paris, was below, demanding to see the
+Lord Seneschal at once upon an affair of State.
+
+Tressan’s flesh trembled and his heart fainted. Then, suddenly,
+desperately, he took his courage in both hands. He remembered who he was
+and what he was the King’s Lord Seneschal of the Province of Dauphiny.
+Throughout that province, from the Rhone to the Alps, his word was law,
+his name a terror to evildoers--and to some others besides. Was he to
+blench and tremble at the mention of the name of a Court lackey out of
+Paris, who brought him a message from the Queen-Regent? Body of God! not
+he.
+
+He heaved himself to his feet, warmed and heartened by the thought; his
+eye sparkled, and there was a deeper flush than usual upon his cheek.
+
+“Admit this Monsieur de Garnache,” said he with a fine loftiness, and in
+his heart he pondered what he would say and how he should say it; how he
+should stand, how move, and how look. His roving eye caught sight of his
+secretary. He remembered something--the cherished pose of being a man
+plunged fathoms-deep in business. Sharply he uttered his secretary’s
+name.
+
+Babylas raised his pale face; he knew what was coming; it had come so
+many times before. But there was no vestige of a smile on his drooping
+lips, no gleam of amusement in his patient eye. He thrust aside the
+papers on which he was at work, and drew towards him a fresh sheet on
+which to pen the letter which, he knew by experience, Tressan was
+about to indite to the Queen-mother. For these purposes Her Majesty was
+Tressan’s only correspondent.
+
+Then the door opened, the portiere was swept aside, and Anselme
+announced “Monsieur de Garnache.”
+
+Tressan turned as the newcomer stepped briskly into the room, and
+bowed, hat in hand, its long crimson feather sweeping the ground, then
+straightened himself and permitted the Seneschal to take his measure.
+
+Tressan beheld a man of a good height, broad to the waist and spare
+thence to the ground, who at first glance appeared to be mainly clad in
+leather. A buff jerkin fitted his body; below it there was a glimpse of
+wine-coloured trunks, and hose of a slightly deeper hue, which vanished
+immediately into a pair of huge thighboots of untanned leather. A
+leather swordbelt, gold-embroidered at the edges, carried a long
+steel-halted rapier in a leather scabbard chaped with steel. The sleeves
+of his doublet which protruded from his leather casing were of the same
+colour and material as his trunks. In one hand he carried his broad
+black hat with its crimson feather, in the other a little roll of
+parchment; and when he moved the creak of leather and jingle of his
+spurs made pleasant music for a martial spirit.
+
+Above all, this man’s head, well set upon his shoulders, claimed some
+attention. His nose was hooked and rather large, his eyes were blue,
+bright as steel, and set a trifle wide. Above a thin-lapped, delicate
+mouth his reddish mustachios, slightly streaked with grey, stood out,
+bristling like a cat’s. His hair was darker--almost brown save at the
+temples, where age had faded it to an ashen colour. In general his
+aspect was one of rugged strength.
+
+The Seneschal, measuring him with an adversary’s eye, misliked his
+looks. But he bowed urbanely, washing his hands in the air, and
+murmuring:
+
+“Your servant, Monsieur de--?”
+
+“Garnache,” came the other’s crisp, metallic voice, and the name had a
+sound as of an oath on his lips. “Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache.
+I come to you on an errand of Her Majesty’s, as this my warrant will
+apprise you.” And he proffered the paper he held, which Tressan accepted
+from his hand.
+
+A change was visible in the wily Seneschal’s fat countenance. Its round
+expanse had expressed interrogation until now; but at the Parisian’s
+announcement that he was an emissary of the Queen’s, Tressan insinuated
+into it just that look of surprise and of increased deference which
+would have been natural had he not already been forewarned of Monsieur
+de Garnache’s mission and identity.
+
+He placed a chair at his visitor’s disposal, himself resuming his seat
+at his writing-table, and unfolding the paper Garnache had given him.
+The newcomer seated himself, hitched his sword-belt round so that he
+could lean both hands upon the hilt, and sat, stiff and immovable,
+awaiting the Lord Seneschal’s pleasure. From his desk across the room
+the secretary, idly chewing the feathered end of his goose-quill, took
+silent stock of the man from Paris, and wondered.
+
+Tressan folded the paper carefully, and returned it to its owner. It
+was no more than a formal credential, setting forth that Garnache was
+travelling into Dauphiny on a State affair, and commanding Monsieur de
+Tressan to give him every assistance he might require in the performance
+of his errand.
+
+“Parfaitement,” purred the Lord Seneschal. “And now, monsieur, if you
+will communicate to me the nature of your affair, you shall find me
+entirely at your service.”
+
+“It goes without saying that you are acquainted with the Chateau de
+Condillac?” began Garnache, plunging straight into business.
+
+“Perfectly.” The Seneschal leaned back, and was concerned to feel his
+pulses throbbing a shade too quickly. But he controlled his features,
+and maintained a placid, bland expression.
+
+“You are perhaps acquainted with its inhabitants?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Intimate with them?”
+
+The Seneschal pursed his lips, arched his brows, and slowly waved his
+podgy hands, a combination of grimace and gesture that said much or
+nothing. But reflecting that Monsieur de Tressan had a tongue, Garnache
+apparently did not opine it worth his while to set a strain upon his own
+imagination, for--
+
+“Intimate with them?” he repeated, and this time there was a sharper
+note in his voice.
+
+Tressan leaned forward and brought his finger-tips together. His voice
+was as urbane as it lay within its power to be.
+
+“I understood that monsieur was proposing to state his business, not to
+question mine.”
+
+Garnache sat back in his chair, and his eyes narrowed. He scented
+opposition, and the greatest stumbling-block in Garnache’s career had
+been that he could never learn to brook opposition from any man. That
+characteristic, evinced early in life, had all but been the ruin of him.
+He was a man of high intellectual gifts, of military skill and great
+resource; out of consideration for which had he been chosen by Marie de
+Medicis to come upon this errand. But he marred it all by a temper so
+ungovernable that in Paris there was current a byword, “Explosive as
+Garnache.”
+
+Little did Tressan dream to what a cask of gunpowder he was applying the
+match of his smug pertness. Nor did Garnache let him dream it just yet.
+He controlled himself betimes, bethinking him that, after all, there
+might be some reason in what this fat fellow said.
+
+“You misapprehend my purpose, sir,” said he, his lean brown hand
+stroking his long chin. “I but sought to learn how far already you may
+be informed of what is taking place up there, to the end that I may
+spare myself the pains of citing facts with which already you are
+acquainted. Still, monsieur, I am willing to proceed upon the lines
+which would appear to be more agreeable to yourself.
+
+“This, then, is the sum of the affair that brings me: The late Marquis
+de Condillac left two sons. The elder, Florimond--who is the present
+marquis, and who has been and still continues absent, warring in Italy,
+since before his father’s death--is the stepson of the present Dowager,
+she being the mother of the younger son, Marius de Condillac.
+
+“Should you observe me to be anywhere at error, I beg, monsieur, that
+you will have the complaisance to correct me.”
+
+The Seneschal bowed gravely, and Monsieur de Garnache continued:
+
+“Now this younger son--I believe that he is in his twenty-first year at
+present--has been something of a scapegrace.”
+
+“A scapegrace? Bon Dieu, no. That is a harsh name to give him. A little
+indiscreet at times, a little rash, as is the way of youth.”
+
+He would have said more, but the man from Paris was of no mind to waste
+time on quibbles.
+
+“Very well,” he snapped, cutting in. “We will say, a little indiscreet.
+My errand is not concerned with Monsieur Marius’s morals or with his
+lack of them. These indiscretions which you belittle appear to have been
+enough to have estranged him from his father, a circumstance which but
+served the more to endear him to his mother. I am told that she is a
+very handsome woman, and that the boy favours her surprisingly.”
+
+“Ah!” sighed the Seneschal in a rapture. “A beautiful woman--a noble,
+splendid woman.’
+
+“Hum!” Garnache observed the ecstatic simper with a grim eye. Then he
+proceeded with his story.
+
+“The late marquis possessed in his neighbour, the also deceased Monsieur
+de La Vauvraye, a very dear and valued friend. Monsieur de La Vauvraye
+had an only child, a daughter, to inherit his very considerable estates
+probably the wealthiest in all Dauphiny, so I am informed. It was
+the dearest wish of his heart to transform what had been a lifelong
+friendship in his own generation into a closer relationship in the
+next--a wish that found a very ready echo in the heart of Monsieur de
+Condillac. Florimond de Condillac was sixteen years of age at the time,
+and Valerie de La Vauvraye fourteen. For all their tender years, they
+were betrothed, and they grew up to love each other and to look forward
+to the consummation of the plans their fathers had laid for them.”
+
+“Monsieur, monsieur,” the Seneschal protested, “how can you possibly
+infer so much? How can you say that they loved each other? What
+authority can you have for pretending to know what was in their inmost
+hearts?”
+
+“The authority of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye,” was the unanswerable
+rejoinder. “I am telling you, more or less, what she herself wrote to
+the Queen.”
+
+“Ah! Well, well--proceed, monsieur.”
+
+“This marriage should render Florimond de Condillac the wealthiest and
+most powerful gentleman in Dauphiny--one of the wealthiest in France;
+and the idea of it pleased the old marquis, inasmuch as the disparity
+there would be between the worldly possessions of his two sons would
+serve to mark his disapproval of the younger. But before settling down,
+Florimond signified a desire to see the world, as was fit and proper
+and becoming in a young man who was later to assume such wide
+responsibilities. His father, realizing the wisdom of such a step, made
+but slight objection, and at the age of twenty Florimond set out for the
+Italian wars. Two years afterwards, a little over six months ago, his
+father died, and was followed to the grave some weeks later by Monsieur
+de La Vauvraye. The latter, with a want of foresight which has given
+rise to the present trouble, misjudging the character of the Dowager
+of Condillac, entrusted to her care his daughter Valerie pending
+Florimond’s return, when the nuptials would naturally be immediately
+celebrated. I am probably telling you no more than you already know.
+But you owe the infliction to your own unwillingness to answer my
+questions.”
+
+“No, no, monsieur; I assure you that in what you say there is much that
+is entirely new to me.”
+
+“I rejoice to hear it, Monsieur de Tressan,” said Garnache very
+seriously, “for had you been in possession of all these facts, Her
+Majesty might have a right to learn how it chanced that you had nowise
+interfered in what is toward at Condillac.
+
+“But to proceed: Madame de Condillac and her precious Benjamin--this
+Marius--finding themselves, in Florimond’s absence, masters of the
+situation, have set about turning it to their own best advantage.
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, whilst being nominally under their
+guardianship, finds herself practically gaoled by them, and odious plans
+are set before her to marry Marius. Could the Dowager but accomplish
+this, it would seem that she would not only be assuring a future of
+ease and dignity for her son, but also be giving vent to all her pent-up
+hatred of her stepson.
+
+“Mademoiselle, however, withstands them, and in this she is aided by
+a fortuitous circumstance which has arisen out of the overbearing
+arrogance that appears to be madame’s chief characteristic. Condillac
+after the marquis’s death had refused to pay tithes to Mother Church
+and has flouted and insulted the Bishop. This prelate, after finding
+remonstrance vain, has retorted by placing Condillac under an Interdict,
+depriving all within it of the benefit of clergy. Thus, they have been
+unable to find a priest to venture thither, so that even had they willed
+to marry mademoiselle by force to Marius, they lacked the actual means
+of doing so.
+
+“Florimond continues absent. We have every reason to believe that he has
+been left in ignorance of his father’s death. Letters coming from him
+from time to time prove that he was alive and well at least until three
+months ago. A messenger has been dispatched to find him and urge him to
+return home at once. But pending his arrival the Queen has determined
+to take the necessary steps to ensure that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye
+shall be released from her captivity, that she shall suffer no further
+molestation at the hands of Madame de Condillac and her son--enfin, that
+she shall run no further risks.
+
+“My errand, monsieur, is to acquaint you with these facts, and to
+request you to proceed to Condillac and deliver thence Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye, whom I am subsequently to escort to Paris and place under
+Her Majesty’s protection until such time as the new marquis shall return
+to claim her.”
+
+Having concluded, Monsieur de Garnache sat back in his chair, and threw
+one leg over the other, fixing his eyes upon the Seneschal’s face and
+awaiting his reply.
+
+On that gross countenance before him he saw fall the shadow of
+perplexity. Tressan was monstrous ill-at-ease, and his face lost a good
+deal of its habitual plethora of colour. He sought to temporize.
+
+“Does it not occur to you, monsieur, that perhaps too much importance
+may have been attached to the word of this child--this Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye?”
+
+“Does it occur to you that such has been the case, that she has
+overstated it?” counter-questioned Monsieur de Garnache.
+
+“No, no. I do not say that. But--but--would it not be
+better--more--ah--satisfactory to all concerned, if you yourself were
+to go to Condillac, and deliver your message in person, demanding
+mademoiselle?”
+
+The man from Paris looked at him a moment, then stood up suddenly, and
+shifted the carriages of his sword back to their normal position. His
+brows came together in a frown, from which the Seneschal argued that his
+suggestion was not well received.
+
+“Monsieur,” said the Parisian very coldly, like a man who contains a
+rising anger, “let me tell you that this is the first time in my life
+that I have been concerned in anything that had to do with women and I
+am close upon forty years of age. The task, I can assure you, was little
+to my taste. I embarked upon it because, being a soldier and having
+received my orders, I was in the unfortunate position of being unable to
+help myself. But I intend, monsieur, to adhere rigidly to the letter of
+these commands. Already I have endured more than enough in the interests
+of this damsel. I have ridden from Paris, and that means close upon a
+week in the saddle--no little thing to a man who has acquired certain
+habits of life and developed a taste for certain minor comforts which he
+is very reluctant to forgo. I have fed and slept at inns, living on the
+worst of fares and sleeping on the hardest, and hardly the cleanest, of
+beds. Ventregris! Figure to yourself that last night we lay at Luzan,
+in the only inn the place contained--a hovel, Monsieur le Seneschal, a
+hovel in which I would not kennel a dog I loved.”
+
+His face flushed, and his voice rose as he dwelt upon the things he had
+undergone.
+
+“My servant and I slept in a dormitory’--a thousand devils! monsieur, in
+a dormitory! Do you realize it? We had for company a drunken vintner,
+a pedlar, a pilgrim on his way to Rome, and two peasant women; and
+they sent us to bed without candles, for modesty’s sake. I ask you to
+conceive my feelings in such a case as that. I could tell you more; but
+that as a sample of what I have undergone could scarcely be surpassed.”
+
+“Truly-truly outrageous,” sympathized the Seneschal; yet he grinned.
+
+“I ask you--have I not suffered inconvenience enough already in the
+service of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye that you can blame me if I refuse
+to go a single step further than my orders bid me?”
+
+The Seneschal stared at him now in increasing dismay. Had his own
+interests been less at issue he could have indulged his mirth at the
+other’s fiery indignation at the inconveniences he recited. As it was,
+he had nothing to say; no thought or feeling other than what concerned
+finding a way of escape from the net that seemed to be closing in about
+him--how to seem to serve the Queen without turning against the Dowager
+of Condillac; how to seem to serve the Dowager without opposing the
+wishes of the Queen.
+
+“A plague on the girl!” he growled, unconsciously uttering his thoughts
+aloud. “The devil take her!”
+
+Garnache smiled grimly. “That is a bond of sympathy between us,” said
+he. “I have said those very words a hundred times--a thousand times,
+indeed--between Paris and Grenoble. Yet I scarcely see that you can damn
+her with as much justice as can I.
+
+“But there, monsieur; all this is unprofitable. You have my message. I
+shall spend the day at Grenoble, and take a well-earned rest. By this
+time to-morrow I shall be ready to start upon my return journey. I
+shall have then the honour to wait upon you again, to the end that I
+may receive from you the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. I shall
+count upon your having her here, in readiness to set out with me, by
+noon to-morrow.”
+
+He bowed, with a flourish of his plumed hat, and would with that have
+taken his departure but that the Seneschal stayed him.
+
+“Monsieur, monsieur,” he cried, in piteous affright, “you do not know
+the Dowager of Condillac.”
+
+“Why, no. What of it?”
+
+“What of it? Did you know her, you would understand that she is not the
+woman to be driven. I may order her in the Queen’s name to deliver up
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But she will withstand me.”
+
+“Withstand you?” echoed Garnache, frowning into the face of this fat
+man, who had risen also, brought to his feet by excitement. “Withstand
+you--you, the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny? You are amusing yourself at my
+expense.”
+
+“But I tell you that she will,” the other insisted in a passion. “You
+may look for the girl in vain tomorrow unless you go to Condillac
+yourself and take her.”
+
+Garnache drew himself up and delivered his answer in a tone that was
+final.
+
+“You are the governor of the province, monsieur, and in this matter you
+have in addition the Queen’s particular authority--nay, her commands are
+imposed upon you. Those commands, as interpreted by me, you will execute
+in the manner I have indicated.”
+
+The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and chewed a second at his beard.
+
+“It is an easy thing for you to tell me what to do. Tell me, rather, how
+to do it, how to overcome her opposition.”
+
+“You are very sure of opposition--strangely sure, monsieur,” said
+Garnache, looking him between the eyes. “In any case, you have
+soldiers.”
+
+“And so has she, and the strongest castle in southern France--to say
+nothing of the most cursed obstinacy in the world. What she says, she
+does.”
+
+“And what the Queen says her loyal servants do,” was Garnache’s
+rejoinder, in a withering tone. “I think there is nothing more to be
+said, monsieur,” he added. “By this time to-morrow I shall expect to
+receive from you, here, the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. A
+demain, donc, Monsieur le Seneschal.”
+
+And with another bow the man from Paris drew himself erect, turned on
+his heel, and went jingling and creaking from the room.
+
+The Lord Seneschal sank back in his chair, and wondered to himself
+whether to die might not prove an easy way out of the horrid situation
+into which chance and his ill-starred tenderness for the Dowager of
+Condillac had thrust him.
+
+At his desk sat his secretary, who had been a witness of the interview,
+lost in wonder almost as great as the Seneschal’s own.
+
+For an hour Tressan remained where he was, deep in thought and gnawing
+at his beard. Then with a sudden burst of passion, expressed in a round
+oath or two, he rose, and called for his horse that he might ride to
+Condillac.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. THE DOWAGER’S COMPLIANCE
+
+Promptly at noon on the morrow Monsieur de Garnache presented himself
+once more at the Seneschal’s palace, and with him went Rabecque, his
+body-servant, a lean, swarthy, sharp-faced man, a trifle younger than
+his master.
+
+Anselme, the obese master of the household, received them with profound
+respect, and at once conducted Garnache to Monsieur de Tressan’s
+presence.
+
+On the stairs they met Captain d’Aubran, who was descending. The captain
+was not in the best of humours. For four-and-twenty hours he had kept
+two hundred of his men under arms, ready to march as soon as he should
+receive his orders from the Lord Seneschal, yet those instructions were
+not forthcoming. He had been to seek them again that morning, only to be
+again put off.
+
+Monsieur de Garnache had considerable doubt, born of his yesterday’s
+interview with the Seneschal, that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye would
+be delivered into his charge as he had stipulated. His relief was,
+therefore, considerable, upon being ushered into Tressan’s presence,
+to find a lady in cloak and hat, dressed as for a journey, seated in a
+chair by the great fireplace.
+
+Tressan advanced to meet him, a smile of cordial welcome on his lips,
+and they bowed to each other in formal greeting.
+
+“You see, monsieur,” said the Seneschal, waving a plump hand in the
+direction of the lady, “that you have been obeyed. Here is your charge.”
+
+Then to the lady: “This is Monsieur de Garnache,” he announced, “of whom
+I have already told you, who is to conduct you to Paris by order of Her
+Majesty.
+
+“And now, my good friends, however great the pleasure I derive from your
+company, I care not how soon you set out, for I have some prodigious
+arrears of work upon my hands.”
+
+Garnache bowed to the lady, who returned his greeting by an inclination
+of the head, and his keen eyes played briskly over her. She was a
+plump-faced, insipid child, with fair hair and pale blue eyes, stolid
+and bovine in their expressionlessness.
+
+“I am quite ready, monsieur,” said she, rising as she spoke, and
+gathering her cloak about her; and Garnache remarked that her voice had
+the southern drawl, her words the faintest suggestion of a patois. It
+was amazing how a lady born and bred could degenerate in the rusticity
+of Dauphiny. Pigs and cows, he made no doubt, had been her chief
+objectives. Yet, even so, he thought he might have expected that she
+would have had more to say to him than just those five words expressing
+her readiness to depart. He had looked for some acknowledgment of
+satisfaction at his presence, some utterances of gratitude either to
+himself or to the Queen-Regent for the promptness with which she had
+been succoured. He was disappointed, but he showed nothing of it, as
+with a simple inclination of the head--
+
+“Good!” said he. “Since you are ready and Monsieur le Seneschal is
+anxious to be rid of us, let us by all means be moving. You have a long
+and tedious journey before you, mademoiselle.”
+
+“I--I am prepared for that,” she faltered.
+
+He stood aside, and bending from the waist he made a sweeping gesture
+towards the door with the hand that held his hat. To the invitation to
+precede him she readily responded, and, with a bow to the Seneschal, she
+began to walk across the apartment.
+
+Garnache’s eyes, narrowing slightly, followed her, like points of steel.
+Suddenly he shot a disturbing glance at Tressan’s face, and the corner
+of his wild-cat mustachios twitched. He stood erect, and called her very
+sharply.
+
+“Mademoiselle!”
+
+She stopped, and turned to face him, an incredible shyness seeming to
+cause her to avoid his gaze.
+
+“You have, no doubt, Monsieur le Seneschal’s word for my identity. But
+I think it is as well that you should satisfy yourself. Before placing
+yourself entirely in my care, as you are about to do, you would be well
+advised to assure yourself, that I am indeed Her Majesty’s emissary.
+Will you be good enough to glance at this?”
+
+He drew forth as he spoke the letter in the queen’s own hand, turned
+it upside down, and so presented it to her. The Seneschal looked on
+stolidly, a few paces distant.
+
+“But certainly, mademoiselle, assure yourself that this gentleman is no
+other than I have told you.”
+
+Thus enjoined, she took the letter; for a second her eyes met Garnache’s
+glittering gaze, and she shivered. Then she bent her glance to the
+writing, and studied it a moment, what time the man from Paris watched
+her closely.
+
+Presently she handed it back to him.
+
+“Thank you, monsieur,” was all she said.
+
+“You are satisfied that it is in order, mademoiselle?” he inquired, and
+a note of mockery too subtle for her or the Seneschal ran through his
+question.
+
+“I am quite satisfied.”
+
+Garnache turned to Tressan. His eyes were smiling, but unpleasantly,
+and in his voice when he spoke there was something akin to the distant
+rumble that heralds an approaching storm.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” said he, “has received an eccentric education.”
+
+“Eh?” quoth Tressan, perplexed.
+
+“I have heard tell, monsieur, of a people somewhere in the East who
+read and write from right to left; but never yet have I heard tell of
+any--particularly in France--so oddly schooled as to do their reading
+upside down.”
+
+Tressan caught the drift of the other’s meaning. He paled a little,
+and sucked his lip, his eyes wandering to the girl, who stood in stolid
+inapprehension of what was being said.
+
+“Did she do that?” said he, and he scarcely knew what he was saying;
+all that he realized was that it urged him to explain this thing.
+“Mademoiselle’s education has been neglected--a by no means uncommon
+happening in these parts. She is sensitive of it; she seeks to hide the
+fact.”
+
+Then the storm broke about their heads. And it crashed and thundered
+awfully in the next few minutes.
+
+“O liar! O damned, audacious liar,” roared Garnache uncompromisingly,
+advancing a step upon the Seneschal, and shaking the parchment
+threateningly in his very face, as though it were become a weapon of
+offence. “Was it to hide the fact that she had not been taught to write
+that she sent the Queen a letter pages-long? Who is this woman?” And the
+finger he pointed at the girl quivered with the rage that filled him at
+this trick they had thought to put upon him.
+
+Tressan sought refuge in offended dignity. He drew himself up, threw
+back his head, and looked the Parisian fiercely in the eye.
+
+“Since you take this tone with me, monsieur--”
+
+“I take with you--as with any man--the tone that to me seems best. You
+miserable fool! As sure as you’re a rogue this affair shall cost you
+your position. You have waxed fat and sleek in your seneschalship; this
+easy life in Dauphiny appears to have been well suited to your health.
+But as your paunch has grown, so, of a truth, have your brains dwindled,
+else had you never thought to cheat me quite so easily.
+
+“Am I some lout who has spent his days herding swine, think you, that
+you could trick me into believing this creature to be Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye--this creature with the mien of a peasant, with a breath
+reeking of garlic like a third-rate eating-house, and the walk of a
+woman who has never known footgear until this moment? Tell me, sir, for
+what manner of fool did you take me?”
+
+The Seneschal stood with blanched face and gaping mouth, his fire all
+turned to ashes before the passion of this gaunt man.
+
+Garnache paid no heed to him. He stepped to the girl, and roughly raised
+her chin with his hand so that she was forced to look him in the face.
+
+“What is your name, wench?” he asked her.
+
+“Margot,” she blubbered, bursting into tears.
+
+He dropped her chin, and turned away with a gesture of disgust.
+
+“Get you gone,” he bade her harshly. “Get you back to the kitchen or the
+onion-field from which they took you.”
+
+And the girl, scarce believing her good fortune, departed with a speed
+that bordered on the ludicrous. Tressan had naught to say, no word to
+stay her with; pretence, he realized, was vain.
+
+“Now, my Lord Seneschal,” quoth Garnache, arms akimbo, feet planted
+wide, and eyes upon the wretched man’s countenance, “what may you have
+to say to me?”
+
+Tressan shifted his position; he avoided the other’s glance; he was
+visibly trembling, and when presently he spoke it was in faltering
+accents.
+
+“It--it--seems, monsieur, that--ah--that I have been the victim of some
+imposture.”
+
+“It had rather seemed to me that the victim chosen was myself.”
+
+“Clearly we were both victims,” the Seneschal rejoined. Then he
+proceeded to explain. “I went to Condillac yesterday as you desired me,
+and after a stormy interview with the Marquise I obtained from her--as
+I believed--the person of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. You see I was not
+myself acquainted with the lady.”
+
+Garnache looked at him. He did not believe him. He regretted almost that
+he had not further questioned the girl. But, after all, perhaps it
+might be easier and more expedient if he were to appear to accept the
+Seneschal’s statement. But he must provide against further fraud.
+
+“Monsieur le Seneschal,” said he in calmer tones, putting his anger
+from him, “at the best you are a blunderer and an ass, at the worst
+a traitor. I will inquire no further at present; I’ll not seek to
+discriminate too finely.”
+
+“Monsieur, these insults--” began the Seneschal, summoning dignity to
+his aid. But Garnache broke in:
+
+“La, la! I speak in the Queen’s name. If you have thought to aid the
+Dowager of Condillac in this resistance of Her Majesty’s mandate, let
+me enjoin you, as you value your seneschalship--as you value your very
+neck--to harbour that thought no longer.
+
+“It seems that, after all, I must deal myself with the situation. I must
+go myself to Condillac. If they should resist me, I shall look to you
+for the necessary means to overcome that resistance.
+
+“And bear you this in mind: I have chosen to leave it an open question
+whether you were a party to the trick it has been sought to put upon the
+Queen, through me, her representative. But it is a question that I have
+it in my power to resolve at any moment--to resolve as I choose.
+Unless, monsieur, I find you hereafter--as I trust--actuated by the most
+unswerving loyalty, I shall resolve that question by proclaiming you
+a traitor; and as a traitor I shall arrest you and carry you to Paris.
+Monsieur le Seneschal, I have the honour to give you good-day!”
+
+When he was gone, Monsieur de Tressan flung off his wig, and mopped the
+perspiration from his brow. He went white as snow and red as fire by
+turns, as he paced the apartment in a frenzy. Never in the fifteen
+years that were sped since he had been raised to the governorship of
+the province had any man taken such a tone with him and harangued him in
+such terms.
+
+A liar and a traitor had he been called that morning, a knave and a
+fool; he had been browbeaten and threatened; and he had swallowed it
+all, and almost turned to lick the hand that administered the dose.
+Dame! What manner of cur was he become? And the man who had done
+all this--a vulgar upstart out of Paris, reeking of leather and the
+barrack-room still lived!
+
+Bloodshed was in his mind; murder beckoned him alluringly to take her as
+his ally. But he put the thought from him, frenzied though he might be.
+He must fight this knave with other weapons; frustrate his mission, and
+send him back to Paris and the Queen’s scorn, beaten and empty-handed.
+
+“Babylas!” he shouted.
+
+Immediately the secretary appeared.
+
+“Have you given thought to the matter of Captain d’Aubran?” he asked,
+his voice an impatient snarl.
+
+“Yes, monsieur, I have pondered it all morning.”
+
+“Well? And what have you concluded?”
+
+“Helas! monsieur, nothing.”
+
+Tressan smote the table before him a blow that shook some of the dust
+out of the papers that cumbered it. “Ventregris! How am I served? For
+what do I pay you, and feed you, and house you, good-for-naught, if you
+are to fail me whenever I need the things you call your brains? Have you
+no intelligence, no thought, no imagination? Can you invent no plausible
+business, no likely rising, no possible disturbances that shall justify
+my sending Aubran and his men to Montelimar--to the very devil, if need
+be.”
+
+The secretary trembled in his every limb; his eyes shunned his master’s
+as his master’s had shunned Garnache’s awhile ago. The Seneschal was
+enjoying himself. If he had been bullied and browbeaten, here, at least,
+was one upon whom he, in his turn, might taste the joys of bullying and
+browbeating.
+
+“You lazy, miserable calf,” he stormed, “I might be better served by
+a wooden image. Go! It seems I must rely upon myself. It is always so.
+Wait!” he thundered; for the secretary, only too glad to obey his last
+order, had already reached the door. “Tell Anselme to bid the Captain
+attend me here at once.”
+
+Babylas’s bowed and went his errand.
+
+A certain amount of his ill-humour vented, Tressan made an effort to
+regain his self-control. He passed his handkerchief for the last time
+over face and head, and resumed his wig.
+
+When d’Aubran entered, the Seneschal was composed and in his wonted
+habit of ponderous dignity. “Ah, d’Aubran,” said he, “your men are
+ready?”
+
+“They have been ready these four-and-twenty hours, monsieur.”
+
+“Good. You are a brisk soldier, d’Aubran. You are a man to be relied
+upon.”
+
+D’Aubran bowed. He was a tall, active young fellow with a pleasant face
+and a pair of fine black eyes.
+
+“Monsieur le Seneschal is very good.”
+
+With a wave of the hand the Seneschal belittled his own goodness.
+
+“You will march out of Grenoble within the hour, Captain, and you will
+lead your men to Montelimar. There you will quarter them, and await
+my further orders. Babylas will give you a letter to the authorities,
+charging them to find you suitable quarters. While there, d’Aubran, and
+until my further orders reach you, you will employ your time in probing
+the feeling in the hill district. You understand?”
+
+“Imperfectly,” d’Aubran confessed.
+
+“You will understand better when you have been in Montelimar a week or
+so. It may, of course, be a false alarm. Still, we must safeguard the
+King’s interests and be prepared. Perhaps we may afterwards be charged
+with starting at shadows; but it is better to be on the alert from the
+moment the shadow is perceived than to wait until the substance itself
+has overwhelmed us.”
+
+It sounded so very much as if the Seneschal’s words really had some
+hidden meaning, that d’Aubran, if not content with going upon an errand
+of which he knew so little, was, at least, reconciled to obey the orders
+he received. He uttered words that conveyed some such idea to Tressan’s
+mind, and within a half-hour he was marching out of Grenoble with
+beating drums, on his two days’ journey to Montelimar.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+
+As Captain d’Aubran and his troop were speeding westwards from Grenoble,
+Monsieur de Garnache, ever attended by his man, rode briskly in the
+opposite direction, towards the grey towers of Condillac, that reared
+themselves towards the greyer sky above the valley of the Isere. It was
+a chill, dull, autumnal day, with a raw wind blowing from the Alps; its
+breath was damp, and foretold of the rain that was likely to come anon,
+the rain with which the clouds hanging low about the distant hills were
+pregnant.
+
+But Monsieur de Garnache was totally insensible to his surroundings; his
+mind was very busy with the interview from which he had come, and
+the interview to which he was speeding. Once he permitted himself a
+digression, that he might point a moral for the benefit of his servant.
+
+“You see, Rebecque, what a plague it is to have to do with women. Are
+you sufficiently grateful to me for having quelled your matrimonial
+ardour of two months ago? No, you are not. Grateful you may be;
+sufficiently grateful, never; it would be impossible. No gratitude could
+be commensurate with the benefit I conferred upon you. Yet if you had
+married, and discovered for yourself the troubles that come from too
+close an association with that sex which some wag of old ironically
+called the weaker, and of which contemporary fools with no sense of
+irony continue so to speak in good faith, you could have blamed only
+yourself. You would have shrugged your shoulders and made the best of
+it, realizing that no other man had put this wrong upon you. But with
+me--thousand devils!--it is very different. I am a man who, in one
+particular at least, has chosen his way of life with care; I have seen
+to it that I should walk a road unencumbered by any petticoat. What
+happens? What comes of all my careful plans?
+
+“Fate sends an infernal cut-throat to murder our good king--whose soul
+God rest eternally! And since his son is of an age too tender to wield
+the sceptre, the boy’s mother does it in his name. Thus, I, a soldier,
+being subject to the head of the State, find myself, by no devising of
+my own, subject to a woman.
+
+“In itself that is bad enough. Too bad, indeed--Ventregris!--too bad.
+Yet Fate is not content. It must occur to this woman to select me--me
+of all men--to journey into Dauphiny, and release another woman from
+the clutches of yet a third. And to what shifts are we not put, to what
+discomforts not subjected? You know them, Rabecque, for you have shared
+them with me. But it begins to break upon my mind that what we have
+endured may be as nothing to what may lie before us. It is an ill thing
+to have to do with women. Yet you, Rabecque, would have deserted me for
+one of them!”
+
+Rabecque was silent. Maybe he was ashamed of himself; or maybe that,
+not agreeing with his master, he had yet sufficient appreciation of
+his position to be discreetly silent where his opinions might be at
+variance. Thus Garnache was encouraged to continue.
+
+“And what is all this trouble about, which they have sent me to set
+right? About a marriage. There is a girl wants to marry one man, and
+a woman who wants to marry her to another. Ponder the possibilities of
+tragedy in such a situation. Half this world’s upheavals have had their
+source in less. Yet you, Rabecque, would have married!”
+
+Necessity at last turned his discourse to other matters.
+
+“Tell me, now,” said he abruptly, in a different tone, “is there
+hereabouts a ford?”
+
+“There is a bridge up yonder, monsieur,” returned the servant, thankful
+to have the conversation changed.
+
+They rode towards it in silence, Garnache’s eyes set now upon the grey
+pile that crowned the hillock, a half-mile away, on the opposite bank of
+the stream. They crossed the bridge and rode up the gently rising, bare,
+and rugged ground towards Condillac. The place wore an entirely peaceful
+air, strong and massive though it appeared. It was encircled by a ditch,
+but the drawbridge was down, and the rust on its chains argued that long
+had it been so.
+
+None coming to challenge them, the pair rode across the planks, and
+the dull thud of their hooves started into activity some one in the
+gatehouse.
+
+A fellow rudely clad--a hybrid between man-at-arms and lackey--lounged
+on a musket to confront them in the gateway. Monsieur de Garnache
+announced his name, adding that he came to crave an audience of Madame
+la Marquise, and the man stood aside to admit him. Thus he and Rabecque
+rode forward into the roughly paved courtyard.
+
+From several doorways other men emerged, some of martial bearing,
+showing that the place was garrisoned to some extent. Garnache took
+little heed of them. He flung his reins to the man whom he had first
+addressed--the fellow had kept pace beside him--and leapt nimbly to the
+ground, bidding Rabecque await him there.
+
+The soldier lackey resigned the reins to Rabecque, and requested
+Monsieur de Garnache to follow him. He led the way through a door on
+the left, down a passage and across an anteroom, and ushered the visitor
+finally into a spacious, gloomy hall, panelled in black oak and lighted
+as much by the piled-up fire that flared on the noble hearth as by the
+grey daylight that filtered through the tall mullioned windows.
+
+As they entered, a liver-coloured hound that lay stretched before the
+fire growled lazily, and showed the whites of his eyes. Paying little
+attention to the dog, Garnache looked about him. The apartment was
+handsome beyond praise, in a sombre, noble fashion. It was hung
+with pictures of departed Condillacs--some of them rudely wrought
+enough--with trophies of ancient armour, and with implements of the
+chase. In the centre stood an oblong table of black oak, very richly
+carved about its massive legs, and in a china bowl, on this, an armful
+of late roses filled the room with their sweet fragrance.
+
+Then Garnache espied a page on the window-seat, industriously burnishing
+a cuirass. He pursued his task, indifferent to the newcomer’s advent,
+until the knave who had conducted thither the Parisian called the boy
+and bade him go tell the Marquise that a Monsieur de Garnache, with a
+message from the Queen-Regent, begged an audience.
+
+The boy rose, and simultaneously, out of a great chair by the hearth,
+whose tall back had hitherto concealed him, there rose another figure.
+This was a stripling of some twenty summers--twenty-one, in fact--of
+a pale, beautifully featured face, black hair and fine black eyes, and
+very sumptuously clad in a suit of shimmering silk whose colour shifted
+from green to purple as he moved.
+
+Monsieur de Garnache assumed that he was in the presence of Marius de
+Condillac. He bowed a trifle stiffly, and was surprised to have his bow
+returned with a graciousness that amounted almost to cordiality.
+
+“You are from Paris, monsieur?” said the young man, in a gentle,
+pleasant voice. “I fear you have had indifferent weather for your
+journey.”
+
+Garnache thought of other things besides the weather that he had found
+indifferent, and he felt warmed almost to the point of anger at the very
+recollection. But he bowed again, and answered amiably enough.
+
+The young man offered him a seat, assuring him that his mother would not
+keep him waiting long. The page had already gone upon his errand.
+
+Garnache took the proffered chair, and sank down with creak and jingle
+to warm himself at the fire.
+
+“From what you have said, I gather that you are Monsieur Marius de
+Condillac,” said he. “I, as you may have heard me announced by your
+servant, am Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache--at your service.”
+
+“We have heard of you, Monsieur de Garnache,” said the youth as he
+crossed his shapely legs of silken violet, and fingered the great pearl
+that depended from his ear. “But we had thought that by now you would be
+on your way to Paris.”
+
+“No doubt--with Margot,” was the grim rejoinder.
+
+But Marius either gathered no suggestion from its grimness, or did not
+know the name Garnache uttered, for he continued:
+
+“We understood that you were to escort Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to
+Paris, to place her under the tutelage of the Queen-Regent. I will not
+conceal from you that we were chagrined at the reflection cast upon
+Condillac; nevertheless, Her Majesty’s word is law in Dauphiny as much
+as it is in Paris.”
+
+“Quite as much, and I am relieved to hear you confess it,” said Garnache
+drily, and he scanned more closely the face of this young man. He found
+cause to modify the excellent impression he had received at first.
+Marius’s eyebrows were finely pencilled, but they arched a shade too
+much, and his eyes were set a trifle too closely; the mouth, which
+had seemed beautiful at first, looked, in addition, on this closer
+inspection, weak, sensual, and cruel.
+
+There fell upon the momentary silence the sound of an opening door, and
+both men rose simultaneously to their feet.
+
+In the splendid woman that entered, Monsieur de Garnache saw a wonderful
+likeness to the boy who stood beside him. She received the emissary very
+graciously. Marius set a chair for her between the two they had been
+occupying, and thus interchanging phrases of agreeable greeting the
+three sat down about the hearth with every show of the greatest amity.
+
+A younger man might have been put out of countenance; the woman’s
+surpassing beauty, her charm of manner, her melodious voice, falling
+on the ear soft and gentle as a caress, might have turned a man of less
+firmness a little from his purpose, a little perhaps from his loyalty
+and the duty that had brought him all the way from Paris. But Monsieur
+de Garnache was to her thousand graces as insensible as a man of stone.
+And he came to business briskly. He had no mind to spend the day at her
+fireside in pleasant, meaningless talk.
+
+“Madame,” said he, “monsieur your son informs me that you have heard of
+me and of the business that brings me into Dauphiny. I had not looked
+for the honour of journeying quite so far as Condillac; but since
+Monsieur de Tressan, whom I made my ambassador, appears to have failed
+so signally, I am constrained to inflict my presence upon you.”
+
+“Inflict?” quoth she, with a pretty look of make-believe dismay. “How
+harsh a word, monsieur!”
+
+The smoothness of the implied compliment annoyed him.
+
+“I will use any word you think more adequate, madame, if you will
+suggest it,” he answered tartly.
+
+“There are a dozen I might suggest that would better fit the case--and
+with more justice to yourself,” she answered, with a smile that revealed
+a gleam of white teeth behind her scarlet lips. “Marcus, bid Benoit
+bring wine. Monsieur de Garnache will no doubt be thirsting after his
+ride.”
+
+Garnache said nothing. Acknowledge the courtesy he would not; refuse it
+he could not. So he sat, and waited for her to speak, his eyes upon the
+fire.
+
+Madame had already set herself a course. Keener witted than her son, she
+had readily understood, upon Garnache’s being announced to her, that his
+visit meant the failure of the imposture by which she had sought to be
+rid of him.
+
+“I think, monsieur,” she said presently, watching him from under her
+lids, “that we have, all of us who are concerned in Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye’s affairs, been at cross-purposes. She is an impetuous,
+impulsive child, and it happened that some little time ago we had
+words--such things will happen in the most united families. Whilst the
+heat of her foolish anger was upon her, she wrote a letter to the
+Queen, in which she desired to be removed from my tutelage. Since then,
+monsieur, she has come to repent her of it. You, who no doubt understand
+a woman’s mind--”
+
+“Set out upon no such presumption, madame,” he interrupted. “I know as
+little of a woman’s mind as any man who thinks he knows a deal--and that
+is nothing.”
+
+She laughed as at an excellent jest, and Marius, overhearing Garnache’s
+retort as he was returning to resume his seat, joined in her laugh.
+
+“Paris is a fine whetstone for a man’s wits,” said he.
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“I take it, madame, that you wish me to understand that Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye, repenting of her letter, desires no longer to repair to
+Paris; desires, in fact, to remain here at Condillac in your excellent
+care.”
+
+“You apprehend the position exactly, monsieur.”
+
+“To my mind,” said he, “it presents few features difficult of
+apprehension.”
+
+Marius’s eyes flashed his mother a look of relief; but the Marquise, who
+had an ear more finely trained, caught the vibration of a second meaning
+in the emissary’s words.
+
+“All being as you say, madame,” he continued, “will you tell me why,
+instead of some message to this purport, you sent Monsieur de Tressan
+back to me with a girl taken from some kitchen or barnyard, whom it was
+sought to pass off upon me as Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye?”
+
+The Marquise laughed, and her son, who had shown signs of perturbation,
+taking his cue from her, laughed too.
+
+“It was a jest, monsieur”--she told him, miserably conscious that the
+explanation could sound no lamer.
+
+“My compliments, madame, upon the humour that prevails in Dauphiny. But
+your jest failed of its purpose. It did not amuse me, nor, so far as I
+could discern, was Monsieur de Tressan greatly taken with it. But all
+this is of little moment, madame,” he continued. “Since you tell me that
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye is content to remain here, I am satisfied
+that it is so.”
+
+They were the very words that she desired to hear from him; yet his
+manner of uttering them gave her little reassurance. The smile on her
+lips was forced; her watchful eyes smiled not at all.
+
+“Still,” he continued, “you will be so good as to remember that I am not
+my own master in this affair. Were that so, I should not fail to relieve
+you at once of my unbidden presence.”
+
+“Oh, monsieur--”
+
+“But, being the Queen’s emissary, I have her orders to obey, and those
+orders are to convey Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to Paris. They make
+no allowance for any change that may have occurred in mademoiselle’s
+inclinations. If the journey is now distasteful to her, she has but her
+own rashness to blame in having sought it herself. What imports is that
+she is bidden by the Queen to repair to Paris; as a loyal subject she
+must obey the Queen’s commands; you, as a loyal subject, must see to
+it that she obeys them. So, madame, I count upon your influence with
+mademoiselle to see that she is ready to set out by noon to-morrow.
+One day already has been wasted me by your--ah--jest, madame. The Queen
+likes her ambassadors to be brisk.”
+
+The Dowager reclined in her chair, and bit her lip. This man was too
+keen for her. She had no illusions. He had seen through her as if she
+had been made of glass; he had penetrated her artifices and detected
+her falsehoods. Yet feigning to believe her and them, he had first
+neutralized her only weapons--other than offensive--then used them for
+her own defeat. Marius it was who took up the conversation.
+
+“Monsieur,” he cried--and there was a frown drawing together his fine
+brows--“what you suggest amounts to a tyranny on the Queen’s part.”
+
+Garnache was on his feet, his chair grating the polished floor.
+
+“Monsieur says?” quoth he, his glittering eye challenging the rash boy
+to repeat his words.
+
+But the Dowager intervened with a little trill of laughter.
+
+“Bon Dieu! Marius, what are you saying? Foolish boy! And you, Monsieur
+de Garnache, do not heed him, I beg you. We are so far from Court in
+this little corner of Dauphiny, and my son has been reared in so free
+an atmosphere that he is sometimes betrayed into expressions whose
+impropriety he does not realize.”
+
+Garnache bowed in token of his perfect satisfaction, and at that moment
+two servants entered bearing flagons and beakers, fruits and sweetmeats,
+which they placed upon the table. The Dowager rose, and went to do the
+honours of the board. The servants withdrew.
+
+“You will taste our wine of Condillac, monsieur?”
+
+He acquiesced, expressing thanks, and watched her fill a beaker for him,
+one for herself, and another for her son. She brought him the cup in
+her hands. He took it with a grave inclination of the head. Then she
+proffered him the sweetmeats. To take one, he set down the cup on the
+table, by which he had also come to stand. His left hand was gloved and
+held his beaver and whip.
+
+She nibbled, herself, at one of the comfits, and he followed her
+example. The boy, a trifle sullen since the last words, stood on the
+hearth with his back to the fire, his hands clasped behind him.
+
+“Monsieur,” she said, “do you think it would enable you to comply
+with what I have signified to be not only our own wishes, but those of
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye herself, if she were to state them to you?”
+
+He looked up sharply, his lips parting in a smile that revealed his
+strong white teeth.
+
+“Are you proposing another of your jests, madame?”
+
+She laughed outright. A wonderful assurance was hers, thought Monsieur
+de Garnache. “Mon Dieu! no, monsieur,” she cried. “If you will, you may
+see the lady herself.”
+
+He took a turn in the apartment, idly, as does a man in thought.
+
+“Very well,” said he, at last. “I do not say that it will alter my
+determination. But perhaps--yes, I should be glad of an opportunity of
+the honour of making Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye’s acquaintance. But no
+impersonations, I beg, madame!” He said it half-laughingly, taking his
+cue from her.
+
+“You need have no fear of any.”
+
+She walked to the door, opened it, and called “Gaston!” In answer came
+the page whom Garnache had found in the room when he was admitted.
+
+“Desire Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to come to us here at once,” she
+bade the boy, and closed the door.
+
+Garnache had been all eyes for some furtive sign, some whispered word;
+but he had surprised neither.
+
+His pacing had brought him to the opposite end of the board, where stood
+the cup of wine madame had poured for Marius. His own, Garnache had left
+untouched. As if abstractedly, he now took up the beaker, pledged madame
+with his glance, and drank. She watched him, and suddenly a suspicion
+darted through her mind--a suspicion that he suspected them.
+
+Dieu! What a man was this! He took no chances. Madame reflected that
+this augured ill for the success of the last resource upon which, should
+all else fail, she was counting to keep mademoiselle at Condillac. It
+seemed incredible that one so wary and watchful should have committed
+the rashness of venturing alone into Condillac without taking his
+precautions to ensure his ability to retreat.
+
+In her heart she felt daunted by him. But in the matter of that
+wine--the faintest of smiles hovered on her lips, her eyebrows went up
+a shade. Then she took up the cup that had been poured for the Parisian,
+and bore it to her son.
+
+“Marius, you are not drinking,” said she. And seeing a command in her
+eyes; he took the beaker from her hand and bore it to his lips, emptying
+the half of it, whilst with the faintest smile of scorn the Dowager
+swept Garnache a glance of protest, as of one repudiating an unworthy
+challenge.
+
+Then the door opened, and the eyes of all three were centred upon the
+girl that entered.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+
+“You sent for me, madame,” said the girl, seeming to hesitate upon the
+threshold of the room, and her voice--a pleasant, boyish contralto--was
+very cold and conveyed a suggestion of disdain.
+
+The Marquise detected that inauspicious note, and was moved by it to
+regret her already of having embarked upon so bold a game as to confront
+Monsieur de Garnache with Valerie. It was a step she had decided upon
+as a last means of convincing the Parisian of the truth of her statement
+touching the change that had taken place in mademoiselle’s inclinations.
+And she had provided for it as soon as she heard of Garnache’s arrival
+by informing mademoiselle that should she be sent for, she must tell
+the gentleman from Paris that it was her wish to remain at Condillac.
+Mademoiselle had incontinently refused, and madame, to win her
+compliance, had resorted to threats.
+
+“You will do as you consider best, of course,” she had said, in a voice
+that was ominously sweet. “But I promise you that if you do otherwise
+than as I tell you, you shall be married before sunset to Marius,
+whether you be willing or not. Monsieur de Garnache comes alone, and if
+I so will it alone he shall depart or not at all. I have men enough at
+Condillac to see my orders carried out, no matter what they be.
+
+“You may tell yourself that this fellow will return to help you. Perhaps
+he will; but when he does, it will be too late so far as you shall be
+concerned.”
+
+Terrified by that threat, Valerie had blenched, and had felt her spirit
+deserting her.
+
+“And if I comply, madame?” she had asked. “If I do as you wish, if I
+tell this gentleman that I no longer desire to go to Paris--what then?”
+
+The Dowager’s manner had become more affectionate. She had patted the
+shrinking girl upon the shoulder. “In that case, Valerie, you shall
+suffer no constraint; you shall continue here as you have done.”
+
+“And has there been no constraint hitherto?” had been the girl’s
+indignant rejoinder.
+
+“Hardly, child,” the Dowager had returned. “We have sought to guide you
+to a wise choice--no more than that. Nor shall we do more hereafter if
+you do my pleasure now and give this Monsieur de Garnache the answer
+that I bid you. But if you fail me, remember--you marry Marius before
+nightfall.”
+
+She had not waited for the girl to promise her compliance. She was too
+clever a woman to show anxiety on that score. She left her with that
+threat vibrating in her mind, confident that she would scare the girl
+into obedience by the very assurance she exhibited that Valerie would
+not dare to disobey.
+
+But now, at the sound of that chill voice, at the sight of that calm,
+resolved countenance, madame was regretting that she had not stayed
+to receive the girl’s promise before she made so very sure of her
+pliability.
+
+She glanced anxiously at Garnache. His eyes were upon the girl. He was
+remarking the slender, supple figure, moderately tall and looking taller
+in its black gown of mourning; the oval face, a trifle pale now from the
+agitation that stirred her, with its fine level brows, its clear,
+hazel eyes, and its crown of lustrous brown hair rolled back under the
+daintiest of white coifs. His glance dwelt appreciatively on the slender
+nose, with its delicate nostrils, the charming line of mouth and chin,
+the dazzling whiteness of her skin, conspicuous not only in neck and
+face but in the long, slender hands that were clasped before her.
+
+These signs of breeding, everywhere proclaimed, left him content that
+here was no imposture; the girl before him was, indeed, Valerie de La
+Vauvraye.
+
+At madame’s invitation she came forward. Marius hastened to close the
+door and to set a chair for her, his manner an admirable suggestion of
+ardour restrained by deference.
+
+She sat down with an outward calm under which none would have suspected
+the full extent of her agitation, and she bent her eyes upon the man
+whom the Queen had sent for her deliverance.
+
+After all, Garnache’s appearance was hardly suggestive of the role of
+Perseus which had been thrust upon him. She saw a tall, spare man,
+with prominent cheek-bones, a gaunt, high-bridged nose, very fierce
+mustachios, and a pair of eyes that were as keen as sword-blades and
+felt to her glance as penetrating. There was little about him like
+to take a woman’s fancy or claim more than a moderate share of her
+attention, even when circumstances rendered her as interested in him as
+was now Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+
+There fell a silence, broken at last by Marius, who leaned, a supple,
+graceful figure, his elbow resting upon the summit of Valerie’s chair.
+
+“Monsieur de Garnache does us the injustice to find a difficulty in
+believing that you no longer wish to leave us.”
+
+That was by no means what Garnache had implied; still, since it really
+expressed his mind, he did not trouble to correct Marius.
+
+Valerie said nothing, but her eyes travelled to madame’s countenance,
+where she found a frown. Garnache observed the silence, and drew his own
+conclusions.
+
+“So we have sent for you, Valerie,” said the Dowager, taking up her
+son’s sentence, “that you may yourself assure Monsieur de Garnache that
+it is so.”
+
+Her voice was stern; it bore to the girl’s ears a subtle, unworded
+repetition of the threat the Marquise had already voiced. Mademoiselle
+caught it, and Garnache caught it too, although he failed to interpret
+it as precisely as he would have liked.
+
+The girl seemed to experience a difficulty in answering. Her eyes roved
+to Garnache’s, and fell away in affright before their glitter. That
+man’s glance seemed to read her very mind, she thought; and suddenly
+the reflection that had terrified her became her hope. If it were as she
+deemed it, what matter what she said? He would know the truth, in spite
+of all.
+
+“Yes, madame,” she said at last, and her voice was wholly void of
+expression. “Yes, monsieur, it is as madame says. It is my wish to
+remain at Condillac.”
+
+From the Dowager, standing a pace or two away from Garnache, came the
+sound of a half-sigh. Garnache missed nothing. He caught the sound,
+and accepted it as an expression of relief. The Marquise stepped back a
+pace; idly, one might have thought; not so thought Garnache. It had this
+advantage: that it enabled her to stand where he might not watch her
+face without turning his head. He was content that such was her motive.
+To defeat her object, to show her that he had guessed it, he stepped
+back, too, also with that same idleness of air, so that he was once more
+in line with her. And then he spoke, addressing Valerie.
+
+“Mademoiselle, that you should have written to the Queen in haste is
+deplorable now that your views have undergone this change. I am a stupid
+man, mademoiselle, just a blunt soldier with orders to obey and no
+authority to think. My orders are to conduct you to Paris. Your will
+was not taken into consideration. I know not how the Queen would have me
+act, seeing your reluctance; it may be that she would elect to leave you
+here, as you desire. But it is not for me to arrogate to determine the
+Queen’s mind. I can but be guided by her orders, and those orders
+leave me no course but one--to ask you, mademoiselle, to make ready
+immediately to go with me.”
+
+The look of relief that swept into Valerie’s face, the little flush
+of colour that warmed her cheeks, hitherto so pale, were all the
+confirmation that he needed of what he suspected.
+
+“But, monsieur,” said Marius, “it must be plain to you that since the
+Queen’s orders are but a compliance with mademoiselle’s wishes, now that
+mademoiselle’s wishes have altered, so too would Her Majesty’s commands
+alter to comply with them once more.”
+
+“That may be plain to you, monsieur; for me, unfortunately, there are
+my orders for only guide,” Garnache persisted. “Does not mademoiselle
+herself agree with me?”
+
+She was about to speak; her glance had looked eager, her lips had
+parted. Then, of a sudden, the little colour faded from her cheeks
+again, and she seemed stricken with a silence. Garnache’s eyes, directed
+in a sidelong glance to the Marquise’s face, surprised there a frown
+that had prompted that sudden change.
+
+He half-turned, his manner changing suddenly to a freezing civility.
+
+“Madame la Marquise,” said he, “I beg with all deference to suggest that
+I am not allowed the interview you promised me with Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye.”
+
+The ominous coldness with which he had begun to speak had had a
+disturbing effect upon the Dowager; the words he uttered, when she had
+weighed them, brought an immense relief. It seemed, then, that he but
+needed convincing that this was Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. This argued
+that for the rest he was satisfied.
+
+“There, monsieur, you are at fault,” she cried, and she was smiling into
+his grave eyes. “Because once I put that jest upon you, you imagine--”
+
+“No, no,” he broke in. “You misapprehend me. I do not say that this is
+not Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye; I do not say that--”
+
+He paused; he was at the end of his resources. He did not know how
+to put the thing without giving offence, and it had been his
+resolve--realizing the necessity for it--to conduct this matter with a
+grave courtesy.
+
+To feel that after having carried the affair so far with a for
+him--commendable lightness of touch, he should be at a loss for a
+delicate word to convey a harsh accusation began to anger him. And once
+Garnache began to be angered, the rest followed quickly. It was just
+that flaw in his character that had been the ruin of him, that had
+blighted what otherwise might have been a brilliant career. Astute and
+wily as a fox, brave as a lion, and active as a panther, gifted with
+intelligence, insight and resource, he had carried a dozen enterprises
+up to the very threshold of success, there to have ruined them all by
+giving way to some sudden excess of choler.
+
+So was it now. His pause was but momentary. Yet in that moment, from
+calm and freezing that he had been, he became ruffled and hot. The
+change was visible in his heightened colour, in his flashing eyes, and
+in his twitching mustachios. For just a second he sought to smother
+his wrath; he had a glimmer of remembrance of the need for caution and
+diplomacy in the darkness of anger that was descending over him. Then,
+without further warning, he exploded.
+
+His nervous, sinewy hand clenched itself and fell with a crash upon the
+table, overturning a flagon and sending a lake of wine across the board,
+to trickle over at a dozen points and form in puddles at the feet of
+Valerie. Startled, they all watched him, mademoiselle the most startled
+of the three.
+
+“Madame,” he thundered, “I have been receiving dancing-lessons at your
+hands for long enough. It is time, I think, we did a little ordinary
+walking, else shall we get no farther along the road I mean to go and
+that is the road to Paris with mademoiselle for company.”
+
+“Monsieur, monsieur!” cried the startled Marquise, placing herself
+intrepidly before him; and Marius trembled for her, for so wild did the
+man seem that he almost feared he might strike her.
+
+“I have heard enough,” he blazed. “Not another word from any here in
+Condillac! I’ll take this lady with me now, at once; and if any here
+raises a finger to resist me, as Heaven is my witness, it will be the
+last resistance he will ever offer any man. Let a hand be laid upon me,
+or a sword bared before my eyes, and I swear, madame, that I’ll come
+back and burn this dunghill of rebellion to the ground.”
+
+In the blindness of his passion all his fine keenness was cast to the
+wind, his all-observing watchfulness was smothered in the cloud of anger
+that oppressed his brain. He never saw the sign that madame made to her
+son, never so much as noticed Marius’s stealthy progress towards the
+door.
+
+“Oh,” he continued, a satirical note running now through his tempestuous
+voice, “it is a fine thing to cozen each other with honeyed words,
+with smirks and with grimaces. But we have done with that, madame.” He
+towered grimly above her, shaking a threatening finger in her very face.
+“We have done with that. We shall resort to deeds, instead.”
+
+“Aye, monsieur,” she answered very coldly, sneering upon his red-hot
+fury, “there shall be deeds enough to satisfy even your outrageous
+thirst for them.”
+
+That cold, sneering voice, with its note of threat, was like a hand
+of ice upon his overheated brain. It cooled him on the instant. He
+stiffened, and looked about him. He saw that Marius had disappeared,
+and that mademoiselle had risen and was regarding him with singularly
+imploring eyes.
+
+He bit his lip in mortified chagrin. He cursed himself inwardly for a
+fool and a dolt--the more pitiable because he accounted himself cunning
+above others. Had he but kept his temper, had he done no more than
+maintain the happy pretence that he was a slave to the orders he
+had received--a mere machine--he might have gained his ends by sheer
+audacity. At least, his way of retreat would have remained open, and he
+might have gone, to return another day with force at his heels.
+
+As it was, that pretty whelp, her son, had been sent, no doubt, for men.
+He stepped up to Valerie.
+
+“Are you ready, mademoiselle?” said he; for little hope though he might
+still have of winning through, yet he must do the best to repair the
+damage that was of his making.
+
+She saw that the storm of passion had passed, and she was infected by
+the sudden, desperate daring that prompted that question of his.
+
+“I am ready, monsieur,” said she, and her boyish voice had an intrepid
+ring. “I will come with you as I am.”
+
+“Then, in God’s name, let us be going.”
+
+They moved together towards the door, with never another glance for the
+Dowager where she stood, patting the head of the hound that had risen
+and come to stand beside her. In silence she watched them, a sinister
+smile upon her beautiful, ivory face.
+
+Then came a sound of feet and voices in the anteroom. The door was flung
+violently open, and a half-dozen men with naked swords came blundering
+into the room, Marius bringing up the rear.
+
+With a cry of fear Valerie shrank back against the panelled wall, her
+little hands to her cheeks, her eyes dilating with alarm.
+
+Garnache’s sword rasped out, an oath rattled from his clenched teeth,
+and he fell on guard. The men paused, and took his measure. Marius urged
+them on, as if they had been a pack of dogs.
+
+“At him!” he snapped, his finger pointing, his handsome eyes flashing
+angrily. “Cut him down!”
+
+They moved; but mademoiselle moved at the same moment. She sprang before
+them, between their swords and their prey.
+
+“You shall not do it; you shall not do it!” she cried, and her face
+looked drawn, her eyes distraught. “It is murder--murder, you curs!” And
+the memory of how that dainty little lady stood undaunted before so much
+bared steel, to shield him from those assassins, was one that abode ever
+after with Garnache.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” said he, in a quiet voice, “if you will but stand aside
+there will be some murder done among them first.”
+
+But she did not move. Marius clenched his hands, fretted by the delay.
+The Dowager looked on and smiled and patted her dog’s head. To her
+mademoiselle now turned in appeal.
+
+“Madame,” she exclaimed, “you’ll not allow it. You’ll not let them
+do this thing. Bid them put up their swords, madame. Bethink you that
+Monsieur de Garnache is here in the Queen’s name.”
+
+Too well did madame bethink her of it. Garnache need not plague himself
+with vexation that his rash temper alone had wrought his ruin now. It
+had but accelerated it. It was just possible, perhaps, that suavity
+might have offered him opportunities; but, for the rest, from the moment
+that he showed himself firm in his resolve to carry mademoiselle to
+Paris, his doom was sealed. Madame would never willingly have allowed
+him to leave Condillac alive, for she realized that did she do so he
+would stir up trouble enough to have them outlawed. He must perish here,
+and be forgotten. If questions came to be asked later, Condillac would
+know nothing of him.
+
+“Monsieur de Garnache promised us some fine deeds on his own account,”
+ she mocked him. “We but afford him the opportunity to perform them. If
+these be not enough for his exceeding valour, there are more men without
+whom we can summon.”
+
+A feeling of pity for mademoiselle--perhaps of no more than decency--now
+overcame Marius. He stepped forward.
+
+“Valerie,” he said, “it is not fitting you should remain.”
+
+“Aye, take her hence,” the Dowager bade him, with a smile. “Her presence
+is unmanning our fine Parisian.”
+
+Eager to do so, over-eager, Marius came forward, past his men-at-arms,
+until he was but some three paces from the girl and just out of reach of
+a sudden dart of Garnache’s sword.
+
+Softly, very warily, Garnache slipped his right foot a little farther to
+the right. Suddenly he threw his weight upon it, so that he was clear of
+the girl. Before they understood what he was about, the thing had taken
+place. He had leaped forward, caught the young man by the breast of his
+shimmering doublet, leaped back to shelter beyond mademoiselle, hurled
+Marius to the ground, and planted his foot, shod as it was in his
+thickly mudded riding-boot, full upon the boy’s long, shapely neck.
+
+“Move so much as a finger, my pretty fellow,” he snapped at him, “and
+I’ll crush the life from you as from a toad.”
+
+There was a sudden forward movement on the part of the men; but if
+Garnache was vicious, he was calm. Were he again to lose his temper now,
+there would indeed be a speedy end to him. That much he knew, and kept
+repeating to himself, lest he should be tempted to forget it.
+
+“Back!” he bade them in a voice so imperative that they stopped, and
+looked on with gaping mouths. “Back, or he perishes!” And dropping the
+point of his sword, he lightly rested it upon the young man’s breast.
+
+In dismay they looked to the Dowager for instruction. She craned
+forward, the smile gone from her lips, a horror in her eyes, her bosom
+heaving. A moment ago she had smiled upon mademoiselle’s outward signs
+of fear; had mademoiselle been so minded, she might in her turn have
+smiled now at the terror written large upon the Dowager’s own face.
+But her attention was all absorbed by the swiftly executed act by which
+Garnache had gained at least a temporary advantage.
+
+She had turned and looked at the strange spectacle of that dauntless
+man, erect, his foot upon Marius’s neck, like some fantastic figure of
+a contemporary Saint George and a contemporary dragon. She pressed her
+hands tighter upon her bosom; her eyes sparkled with an odd approval of
+that brisk deed.
+
+But Garnache’s watchful eyes were upon the Dowager. He read the anxious
+fear that marred the beauty of her face, and he took heart at the sight,
+for he was dependent upon the extent to which he might work upon her
+feelings.
+
+“You smiled just now, madame, when it was intended to butcher a man
+before your eyes. You smile no longer, I observe, at this the first of
+the fine deeds I promised you.”
+
+“Let him go,” she said, and her voice was scarce louder than a whisper,
+horror-laden. “Let him go, monsieur, if you would save your own neck.”
+
+“At that price, yes--though, believe me, you are paying too much for so
+poor a life as this. Still, you value the thing, and I hold it; and so
+you’ll forgive me if I am extortionate.”
+
+“Release him, and, in God’s name, go your ways. None shall stay you,”
+ she promised him.
+
+He smiled. “I’ll need some security for that. I do not choose to take
+your word for it, Madame de Condillac.”
+
+“What security can I give you?” she cried, wringing her hands, her eyes
+on the boy’s ashen face ashen from mingling fear and rage--where it
+showed beyond Garnache’s heavy boot.
+
+“Bid one of your knaves summon my servant. I left him awaiting me in the
+courtyard.”
+
+The order was given, and one of the cut-throats departed.
+
+In a tense and anxious silence they awaited his return, though he kept
+them but an instant.
+
+Rabecque’s eyes took on a startled look when he had viewed the
+situation. Garnache called to him to deprive those present of their
+weapons.
+
+“And let none refuse, or offer him violence,” he added, “or your
+master’s life shall pay the price of it.”
+
+The Dowager with a ready anxiety repeated to them his commands.
+Rabecque, understanding nothing, went from man to man, and received from
+each his weapons. He placed the armful on the windowseat, at the far
+end of the apartment, as Garnache bade him. At the other end of the long
+room, Garnache ordered the disarmed men to range themselves. When that
+was done, the Parisian removed his foot from his victim’s neck.
+
+“Stand up,” he commanded, and Marius very readily obeyed him.
+
+Garnache placed himself immediately behind the boy. “Madame,” said he,
+“no harm shall come to your son if he is but wise. Let him disobey me,
+or let any man in Condillac lift a hand against us, and that shall be
+the signal for Monsieur de Condillac’s death. Mademoiselle, it is your
+wish to accompany me to Paris?”
+
+“Yes, monsieur,” she answered fearlessly, her eyes sparkling now.
+
+“We will be going then. Place yourself alongside of Monsieur de
+Condillac. Rabecque, follow me. Forward, Monsieur de Condillac. You will
+be so good as to conduct us to our horses in the courtyard.”
+
+They made an odd procession as they marched out of the hall, under
+the sullen eyes of the baulked cut-throats and their mistress. On the
+threshold Garnache paused, and looked over his shoulder.
+
+“Are you content, madame? Have you seen fine deeds enough for one
+day?” he asked her, laughing. But, white to the lips with chagrin, she
+returned no answer.
+
+Garnache and his party crossed the anteroom, after having taken
+the precaution to lock the door upon the Marquise and her men, and
+proceeding down a gloomy passage they gained the courtyard. Here Marius
+was consoled to find some men of the garrison of Condillac a half-score,
+or so--all more or less armed, surrounding the horses of Garnache and
+his lackey. At sight of the odd group that now appeared those ruffians
+stood at gaze, surprised, and with suspicions aroused by Garnache’s
+naked sword, ready for anything their master might demand of them.
+
+Marius had in that instant a gleam of hope. Thus far, Garnache had been
+master of the situation. But surely the position would be reversed
+when Garnache and his man came to mount their horses, particularly
+considering how hampered they must be by Valerie. This danger Garnache,
+however, was no less quick to perceive, and with a dismaying promptness
+did he take his measures.
+
+“Remember,” he threatened Monsieur de Condillac, “if any of your men
+show their teeth it will be the worse for you.” They had come to a halt
+on the threshold of the courtyard. “You will be so good as to bid them
+retreat through that doorway across the yard yonder.”
+
+Marius hesitated. “And if I refuse?” he demanded hardily, but keeping
+his back to Garnache. The men stirred, and stray words of mingling
+wonder and anger reached the Parisian.
+
+“You will not,” said Garnache, with quiet confidence.
+
+“I think you make too sure,” Marius replied, and dissembled his
+misgivings in a short laugh. Garnache became impatient. His position was
+not being improved by delay.
+
+“Monsieur de Condillac,” said he, speaking quickly and yet with an
+incisiveness of tone that made his words sound deliberate, “I am a
+desperate man in a desperate position. Every moment that I tarry here
+increases my danger and shortens my temper. If you think to temporize
+in the hope of gaining an opportunity of turning the tables upon me, you
+must be mad to dream that I shall permit it. Monsieur, you will at once
+order those men to leave the courtyard by that doorway, or I give you my
+word of honour that I shall run you through as you stand.”
+
+“That would be to destroy yourself,” said Marius with an attempted note
+of confidence.
+
+“I should be no less destroyed by delay,” answered Garnache; and added
+more sharply, “Give the word, monsieur, or I will make an end.”
+
+From the movement behind him Marius guessed almost by instinct that
+Garnache had drawn back for a lunge. At his side Valerie looked over her
+shoulder, with eyes that were startled but unafraid. For a second Marius
+considered whether he might not attempt to elude Garnache by a wild and
+sudden dash towards his men. But the consequences of failure were too
+fearful.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and gave the order. The men hesitated a
+moment, then shuffled away in the direction indicated. But they went
+slowly, with much half-whispered, sullen conferring and many a backward
+glance at Marius and those with him.
+
+“Bid them go faster,” snapped Garnache. Marius obeyed him, and the men
+obeyed Marius, and vanished into the gloom of the archway. After
+all, thought Monsieur de Condillac, they need go no farther than that
+doorway; they must have appreciated the situation by now; and he was
+confident they would have the sense to hold themselves in readiness for
+a rush in the moment of Garnache’s mounting.
+
+But Garnache’s next order shattered that last hope.
+
+“Rebecque,” said he, without turning his head, “go and lock them in.”
+ Before bidding the men go that way, he had satisfied himself that
+there was a key on the outside of the door. “Monsieur de Condillac,”
+ he resumed to Marius, “you will order your men in no way to hinder my
+servant. I shall act upon any menace of danger to my lackey precisely as
+I should were I, myself, in danger.”
+
+Marius’s heart sank within him, as sinks a stone through water. He
+realized, as his mother had realized a little while before, that in
+Garnache they had an opponent who took no chances. In a voice thick with
+the torturing rage of impotence he gave the order upon which the grim
+Parisian insisted. There followed a silence broken by the fall of
+Rabecque’s heavily shod feet upon the stones of the yard, as he crossed
+it to do his master’s bidding. The door creaked on its hinges; the key
+grated screaming in its lock, and Rabecque returned to Garnache’s side
+even as Garnache tapped Marius on the shoulder.
+
+“This way, Monsieur de Condillac, if you please,” said he, and as Marius
+turned at last to face him, he stood aside and waved his left hand
+towards the door through which they had lately emerged. A moment stood
+the youth facing his stern conqueror; his hands were clenched until the
+knuckles showed white; his face was a dull crimson. Vainly he sought
+for words in which to vent some of the malicious chagrin that filled
+his soul almost to bursting-point. Then, despairing, with a shrug and an
+inarticulate mutter, he flung past the Parisian, obeying him as the cur
+obeys, with pendant tail and teeth-revealing snarl.
+
+Garnache closed the door upon him with a bang, and smiled quietly as he
+turned to Valerie.
+
+“I think we have won through, mademoiselle,” said he, with pardonable
+vanity. “The rest is easy, though you may be subjected to some slight
+discomfort between this and Grenoble.”
+
+She smiled back at him, a pale, timid smile, like a gleam of sunshine
+from a wintry sky. “That matters nothing,” she assured him, and strove
+to make her voice sound brave.
+
+There was need for speed, and compliments were set aside by Garnache,
+who, at his best, was not felicitous with them. Valerie felt herself
+caught by the wrist, a trifle roughly she remembered afterwards, and
+hurried across the cobbles to the tethered horses, with which Rabecque
+was already busy. She saw Garnache raise his foot to the stirrup and
+hoist himself to the saddle. Then he held down a hand to her, bade her
+set her foot on his, and called with an oath to Rabecque to lend her his
+assistance. A moment later she was perched in front of Garnache, almost
+on the withers of his horse. The cobbles rattled under its hooves, the
+timbers of the drawbridge sent up a booming sound, they were across--out
+of Condillac--and speeding at a gallop down the white road that led to
+the river; after them pounded Rabecque, bumping horribly in his
+saddle, and attempting wildly, and with awful objurgations, to find his
+stirrups.
+
+They crossed the bridge that spans the Isere and took the road to
+Grenoble at a sharp pace, with scarce a backward glance at the grey
+towers of Condillac. Valerie experienced an overwhelming inclination to
+weep and laugh, to cry and sing at one and the same time; but whether
+this odd emotion sprang from the happenings in which she had had her
+part, or from the exhilaration of that mad ride, she could not tell. No
+doubt it sprang from both, owing a part to each. She controlled herself,
+however. A shy, upward glance at the stern, set face of the man whose
+arm encircled and held her fast had a curiously sobering effect upon
+her. Their eyes met, and he smiled a friendly, reassuring smile, such as
+a father might have bestowed upon a daughter.
+
+“I do not think that they will charge me with blundering this time,” he
+said.
+
+“Charge you with blundering?” she echoed; and the inflection of the
+pronoun might have flattered him had he not reflected that it was
+impossible she could have understood his allusion. And now she bethought
+her that she had not thanked him--and the debt was a heavy one. He
+had come to her aid in an hour when hope seemed dead. He had come
+single-handed--save for his man Rabecque; and in a manner that was
+worthy of being made the subject of an epic, he had carried her out
+of Condillac, away from the terrible Dowager and her cut-throats. The
+thought of them sent a shiver through her.
+
+“Do you feel the cold?” he asked concernedly; and that the wind might
+cut her less, he slackened speed.
+
+“No, no,” she cried, her alarm waking again at the thought of the
+folk of Condillac. “Make haste! Go on, go on! Mon Dieu! if they should
+overtake us!”
+
+He looked over his shoulder. The road ran straight for over a half-mile
+behind them, and not a living thing showed upon it.
+
+“You need have no alarm,” he smiled. “We are not pursued. They must
+have realized the futility of attempting to overtake us. Courage,
+mademoiselle. We shall be in Grenoble presently, and once there, you
+will have nothing more to fear.”
+
+“You are sure of that?” she asked, and there was doubt in her voice.
+
+He smiled reassuringly again. “The Lord Seneschal shall supply us with
+an escort,” he promised confidently.
+
+“Still,” she said, “we shall not stay there, I hope, monsieur.”
+
+“No longer than may be necessary to procure a coach for you.”
+
+“I am glad of that,” said she. “I shall know no peace until Grenoble is
+a good ten leagues behind us. The Marquise and her son are too powerful
+there.”
+
+“Yet their might shall not prevail against the Queen’s,” he made reply.
+And as now they rode amain she fell to thanking him, shyly at first,
+then, as she gathered confidence in her subject, with a greater fervour.
+But he interrupted her ere she had gone far, “Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye,” said he, “you overstate the matter.” His tone was chilling
+almost; and she felt as she had been rebuked. “I am no more than the
+emissary of Her Majesty--it is to her that your thanks are due.”
+
+“Ah, but, monsieur,” she returned to the assault, “I owe some thanks
+to you as well. What other in your place would have done what you have
+done?”
+
+“I know not that, nor do I greatly care,” said he, and laughed, but
+with a laugh that jarred on her. “That which I did I must have done, no
+matter whom it was a question of saving. I am but an instrument in this
+matter, mademoiselle.”
+
+His thought was to do no more than belittle the service he had rendered
+her, to stem her flow of gratitude, since, indeed, he felt, as he said,
+that it was to the Queen-Regent her thanks were due. All unwitting was
+it--out of his ignorance of the ways of thought of a sex with which he
+held the view that it is an ill thing to meddle--that he wounded her by
+his disclaimer, in which her sensitive maiden fancy imagined a something
+that was almost contemptuous.
+
+They rode in silence for a little spell, broken at last by Garnache in
+expression of the thoughts that had come to him as a consequence of what
+she had said.
+
+“On this same subject of thanks,” said he--and as she raised her eyes
+again she found him smiling almost tenderly--“if any are due between us
+they are surely due from me to you.”
+
+“From you to me?” she asked in wonder.
+
+“Assuredly,” said he. “Had you not come between me and the Dowager’s
+assassins there had been an end to me in the hall of Condillac.”
+
+Her hazel eyes were very round for a moment, then they narrowed, and
+little humorous lines formed at the corners of her lips.
+
+“Monsieur de Garnache,” said she, with a mock coldness that was a faint
+echo of his own recent manner, “you overstate the case. That which I did
+I must have done, no matter whom it was a question of saving. I was but
+an instrument in this matter, monsieur.”
+
+His brows went up. He stared at her a moment, gathering instruction from
+the shy mockery of her glance. Then he laughed with genuine amusement.
+
+“True,” he said. “An instrument you were; but an instrument of Heaven,
+whereas in me you but behold the instrument of an earthly power. We are
+not quite quits, you see.”
+
+But she felt, at least, that she was quits with him in the matter of his
+repudiation of her own thanks, and the feeling bridged the unfriendly
+gap that she had felt was opening out between them; and for no reason in
+the world that she could think of, she was glad that this was so.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+
+Night had fallen and it had begun to rain when Garnache and Valerie
+reached Grenoble. They entered the town afoot, the Parisian not desiring
+to attract attention by being seen in the streets with a lady on the
+withers of his horse.
+
+With thought for her comfort, Monsieur de Garnache had divested himself
+of his heavy horseman’s cloak and insisted upon her assuming it, so
+setting it about her that her head was covered as by a wimple. Thus
+was she protected not only from the rain, but from the gaze of the
+inquisitive.
+
+They made their way in the drizzle, through the greasy, slippery
+streets ashine with the lights that fell from door and window, Rabecque
+following closely with the horses. Garnache made straight for his
+inn--the Auberge du Veau qui Tete--which enjoyed the advantage of facing
+the Palais Seneschal.
+
+The ostler took charge of the nags, and the landlord conducted them to
+a room above-stairs, which he placed at mademoiselle’s disposal.
+That done, Garnache left Rabecque on guard, and proceeded to make the
+necessary arrangements for the journey that lay before them. He began by
+what he conceived to be the more urgent measure, and stepping across to
+the Palais Seneschal, he demanded to see Monsieur de Tressan at once.
+
+Ushered into the Lord Seneschal’s presence, he startled that obese
+gentleman by the announcement that he had returned from Condillac with
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and that he would require an escort to
+accompany them to Paris.
+
+“For I am by no means minded to be exposed to such measures as the
+tigress of Condillac and her cub may take to recover their victim,” he
+explained with a grim smile.
+
+The Seneschal combed his beard and screwed up his pale eyes until they
+vanished in the cushions of his cheeks. He was lost in amazement.
+He could only imagine that the Queen’s emissary had been duped more
+successfully this time.
+
+“I am to gather, then,” said he, dissembling what was passing through
+his mind, “that you delivered the lady by force or strategy.”
+
+“By both, monsieur,” was the short answer.
+
+Tressan continued to comb his beard, and pondered the situation. If
+things were so, indeed, they could not have fallen out more to his
+taste. He had had no hand in it, one way or the other. He had run with
+the hare and hunted with the hounds, and neither party could charge him
+with any lack of loyalty. His admiration and respect for Monsieur de
+Garnache grew enormously. When the rash Parisian had left him that
+afternoon for the purpose of carrying his message himself to Condillac,
+Tressan had entertained little hope of ever again seeing him alive.
+Yet there he stood, as calm and composed as ever, announcing that
+singlehanded he had carried out what another might well have hesitated
+to attempt with a regiment at his heels.
+
+Tressan’s curiosity urged him to beg for the details of this marvel, and
+Garnache entertained him with a brief recital of what had taken
+place, whereat, realizing that Garnache had indeed outwitted them, the
+Seneschal’s wonder increased.
+
+“But we are not out of the quagmire yet,” cried Garnache; “and that is
+why I want an escort.”
+
+Tressan became uneasy. “How many men shall you require?” he asked,
+thinking that the Parisian would demand at least the half of a company.
+
+“A half-dozen and a sergeant to command them.”
+
+Tressan’s uneasiness was dissipated, and he found himself despising
+Garnache more for his rashness in being content with so small a number
+than he respected him for the boldness and courage he had so lately
+displayed. It was not for him to suggest that the force might prove
+insufficient; rather was it for him to be thankful that Garnache had not
+asked for more. An escort Tressan dared not refuse him, and yet refuse
+it him he must have done--or broken with the Condillacs--had he asked
+for a greater number. But six men! Pooh! they would be of little
+account. So he very readily consented, inquiring how soon Garnache would
+require them.
+
+“At once,” was the Parisian’s answer. “I leave Grenoble to-night. I hope
+to set out in an hour’s time. Meanwhile I’ll have the troopers form a
+guard of honour. I am lodged over the way.”
+
+Tressan, but too glad to be quit of him, rose there and then to give
+the necessary orders, and within ten minutes Garnache was back at the
+Sucking Calf with six troopers and a sergeant, who had left their horses
+in the Seneschal’s stables until the time for setting out. Meanwhile
+Garnache placed them on duty in the common-room of the inn.
+
+He called for refreshment for them, and bade them remain there at the
+orders of his man Rabecque. His reason for this step was that it became
+necessary that he should absent himself for a while to find a carriage
+suitable for the journey; for as the Sucking Calf was not a post-house
+he must seek one elsewhere--at the Auberge de France, in fact, which was
+situate on the eastern side of the town by the Porte de Savoie--and
+he was not minded to leave the person of Valerie unguarded during his
+absence. The half-dozen troopers he considered ample, as indeed they
+were.
+
+On this errand he departed, wrapped tightly in his cloak, walking
+briskly through the now heavier rain.
+
+But at the Auberge de France a disappointment awaited him. The host
+had no horses and no carriage, nor would he have until the following
+morning. He was sorrow-stricken that the circumstance should discompose
+Monsieur de Garnache; he was elaborate in his explanations of how
+it happened that he could place no vehicle at Monsieur de Garnache’s
+disposal--so elaborate that it is surprising Monsieur de Garnache’s
+suspicions should not have been aroused. For the truth of the matter
+was that the folk of Condillac had been at the Auberge de France before
+him--as they had been elsewhere in the town wherever a conveyance might
+be procurable--and by promises of reward for obedience and threats of
+punishment for disobedience, they had contrived that Garnache should
+hear this same story on every hand. His mistake had lain in his
+eagerness to obtain a guard from the Seneschal. Had he begun by making
+sure of a conveyance, anticipating, as he should have done, this move on
+the part of the Condillacs--a move which he did not even now suspect--it
+is possible that he might have been spared much of the trouble that was
+to follow.
+
+An hour or so later, after having vainly ransacked the town for the
+thing he needed, he returned wet and annoyed to the Veau qui Tote. In a
+corner of the spacious common-room--a corner by the door leading to the
+interior of the inn--he saw the six troopers at table, waxing a trifle
+noisy over cards. Their sergeant sat a little apart, in conversation
+with the landlord’s wife, eyes upturned adoringly, oblivious of the
+increasing scowl that gathered about her watchful husband’s brow.
+
+At another table sat four gentlemen--seemingly travellers, by their air
+and garb--in a conversation that was hushed at Garnache’s entrance.
+But he paid no heed to them as he stalked with ringing step across the
+rushstrewn floor, nor observed how covertly and watchfully their glances
+followed him as returning, in passing the sergeant’s prompt salute he
+vanished through the doorway leading to the stairs.
+
+He reappeared again a moment later, to call the host, and give him
+orders for the preparing of his own and Rabecque’s supper.
+
+On the landing above he found Rabecque awaiting him.
+
+“Is all well?” he asked, and received from his lackey a reassuring
+answer.
+
+Mademoiselle welcomed him gladly. His long absence, it appeared, had
+been giving her concern. He told her on what errand he had been, and
+alarm overspread her face upon hearing its result.
+
+“But, monsieur,” she cried, “you are not proposing that I should remain
+a night in Grenoble.”
+
+“What alternative have we?” he asked, and his brows met, impatient at
+what he accounted no more than feminine whimsey.
+
+“It is not safe,” she exclaimed, her fears increasing. “You do not know
+how powerful are the Condillacs.”
+
+He strode to the fire, and the logs hissed under the pressure of his wet
+boot. He set his back to the blaze, and smiled down upon her.
+
+“Nor do you know how powerful are we,” he answered easily. “I have below
+six troopers and a sergeant of the Seneschal’s regiment; with myself
+and Rabecque we are nine men in all. That should be a sufficient guard,
+mademoiselle. Nor do I think that with all their power the Condillacs
+will venture here to claim you at the sword point.”
+
+“And yet,” she answered, for all that she was plainly reassured, at
+least in part, “I would rather you had got me a horse, that we might
+have ridden to Saint Marcellin, where no doubt a carriage might be
+obtained.”
+
+“I did not see the need to put you to so much discomfort,” he returned.
+“It is raining heavily.”
+
+“Oh, what of that?” she flung back impatiently.
+
+“Besides,” he added, “it seems there are no horses at the post-house. A
+benighted place this Dauphiny of yours, mademoiselle.”
+
+But she never heeded the gibe at her native province. “No horses?” she
+echoed, and her hazel eyes looked up sharply, the alarm returning to her
+face. She rose, and approached him. “Surely that is impossible.”
+
+“I assure you that it is as I say--neither at the post-house nor at any
+of the inns I visited could I find me a spare horse.”
+
+“Monsieur,” she cried, “I see the hand of Condillac in this.”
+
+“As how?” he inquired, and his tone again was quickened by impatience.
+
+“They have anticipated you. They seek to keep you here--to keep us in
+Grenoble.”
+
+“But to what end?” he asked, his impatience growing. “The Auberge de
+France has promised me a carriage in the morning. What shall it avail
+them at Condillac to keep us here to-night?”
+
+“They may have some project. Oh, monsieur! I am full of fears.”
+
+“Dismiss them,” he answered lightly; and to reassure her he added,
+smiling: “Rest assured we shall keep good watch over you, Rabecque and
+I and the troopers. A guard shall remain in the passage throughout the
+night. Rabecque and I will take turn about at sentry-go. Will that give
+you peace?”
+
+“You are very good,” she said, her voice quivering with feeling and real
+gratitude, and as he was departing she called after him. “You will be
+careful of yourself,” she said.
+
+He paused under the lintel, and turned, surprised. “It is a habit of
+mine,” said he, with a glint of humour in his eye.
+
+But there was no answering smile from her. Her face was all anxiety.
+
+“Beware of pitfalls,” she bade him. “Go warily; they are cruelly
+cunning, those folk of Condillac. And if evil should befall you...”
+
+“There would still remain Rabecque and the troopers,” he concluded.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders. “I implore you to be careful,” she insisted.
+
+“You may depend upon me,” he said, and closed the door.
+
+Outside he called Rabecque, and together they went below. But mindful of
+her fears, he dispatched one of the troopers to stand sentry outside her
+door whilst he and his lackey supped. That done, he called the host, and
+set himself at table, Rabecque at his elbow in attendance to hand him
+the dishes and pour his wine.
+
+Across the low-ceilinged room the four travellers still sat in talk, and
+as Garnache seated himself, one of them shouted for the host and asked
+in an impatient tone to know if his supper was soon to come.
+
+“In a moment, sir,” answered the landlord respectfully, and he turned
+again to the Parisian. He went out to bring the latter’s meal, and
+whilst he was gone Rabecque heard from his master the reason of their
+remaining that night in Grenoble. The inference drawn by the astute
+lackey--and freely expressed by him--from the lack of horses or
+carriages in Grenoble that night, coincided oddly with Valerie’s. He
+too gave it as his opinion that his master had been forestalled by
+the Dowager’s people, and without presuming to advise Garnache to go
+warily--a piece of advice that Garnache would have resented, to the
+extent perhaps of boxing the fellow’s ears--he determined, there and
+then, to keep a close watch upon his master, and under no circumstances,
+if possible, permit him to leave the Sucking Calf that night.
+
+The host returned, bearing a platter on which there steamed a ragout
+that gave out an appetizing odour; his wife followed with other dishes
+and a bottle of Armagnac under her arm. Rabecque busied himself at
+once, and his hungry master disposed himself to satisfy the healthiest
+appetite in France, when suddenly a shadow fell across the table. A man
+had come to stand beside it, his body screening the light of one of the
+lamps that hung from a rafter of the ceiling.
+
+“At last!” he exclaimed, and his voice was harsh with ill-humour.
+
+Garnache looked up, pausing in the very act of helping himself to
+that ragout. Rabecque looked up from behind his master, and his lips
+tightened. The host looked up from the act of drawing the cork of the
+flagon he had taken from his wife, and his eyes grew big as in his mind
+he prepared a judicious blend of apology and remonstrance wherewith
+to soothe this very impatient gentleman. But before he could speak,
+Garnache’s voice cut sharply into the silence. An interruption at such a
+moment vexed him sorely.
+
+“Monsieur says?” quoth he.
+
+“To you, sir--nothing,” answered the fellow impudently, and looked him
+straight between the eyes.
+
+With a flush mounting to his cheeks, and his brows drawn together in
+perplexity, Garnache surveyed him. He was that same traveller who had
+lately clamoured to know when he might sup, a man of rather more than
+middle height, lithe and active of frame, yet with a breadth of shoulder
+and depth of chest that argued strength and endurance as well. He had
+fair, wavy hair, which he wore rather longer than was the mode, brown
+eyes, and a face which, without being handsome, was yet more than
+ordinarily engaging by virtue of its strength and frank ingenuousness.
+His dress was his worst feature. It was flamboyant and showy; cheap, and
+tawdrily pretentious. Yet he bore himself with the easy dignity of a man
+who counts more inferiors than superiors.
+
+Despite the arrogant manner of his address, Garnache felt prepossessed
+in the newcomer’s favour. But before he could answer him, the host was
+speaking.
+
+“Monsieur mistakes...” he began.
+
+“Mistakes?” thundered the other in an accent slightly foreign. “It is
+you who mistake if you propose to tell me that this is not my supper.
+Am I to wait all night, while every jackanapes who follows me into your
+pigsty is to be served before me?”
+
+“Jackanapes?” said Garnache thoughtfully, and looked the man in the face
+again. Behind the stranger pressed his three companions now, whilst the
+troopers across the room forgot their card-play to watch the altercation
+that seemed to impend.
+
+The foreigner--for such, indeed, his French proclaimed him--turned
+half-contemptuously to the host, ignoring Garnache with an air that was
+studiously offensive.
+
+“Jackanapes?” murmured Garnache again, and he, too, turned to the host.
+“Tell me, Monsieur l’Hote,” said he, “where do the jackanapes bury their
+dead in Grenoble? I may need the information.”
+
+Before the distressed landlord could utter a word, the stranger had
+wheeled about again to face Garnache. “What shall that mean?” he asked
+sharply, a great fierceness in his glance.
+
+“That Grenoble may be witnessing the funeral of a foreign bully by
+to-morrow, Monsieur l’Etranger,” said Garnache, showing his teeth in a
+pleasant smile. He became conscious in that moment of a pressure on his
+shoulder blade, but paid no heed to it, intent on watching the other’s
+countenance. It expressed surprise a moment, then grew dark with anger.
+
+“Do you mean that for me, sir?” he growled.
+
+Garnache spread his hands. “If monsieur feels that the cap fits him, I
+shall not stay him in the act of donning it.”
+
+The stranger set one hand upon the table, and leaned forward towards
+Garnache. “May I ask monsieur to be a little more definite?” he begged.
+
+Garnache sat back in his chair and surveyed the man, smiling. Quick
+though his temper usually might be, it was checked at present by
+amusement. He had seen in his time many quarrels spring from the
+flimsiest of motives, but surely never had he seen one quite so
+self-begotten. It was almost as if the fellow had come there of set
+purpose to pick it with him.
+
+A suspicion flashed across his mind. He remembered the warning
+mademoiselle had given him. And he wondered. Was this a trick to lure
+him to some guet-apens? He surveyed his man more closely; but the
+inspection lent no colour to his suspicions. The stranger looked so
+frank and honest; then again his accent was foreign. It might very well
+be that he was some Savoyard lordling unused to being kept waiting,
+and that his hunger made him irritable and impatient. If that were so,
+assuredly the fellow deserved a lesson that should show him he was now
+in France, where different manners obtained to those that he displayed;
+yet, lest he should be something else, Garnache determined to pursue a
+policy of conciliation. It would be a madness to embroil himself just
+then, whether this fellow were of Condillac or not.
+
+“I have asked you, monsieur,” the stranger insisted, “to be a little
+more definite.”
+
+Garnache’s smile broadened and grew more friendly. “Frankly,” said he,
+“I experience difficulty. My remark was vague. I meant it so to be.”
+
+“But it offended me, monsieur,” the other answered sharply.
+
+The Parisian raised his eyebrows, and pursed his lips. “Then I deplore
+it,” said he. And now he had to endure the hardest trial of all. The
+stranger’s expression changed to one of wondering scorn.
+
+“Do I understand that monsieur apologizes?”
+
+Garnache felt himself crimsoning; his self-control was slipping from
+him; the pressure against his shoulder blade was renewed, and in time he
+became aware of it and knew it for a warning from Rabecque.
+
+“I cannot conceive, sir, that I have offended,” said he at length,
+keeping a tight hand upon his every instinct--which was to knock this
+impertinent stranger down. “But if I have, I beg that you will believe
+that I have done so unwittingly. I had no such intent.”
+
+The stranger removed his hand from the table and drew himself erect.
+
+“So much for that, then,” said he, provokingly contemptuous. “If you
+will be as amiable in the matter of the supper I shall be glad to
+terminate an acquaintance which I can see no honour to myself in
+pursuing.”
+
+This, Garnache felt, was more than he could endure. A spasm of passion
+crossed his face, another instant and despite Rabecque’s frantic
+proddings he might have flung the ragout in the gentleman’s face; when
+suddenly came the landlord unexpectedly to the rescue.
+
+“Monsieur, here comes your supper now,” he announced, as his wife
+reentered from the kitchen with a laden tray.
+
+For a moment the stranger seemed out of countenance. Then he looked with
+cold insolence from the dishes set before Garnache to those which were
+being set for himself.
+
+“Ah,” said he, and his tone was an insult unsurpassable, “perhaps it is
+to be preferred. This ragout grows cold, I think.”
+
+He sniffed, and turning on his heel, without word or sign of salutation
+to Garnache, he passed to the next table, and sat down with his
+companions. The Parisian’s eyes followed him, and they blazed
+with suppressed wrath. Never in all his life had he exercised such
+self-control as he was exercising then--which was the reason why he had
+failed to achieve greatness--and he was exercising it for the sake of
+that child above-stairs, and because he kept ever-present in his mind
+the thought that she must come to grievous harm if ill befell himself.
+But he controlled his passion at the cost of his appetite. He could not
+eat, so enraged was he. And so he pushed the platter from him, and rose.
+
+He turned to Rabecque, and the sight of his face sent the lackey back a
+pace or two in very fear. He waved his hand to the table.
+
+“Sup, Rabecque,” said he. “Then come to me above.”
+
+And followed, as before, by the eyes of the stranger and his companions,
+Garnache strode out of the room, and mounting the stairs went to find
+solace in talk with Valerie. But however impossible he might find it to
+digest the affront he had swallowed, no word of the matter did he utter
+to the girl, lest it should cause her fears to reawaken.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+
+Garnache spent a sleepless night at Grenoble, on guard throughout the
+greater part of it since nothing short of that would appease the fears
+of Valerie. Yet it passed without any bellicose manifestation on the
+part of the Condillacs such as Valerie feared and such as Garnache was
+satisfied would not--could not, indeed--take place.
+
+Betimes next morning he dispatched Rabecque to the Auberge de France for
+the promised carriage, and broke his fast in the common-room what time
+he awaited his man’s return. The chamber was again occupied by the
+stranger of yesternight, who sat apart, however, and seemed no longer
+disposed to interfere with the Parisian. Garnache wondered idly, might
+this be due to the circumstance that that same stranger was supported
+now by one single companion, and was therefore less valorous than when
+he had been in the company of three.
+
+At another table were two gentlemen, sprung he knew not whence, quiet
+in dress and orderly in manner, to whom he paid little heed until one of
+them a slender, swarthy, hawk-faced fellow--looking up suddenly, started
+slightly at sight of the Parisian and addressed him instantly by name.
+Garnache paused in the act of rising from table, half-turned, and
+sharply scrutinized the swarthy gentleman, but failed to recognize him.
+He advanced towards him.
+
+“I have the honour to be known to you, monsieur?” he half-stated,
+half-inquired.
+
+“Parbleu, Monsieur de Garnache!” exclaimed the other with a ready
+smile, the more winning since it lighted up a face that at rest was very
+sombre. “Lives there a Parisian to whom you are not known? I have seen
+you often at the Hotel de Bourgogne.”
+
+Garnache acknowledged the courtesy by a slight inclination of the head.
+
+“And once,” continued the other, “I had the honour to be presented to
+you by Monsieur le Duc himself. My name is Gaubert--Fabre Gaubert.” And
+as he introduced himself he rose out of respect for Garnache, who had
+remained standing. Garnache knew him not at all, yet never doubted that
+his tale was true; the fellow had a very courtly, winning air; moreover,
+Garnache was beginning to feel lonely in the wilds of Dauphiny, so that
+it rejoiced him to come into the company of one whom he might regard as
+something of a fellow-creature. He held out his hand.
+
+“I am honoured in that you should have borne me in your memory,
+monsieur,” said he. He was about to add that he would be overjoyed if
+it should happen that Monsieur Gaubert was travelling to Paris, since he
+might give himself the pleasure of his company on that tedious journey;
+but he checked himself betimes. He had no reason to suspect this
+gentleman; and yet, all things considered, he bethought him suddenly
+that he would do well to observe the greatest circumspection. So with a
+pleasant but meaningless civility touching Monsieur Gaubert’s presence
+in those parts, Garnache passed on and gained the door. He paused in the
+porch, above which the rebus-like sign of the Sucking Calf creaked and
+grated in each gust of the chill wind that was blowing from the Alps.
+The rain had ceased, but the sky was dark and heavy with great banks of
+scudding clouds. In the street the men of his escort sat their horses,
+having mounted at his bidding in readiness for the journey. A word or
+two he exchanged with the sergeant, and then with a great rumble the
+clumsy carriage from the Auberge de France heralded its approach. It
+rolled up the street, a vast machine of wood and leather, drawn by three
+horses, and drew up at the door of the inn. Out sprang Rabecque, to be
+immediately sent by his master to summon mademoiselle. They would set
+out upon the instant.
+
+Rabecque turned to obey; but in that same moment he was thrust rudely
+aside by a man with the air of a servant, who issued from he inn
+carrying a valise; after him, following close upon his heels, with head
+held high and eyes that looked straight before him and took no heed of
+Garnache, came the foreigner of yesternight.
+
+Rabecque, his shoulders touching the timbers of the porch, against which
+he had been thrust, remained at gaze, following with resentful eye the
+fellow who had so rudely used him. Garnache, on the other side, watched
+with some wonder the advent of the ingenuous-looking stranger, but as
+yet with no suspicion of his intent.
+
+Not until the servant had thrown open the door of the coach and
+deposited within the valise he carried, did Garnache stir. Not, indeed,
+until the foreigner’s foot was on the step preparatory to mounting did
+Garnache speak.
+
+“Hi! monsieur,” he called to him, “what is your pleasure with my
+carriage?”
+
+The stranger turned, and stared at Garnache with a look of wonder that
+artfully changed to one of disdainful recognition.
+
+“Ah?” said he, and his eyebrows went up. “The apologetic gentleman! You
+said?”
+
+Garnache approached him, followed a step not only by Rabecque, but also
+by Monsieur Gaubert, who had sauntered out a second earlier. Behind
+them, in the porch, lounged now the foreigner’s friend, and behind him
+again was to be seen the great face and staring, somewhat startled eyes
+of the landlord.
+
+“I asked you, monsieur,” said Garnache, already at grips with that quick
+temper of his, “what might be your pleasure with my coach?”
+
+“With your coach?” echoed the other, his superciliousness waxing more
+and more offensive. “Voyons! on! my apologetic friend, do all things
+in Grenoble belong to you?” He turned to the post-boy, who looked on
+stolidly. “You are from the Auberge de France, are you not?” quoth he.
+
+“I am, monsieur,” replied the man. “This carriage was ordered last night
+by a gentleman lodging at the Veau qui Tete?”
+
+“Perfectly,” replied the stranger, in a tone of finality. “It was
+ordered by me.” And he was about to turn away, when Garnache approached
+him by yet another step.
+
+“I will ask you to observe, monsieur,” said he and for all that his tone
+and words were civil, that they were forcedly so was obvious from their
+quiver--“I will ask you to observe that the carriage was fetched by my
+own man there, who rode hither in it.”
+
+The stranger looked him up and down with a curling lip.
+
+“It seems, sir,” said he, with a broad sneer, “that you are one of
+those impertinent fellows who will be for ever thrusting themselves upon
+gentlemen with an eye to such profit as they can make.” He produced
+a purse and opened it. “Last night it was my supper you usurped. I
+suffered that. Now you would do the same by my coach, and that I
+shall not suffer. But there is for your pains, and to be quit of your
+company.” And he tossed a silver coin at the Parisian.
+
+There was an exclamation of horror in the background, and Monsieur de
+Gaubert thrust himself forward.
+
+“Sir, sir,” he exclaimed in an agitated voice, “you cannot know whom
+you are addressing. This is Monsieur Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache,
+Mestre-de-Champ in the army of the King.”
+
+“Of all those names the one I should opine might fit him best, but for
+his ugliness, is that of Marie,” answered the foreigner, leering, and
+with a contemptuous shrug he turned again to mount the carriage.
+
+At that all Garnache’s self-control deserted him, and he did a thing
+deplorable. In one of his blind excesses of fury, heedless of the
+faithful and watchful Rabecque’s arresting tug at his sleeve, he stepped
+forward, and brought a heavy hand down upon the supercilious gentleman’s
+shoulder. He took him in the instant in which, with one foot off the
+ground and the other on the step of the carriage, the foreigner was
+easily thrown’ off his balance; he dragged him violently backward, span
+him round and dropped him floundering in the mire of the street-kennel.
+
+That done, there fell a pause--a hush that was ominous of things
+impending. A little crowd of idlers that had gathered was quickly
+augmenting now, and from some there came a cry of “Shame!” at Garnache’s
+act of violence.
+
+This is no moment at which to pause to moralize. And yet, how often is
+it not so? How often does not public sympathy go out to the man who has
+been assaulted without thought of the extent to which that man may have
+provoked and goaded his assailant.
+
+That cry of “Shame!” did no more than increase the anger that was
+mastering Garnache. His mission in Grenoble was forgotten; mademoiselle
+above-stairs was forgotten; the need for caution and the fear of the
+Condillacs were forgotten; everything was thrust from his mind but the
+situation of the moment.
+
+Amid the hush that followed, the stranger picked himself slowly up, and
+sought to wipe the filth from his face and garments. His servant and his
+friend flew to his aid, but he waved them aside, and advanced towards
+Garnache, eyes blazing, lips sneering.
+
+“Perhaps,” said he, in that soft, foreign tone of his, laden now with
+fierce mock-politeness, “perhaps monsieur proposes to apologize again.”
+
+“Sir, you are mad,” interposed Gaubert. “You are a foreigner, I
+perceive, else you would--”
+
+But Garnache thrust him quietly aside. “You are very kind, Monsieur
+Gaubert,” said he, and his manner now was one of frozen calm--a manner
+that betrayed none of the frenzy of seething passion underneath.
+“I think, sir,” said he to the stranger, adopting something of that
+gentleman’s sardonic manner, “that it will be a more peaceful world
+without you. It is that consideration restrains me from apologizing. And
+yet, if monsieur will express regret for having sought, and with such
+lack of manners, to appropriate my carriage--”
+
+“Enough!” broke in the other. “We are wasting time, and I have a long
+journey before me. Courthon,” said he, addressing his friend, “will you
+bring me the length of this gentleman’s sword? My name, sir,” he added
+to Garnache, “is Sanguinetti.”
+
+“Faith,” said Garnache, “it sorts well with your bloody spirit.”
+
+“And will sort well, no doubt, with his condition presently,” put in
+hawk-faced Gaubert. “Monsieur de Garnache, if you have no friend at hand
+to act for you, I shall esteem myself honoured.” And he bowed.
+
+“Why, thanks, sir. You are most opportunely met. You should be a
+gentleman since you frequent the Hotel de Bourgogne. My thanks.”
+
+Gaubert went aside to confer with Monsieur Courthon. Sanguinetti stood
+apart, his manner haughty and impressive, his eye roaming scornfully
+through the ranks of what had by now become a crowd. Windows were
+opening in the street, and heads appearing, and across the way Garnache
+might have beheld the flabby face of Monsieur de Tressan among the
+spectators of that little scene.
+
+Rabecque drew near his master.
+
+“Have a care, monsieur,” he implored him. “If this should be a trap.”
+
+Garnache started. The remark sobered him, and brought to his mind his
+own suspicions of yesternight, which his present anger had for the
+moment lulled. Still, he conceived that he had gone too far to extricate
+himself. But he could at least see to it that he was not drawn away
+from the place that sheltered mademoiselle. And so he stepped forward,
+joining Courthon and Gaubert, to insist that the combat should take
+place in the inn--either in the common room or in the yard. But the
+landlord, overhearing this, protested loudly that he could not consent
+to it. He had his house to think of. He swore that they should not fight
+on his premises, and implored them in the same breath not to attempt it.
+
+At that Garnache, now thoroughly on his guard, was for putting off the
+encounter.
+
+“Monsieur Courthon,” said he--and he felt a flush of shame mounting
+to his brow, and realized that it may need more courage to avoid an
+encounter than to engage in one--“there is something that in the heat
+of passion I forgot; something that renders it difficult for me to meet
+your friend at present.”
+
+Courthon looked at him as he might look at an impertinent lackey.
+
+“And what may that be?” he inquired, mightily contemptuous. There was
+a snigger from some in the crowd that pressed about them, and even
+Monsieur Gaubert looked askance.
+
+“Surely, sir,” he began, “if I did not know you for Monsieur de
+Garnache--”
+
+But Garnache did not let him finish.
+
+“Give me air,” he cried, and cuffed out to right and left of him at the
+grinning spectators, who fell back and grinned less broadly. “My reason,
+Monsieur de Courthon,” said he, “is that I do not belong to my self at
+present. I am in Grenoble on business of the State, as the emissary of
+the Queen-Regent, and so it would hardly become me to engage in private
+quarrels.”
+
+Courthon raised his brows.
+
+“You should have thought of that before you rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti
+in the mud,” he answered coldly.
+
+“I will tender him my apologies for that,” Garnache promised, swallowing
+hard, “and if he still insists upon a meeting he shall have it in, say,
+a month’s time.”
+
+“I cannot permit--” began Courthon, very fiercely.
+
+“You will be so good as to inform your friend of what I have said,”
+ Garnache insisted, interrupting him.
+
+Cowed, Courthon shrugged and went apart to confer with his friend.
+
+“Ah!” came Sanguinetti’s soft voice, yet loud enough to be heard by
+all present. “He shall have a caning then for his impertinence.” And
+he called loudly to the post-boy for his whip. But at that insult
+Garnache’s brain seemed to take fire, and his cautious resolutions were
+reduced to ashes by the conflagration. He stepped forward, and,
+virulent of tone and terrific of mien, he announced that since Monsieur
+Sanguinetti took that tone with him, he would cut his throat for him at
+once and wherever they should please.
+
+At last it was arranged that they should proceed there and then to the
+Champs aux Capuchins, a half-mile away behind the Franciscan convent.
+
+Accordingly they set out, Sanguinetti and Courthon going first, and
+Garnache following with Gaubert; the rear being brought up by a regiment
+of rabble, idlers and citizens, that must have represented a very
+considerable proportion of the population of Grenoble. This audience
+heartened Garnache, to whom some measure of reflection had again
+returned. Before such numbers it was unthinkable that these
+gentlemen--assuming them to be acting on behalf of Condillac--should
+dare to attempt foul measures with him. For the rest he had taken the
+precaution of leaving Rabecque at the Sucking Calf, and he had given the
+sergeant strict injunctions that he was not to allow any of his men to
+leave their posts during his absence, and that the troopers were to
+hold themselves entirely at the orders of Rabecque. Comparatively easy
+therefore in his mind, and but little exercised by any thought of the
+coming encounter, Garnache walked briskly along.
+
+They came at last to the Champs aux Capuchins--a pleasant stretch
+of verdure covering perhaps half an acre and set about by a belt of
+beech-trees.
+
+The crowd disposed itself on the fringe of the sward, and the duellists
+went forward, and set about the preparations. Principals and seconds
+threw off cloak and doublet, and Sanguinetti, Courthon, and Gaubert
+removed their heavy boots, whilst Garnache did no more than detach the
+spurs from his.
+
+Sanguinetti, observing this, drew the attention of the others to it, and
+an altercation arose. It was Gaubert who came to beg Garnache that he
+should follow the example they had set him in that respect. But Garnache
+shook his head.
+
+“The turf is sodden.”
+
+“But it is precisely on that account, sir,” protested Gaubert very
+earnestly. “In your boots you will be unable to stand firm; you will run
+the risk of slipping every time that you break ground.”
+
+“I venture to think, sir, that that is my affair,” said Garnache
+stiffly.
+
+“But it is not,” the other cried. “If you fight in your boots, we must
+all do the same, and for myself--well, I have not come here to commit
+suicide.”
+
+“Look you, Monsieur Gaubert,” said Garnache quietly, “your opponent will
+be Monsieur Courthon, and since he is in his stockinged feet, there is
+no reason why you yourself should not remain so too. As for me, I retain
+my boots, and Monsieur Sanguinetti may have all the advantage that may
+give him. Since I am content, in Heaven’s name let the fight go forward.
+I am in haste.”
+
+Gaubert bowed in submission; but Sanguinetti, who had overheard, turned
+with an oath.
+
+“By God, no!” said he. “I need no such advantage, sir. Courthon, be so
+good as to help me on with my boots again.” And there was a fresh delay
+whilst he resumed them.
+
+At last, however, the four men came together, and proceeded to the
+measurement of swords. It was found that Sanguinetti’s was two inches
+longer than any of the other three.
+
+“It is the usual length in Italy,” said Sanguinetti with a shrug.
+
+“If monsieur had realized that he was no longer in Italy, we might
+perhaps have been spared this very foolish business,” answered Garnache
+testily.
+
+“But what are we to do?” cried the perplexed Gaubert.
+
+“Fight,” said Garnache impatiently. “Is there never to be an end to
+these preliminaries?”
+
+“But I cannot permit you to oppose yourself to a sword two inches longer
+than your own,” cried Gaubert, almost in a temper.
+
+“Why not, if I am satisfied?” asked Garnache. “Mine is the longer reach;
+thus matters will stand equal.”
+
+“Equal?” roared Gaubert. “Your longer reach is an advantage that you
+had from God, his longer sword is one he had from an armourer. Is that
+equality?”
+
+“He may have my sword, and I’ll take his,” cut in the Italian, also
+showing impatience. “I too am in haste.”
+
+“In haste to die, then,” snapped Gaubert.
+
+“Monsieur, this is not seemly,” Courthon reproved him.
+
+“You shall teach me manners when we engage,” snapped the hawk-faced
+gentleman.
+
+“Sirs, sirs,” Garnache implored them, “are we to waste the day in words?
+Monsieur Gaubert, there are several gentlemen yonder wearing swords; I
+make no doubt that you will find one whose blade is of the same length
+as your own, sufficiently obliging to lend it to Monsieur Sanguinetti.”
+
+“That is an office that my friend can do for me,” interposed
+Sanguinetti, and thereupon Courthon departed, to return presently with a
+borrowed weapon of the proper length.
+
+At last it seemed that they might proceed with the business upon which
+they were come; but Garnache was wrong in so supposing. A discussion now
+arose between Gaubert and Courthon as to the choice of spot. The turf
+was drenched and slippery, and for all that they moved from place to
+place testing the ground, their principals following, nowhere could they
+find the conditions sufficiently improved to decide upon engaging.
+To Garnache the utility of this was apparent from the first. If these
+gentlemen had thought to avoid slippery ground, they should have elected
+to appoint the meeting elsewhere. But having chosen the Champs aux
+Capuchins, it was idle to expect that one stretch of turf would prove
+firmer than another.
+
+Wearied at last by this delay, he gave expression to his thoughts.
+
+“You are quite right, monsieur,” said Courthon. “But your second is
+over-fastidious. It would simplify matters so much if you would remove
+your boots.”
+
+“Look you, sirs,” said Garnache, taking a firm stand, “I will engage in
+my boots and on this very spot or not at all. I have told you that I am
+in haste. As for the slipperiness of the ground, my opponent will run
+no greater risks than I. I am not the only impatient one. The spectators
+are beginning to jeer at us. We shall have every scullion in Grenoble
+presently saying that we are afraid of one another. Besides which, sirs,
+I think I am taking cold.”
+
+“I am quite of monsieur’s mind, myself,” drawled Sanguinetti.
+
+“You hear, sir,” exclaimed Courthon, turning to Gaubert. “You can scarce
+persist in finding objections now.”
+
+“Why, since all are satisfied, so be it,” said Gaubert, with a shrug. “I
+sought to do the best for my principal. As it is, I wash my hands of all
+responsibility, and by all means let us engage, sirs.”
+
+They disposed themselves accordingly, Gaubert engaging Courthon, on
+Garnache’s right hand, and Garnache himself falling on guard to receive
+the attack of Sanguinetti. The jeers and murmurs that had been rising
+from the ever-growing crowd that swarmed about the outskirts of the
+place fell silent as the clatter of meeting swords rang out at last. And
+then, scarce were they engaged when a voice arose, calling angrily:
+
+“Hold, Sanguinetti! Wait!”
+
+A big, broad-shouldered man, in a suit of homespun and a featherless
+hat, thrust his way rudely trough the crowd and broke into the space
+within the belt of trees. The combatants had fallen apart at this
+commanding cry, and the newcomer now dashed forward, flushed and out of
+breath as if with running.
+
+“_Vertudieu_! Sanguinetti,” he swore, and his manner was half-angry,
+half-bantering; “do you call this friendship?”
+
+“My dear Francois” returned the foreigner, “you arrive most
+inopportunely.”
+
+“And is that all the greeting you have for me?”
+
+Looking more closely, Garnache thought that he recognized in him one of
+Sanguinetti’s companions of yesternight.
+
+“But do you not see that I am engaged?”
+
+“Ay; and that is my grievance that you should be engaged upon such an
+affair, and that I should have no share in it. It is to treat me like
+a lackey, and have the right to feel offended. Enfin! It seems I am not
+come too late.”
+
+Garnache cut in. He saw the drift of the fellow’s intentions, and he was
+not minded to submit to fresh delays; already more than half an hour was
+sped since he had left the Sucking Calf. He put it plainly to them that
+more than enough delay had there been already and he begged the newcomer
+to stand aside and allow them to terminate the business on which they
+were met. But Monsieur Francois--as Sanguinetti had called him--would
+not hear of it. He proved, indeed, a very testy fellow, and he had,
+moreover, the support of the others, including even Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+“Let me implore you not to spoil sport, sir,” the latter begged
+Garnache. “I have a friend at the inn who would never forgive me if I
+permitted him to miss such a morning’s diversion as this gentleman is
+willing to afford him. Suffer me to go for him.”
+
+“Look you, sir,” answered Garnache sharply, “however you may view this
+meeting, it is not with me an affair of jest or sport. I am in a quarrel
+that has been forced upon me, and--”
+
+“Surely not, sir,” Courthon interrupted sweetly. “You forget that you
+rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti in the mud. That is hardly to have a quarrel
+forced upon you.”
+
+Garnache bit his lip to the blood in his vexation.
+
+“However the quarrel may have originated,” said Francois, with a great
+laugh, “I swear that it goes not forward until I am accommodated, too.”
+
+“You had better accede, monsieur,” murmured Gaubert. “I shall not be
+gone five minutes, and it will save time in the end.”
+
+“Oh, very well,” cried poor Garnache in his despair. “Anything to save
+time; anything! In God’s name fetch your friend, and I hope you and he
+and every man here will get his fill of fighting for once.”
+
+Gaubert departed on his errand, and there were fresh murmurs in the mob
+until the reason of his going was understood. Five minutes sped; ten
+minutes, and yet he returned not. Grouped together were Sanguinetti
+and his two friends, in easy, whispered talk. At a little distance from
+them, Garnache paced up and down to keep himself warm. He had thrown his
+cloak over his shoulders again, and with sword tucked under arm and head
+thrust forward, he stamped backwards and forwards, the very picture
+of ill-humour. Fifteen minutes passed; twelve o’clock boomed from the
+Church of Saint Francois d’Assisi and still Monsieur Gaubert returned
+not. Garnache stood still a moment, in angry thought. This must not go
+on. There must be an end, and at once. The tastes and inclinations
+of brawlers were no concern of his. He had business of State--however
+unworthy--to dispatch. He turned, intending to demand of Monsieur
+Sanguinetti that they should engage at once and be done, when suddenly
+a fellow roughly dressed, with dirty face and a shock head of fair
+hair, pushed his way through the throng and advanced towards Monsieur
+Sanguinetti and his friends. Garnache checked in his movement to look
+at the fellow, for he recognized in him the ostler of the Auberge de
+France: He spoke at that moment, and Garnache overheard the words he
+uttered.
+
+“Monsieur Sanguinetti,” said he, addressing that gentleman, “my master
+sends to inquire if you shall want the carriage you ordered for to-day.
+It has been standing for an hour at the door of the Auberge de France,
+awaiting you, and if you don’t want it--”
+
+“Standing where?” asked Sanguinetti harshly.
+
+“At the door of the Auberge de France.”
+
+“Peste, fool!” cried the foreigner, “why is it there, when I bade it be
+sent to the Sucking Calf?”
+
+“I don’t know, sir. I know no more than Monsieur l’Hote told me.”
+
+“Now, a plague on Monsieur l’Hote,” swore Sanguinetti, and in that
+moment his eye fell upon Garnache, standing there, attentive. At sight
+of the Parisian he seemed lost in confusion. He dropped his glance and
+appeared on the point of turning aside. Then to the ostler: “I shall
+want the carriage, and I shall come for it anon. Carry that message
+to your master.” And with that he turned and advanced to Garnache. His
+whilom arrogance was all fallen from him; he wore instead an air of
+extreme contrition.
+
+“Monsieur, what shall I say to you?” he asked in a voice that was rather
+small. “It seems there has been an error. I am deeply grieved, believe
+me--”
+
+“Say no more, I beg,” cried Garnache, immensely relieved that at last
+there should be a conclusion to an affair which had threatened to be
+interminable. “Let me but express my regrets for the treatment you
+received at my hands.”
+
+“I accept your expressions, and I admire their generosity,” returned the
+other as courteous now as subservient, indeed, in his courtesy--as
+he had been erstwhile fierce and intractable. “As for the treatment I
+received, I confess that my mistake and my opinionativeness deserved it
+me. I deplore to deprive these gentlemen of the entertainment to which
+they were looking forward, but unless you should prove of an excessive
+amiability I am afraid they must suffer with me the consequences of my
+error.”
+
+Garnache assured him very briefly, and none too politely that he did not
+intend to prove of any excessive amiability. He spoke whilst struggling
+into his doublet. He felt that he could cheerfully have caned the fellow
+for the inconvenience he had caused him, and yet he realized that he had
+other more pressing matters to attend to. He sheathed his sword, took up
+his cloak and hat, made those gentlemen the compliments that became the
+occasion, in terms a trifle more brief, perhaps, than were usual, and,
+still wondering why Monsieur de Gaubert had not yet returned, he stalked
+briskly away. Followed by the booings of the disappointed crowd, he set
+out for the Sucking Calf at a sharp pace, taking the shorter way behind
+the Church and across the graveyard of Saint Francois.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+
+Upon leaving the Champs aux Capuchins, hawk-faced Monsieur Gaubert had
+run every foot of the way to the Sucking Calf, and he had arrived there
+within some five minutes, out of breath and wearing every appearance of
+distress--of a distress rather greater than his haste to find his friend
+should warrant.
+
+At the door of the inn he found the carriage still waiting; the
+post-boy, however, was in the porch, leaning in talk with one of the
+drawers. The troopers sat their horses in stolid patience, keeping
+guard, and awaiting, as they had been bidden, the return of Monsieur de
+Garnache. Rabecque, very watchful, lounged in the doorway, betraying in
+his air none of the anxiety and impatience with which he looked for his
+master.
+
+At sight of Monsieur Gaubert, running so breathlessly, he started
+forward, wondering and uneasy. Across the street, from the Palais
+Seneschal, came at that same moment Monsieur de Tressan with rolling
+gait. He reached the door of the inn together with Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+Full of evil forebodings, Rabecque hailed the runner.
+
+“What has happened?” he cried. “Where is Monsieur de Garnache?”
+
+Gaubert came to a staggering halt; he groaned and wrung his hands.
+
+“Killed!” he panted, rocking himself in a passion of distress. “He has
+been butchered! Oh! it was horrible!”
+
+Rabecque gripped him by the shoulder, and steadied him with a hand that
+hurt. “What do you say?” he gasped, his face white to the lips.
+
+Tressan halted, too, and turned upon Gaubert, a look of incredulity in
+his fat countenance. “Who has been killed?” he asked. “Not Monsieur de
+Garnache?”
+
+“Helas! yes,” groaned the other. “It was a snare, a guet-apens to which
+they led us. Four of them set upon us in the Champs aux Capuchins. As
+long as he lived, I stood beside him. But seeing him fallen, I come for
+help.”
+
+“My God!” sobbed Rabecque, and loosed his grasp of Monsieur Gaubert’s
+shoulder.
+
+“Who did it?” inquired Tressan, and his voice rumbled fiercely.
+
+“I know not who they were. The man who picked the quarrel with Monsieur
+de Garnache called himself Sanguinetti. There is a riot down there at
+present. There was a crowd to witness the combat, and they have fallen
+to fighting among themselves. Would to Heaven they had stirred in time
+to save that poor gentleman from being murdered.”
+
+“A riot, did you say?” cried Tressan, the official seeming to awaken in
+him.
+
+“Aye,” answered the other indifferently; “they are cutting one another’s
+throats.”
+
+“But... But... Are you sure that he is dead, monsieur?” inquired
+Rabecque; and his tone was one that implored contradiction.
+
+Gaubert looked and paused, seeming to give the matter a second’s
+thought. “I saw him fall,” said he. “It may be that he was no more than
+wounded.”
+
+“And you left him there?” roared the servant. “You left him there?”
+
+Gaubert shrugged his shoulders. “What could I do against four? Besides,
+the crowd was interfering already, and it seemed best to me to come for
+help. These soldiers, now--”
+
+“Aye,” cut in Tressan, and he turned about and called the sergeant.
+“This becomes my affair.” And he announced his quality to Monsieur
+Gaubert. “I am the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny.”
+
+“I am fortunate in finding you,” returned Gaubert, and bowed. “I could
+place the matter in no better hand.”
+
+But Tressan, without heeding him, was already ordering the sergeant
+to ride hard with his troopers for the Champs aux Capuchins. Rabecque,
+however, thrust himself suddenly forward.
+
+“Not so, Monsieur le Seneschal,” he interposed in fresh alarm, and
+mindful of his charge. “These men are here to guard Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye. Let them remain. I will go to Monsieur de Garnache.”
+
+The Seneschal stared at him with contemptuously pouting underlip. “You
+will go?” said he. “And what can you do alone? Who are you?” he asked.
+
+“I am Monsieur de Garnache’s servant.”
+
+“A lackey? Ah!” And Tressan turned aside and resumed his orders as
+if Rabecque did not exist or had never spoken. “To the Champs aux
+Capuchins!” said he. “At the gallop, Pommier! I will send others after
+you.”
+
+The sergeant rose in his stirrups and growled an order. The troopers
+wheeled about; another order, and they were off, their cantering hoofs
+thundering down the narrow street.
+
+Rabecque clutched at the Lord Seneschal’s arm.
+
+“Stop them, monsieur!” he almost screamed in his excitement. “Stop them!
+There is some snare, some trick in this.”
+
+“Stop them?” quoth the Seneschal. “Are you mad?” He shook off Rabecque’s
+detaining hand, and left him, to cross the street again with ponderous
+and sluggish haste, no doubt to carry out his purpose of sending more
+troopers to the scene of the disturbance.
+
+Rabecque swore angrily and bitterly, and his vexation had two entirely
+separate sources. On the one hand his anxiety and affection for his
+master urged him to run at once to his assistance, whilst Tressan’s
+removal of the troopers rendered it impossible for him to leave
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye unguarded--though what he should do with
+her if Garnache came not back at all, he did not at this stage pause
+to consider. On the other hand, an instinctive and growing suspicion of
+this Monsieur Gaubert--who was now entering the inn--inspired him with
+the opinion that the fat Seneschal had been duped by a wild tale to
+send the troopers from the spot where they might presently become very
+necessary.
+
+Full of fears, anxiety, and mistrust, it was a very dispirited Rabecque
+that now slowly followed Monsieur Gaubert into the inn. But as he set
+his foot across the threshold of the common-room, a sight met his eyes
+that brought him to a momentary standstill, and turned to certainty all
+his rising suspicions. He found it tenanted by a half-dozen fellows of
+very rude aspect, all armed and bearing an odd resemblance in air and
+accoutrements to the braves he had seen at Condillac the day before.
+As to how they came there, he could only surmise that they had entered
+through the stable-yard, as otherwise he must have observed their
+approach. They were grouped now at the other end of the long, low
+chamber, by the door leading to the interior of the inn. A few paces
+distant the landlord watched them with uneasy eyes.
+
+But what dismayed Garnache’s servant most of all was to see the man who
+called himself Gaubert standing in talk with a slender, handsome youth,
+magnificently arrayed, in whom he recognized Marius de Condillac.
+
+Rabecque checked in his advance, and caught in that moment from Marius
+the words: “Let her be told that it is Monsieur de Garnache wishes her
+to descend.”
+
+At that Rabecque stepped towards them, very purposeful of mien. Gaubert
+turned at his approach, and smiled. Marius looked up quickly; then
+made a sign to the men. Instantly two of them went out by the door they
+guarded, and ere it swung back again Rabecque saw that they were
+making for the stairs. The remaining four ranged themselves shoulder
+to shoulder across the doorway, plainly with intent to bar the way.
+Gaubert, followed immediately by Marius, stepped aside and approached
+the landlord with arms akimbo and a truculent smile on his pale hawk
+face. What he and Marius said, Rabecque could not make out, but he
+distinctly heard the landlord’s answer delivered with a respectful bow
+to Marius:
+
+“Bien, Monsieur de Condillac. I would not interfere in your
+concerns--not for the world. I will be blind and deaf.”
+
+Marius acknowledged the servile protestation by a sneer, and Rabecque,
+stirring at last, went forward boldly towards the doorway and its ugly,
+human barrier.
+
+“By your leave, sirs,” said he--and he made to thrust one of them aside.
+
+“You cannot pass this way, sir,” he was answered, respectfully but
+firmly.
+
+Rabecque stood still, clenching and unclenching his hands and quivering
+with anger. It was in that moment that he most fervently cursed Tressan
+and his stupid meddling. Had the troopers still been there, they could
+have made short work of these tatter-demalions. As it was, and with
+Monsieur de Garnache dead, or at least absent, everything seemed at an
+end. He might have contended that, his master being slain, it was no
+great matter what he did, for in the end the Condillacs must surely have
+their way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But he never paused to think
+of that just then. His sense of trust was strong; his duty to his master
+plain. He stepped back, and drew his sword.
+
+“Let me pass!” he roared. But at the same instant there came the soft
+slither of another weapon drawn, and Rabecque was forced to turn to meet
+the onslaught of Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+“You dirty traitor,” cried the angry lackey, and that was all they left
+him breath to say. Strong arms gripped him from behind. The sword was
+wrenched from his hand. He was flung down heavily, and pinned prone in a
+corner by one of those bullies who knelt on his spine. And then the door
+opened again, and poor Rabecque groaned in impotent anguish to behold
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye pause white-faced and wide-eyed on, the
+threshold at sight of Monsieur de Condillac bowing low before her.
+
+She stood there a moment between the two ruffians who had been sent to
+fetch her, and her eyes travelling round that room discovered Rabecque
+in his undignified and half; strangled condition.
+
+“Where... Where is Monsieur de Garnache?” she faltered.
+
+“He is where all those who cross the will of Condillac must sooner or
+later find themselves,” said Marius airily. “He is... disposed of.”
+
+“Do you mean that he is dead?” she cried.
+
+“I think it very probable by now,” he smiled. “So you see, mademoiselle,
+since the guardian the Queen appointed you has... deserted you, you
+would do well to return to my mother’s roof. Let me assure you that we
+shall very gladly welcome your return. We blame none but Garnache for
+your departure, and he has paid for the brutality of his abduction of
+you.”
+
+She turned in despair from that mocking gentleman, and attempted to make
+appeal to the landlord, as though he could help her who could not help
+himself.
+
+“Monsieur l’Hote--” she began, but Marius cut in sharply.
+
+“Take her out that way,” he said, and pointed back down the passage by
+the stairs. “To the coach. Make haste.”
+
+She sought to resist them now; but they dragged her back, and there
+was a rush of the others following through the doorway, the rear being
+brought up by Gaubert.
+
+“Follow presently,” was his parting command to the man who still knelt
+upon Rabecque, and with that he vanished too.
+
+Their steps died away in the passage; a door banged in the distance.
+There followed a silence, disturbed only by the sound of Rabecque’s
+laboured breathing; then came a stir outside the door of the inn; some
+one shouted an order. There was a movement of hoofs, a creak and crunch
+of wheels, and presently the rumble of a heavy carriage being driven
+rapidly away. But too well did Rabecque surmise what had taken place.
+
+The ruffian released him at last, and, leaping to his feet, was gone
+before Rabecque could rise. Once up, however, the lackey darted to the
+door. In the distance he saw his late assailant running hard; the
+coach had disappeared. He turned, and his smouldering eye fell upon the
+landlord.
+
+“O pig!” he apostrophized him, snarling at him to vent some of his
+pent-up rage. “O cowardly pig.”
+
+“What would you?” expostulated the frightened taverner. “They had cut my
+throat if I resisted them.”
+
+Rabecque poured abuse upon him, until for very lack of words he was
+forced to cease, then, with a final bark of contempt, he went to recover
+his sword, which had been flung into a corner of the room. He was
+stooping in the act, when a quick step rang behind him on the threshold,
+an angry voice harsh and metallic pronounced his name:
+
+“Rebecque!”
+
+The sword clattered from Rabecque’s hand suddenly gone
+nerveless--nerveless with sheer joy, all else forgotten in the
+perception that there, safe and sound, stood his beloved master.
+
+“Monsieur!” he cried, and the tears welled up to the rough servant’s
+eyes. “Monsieur!” he cried again, and then with the tears streaming
+down his cheeks, sallow and wrinkled as parchment, “Oh, thank God!” he
+blubbered. “Thank God!”
+
+“For what?” asked Garnache, coming forward, a scowl like a thunder-cloud
+upon his brow. “Where is the coach, where the troopers? Where is
+mademoiselle? Answer me!”
+
+He caught Rabecque’s wrist in a grip that threatened to snap it. His
+face was livid, his eyes aflame.
+
+“They--they--” stammered Rabecque. He had not the courage to tell the
+thing that had happened. He feared Garnache would strike him dead.
+
+And then out of his terror he gathered an odd daring. He spoke to
+Garnache as never he had dreamt to speak to him, and it may well be that
+by his tone and by what he said he saved his life just then.
+
+“You fool,” he cried to him. “I told you to be on your guard. I warned
+you to go warily. But you would not heed me. You know better than
+Rabecque. You would have your way. You must go a-brawling. And they
+duped you, they fooled you to the very top of their bent, monsieur.”
+
+Garnache dropped the servant’s hand and stood back a pace. That
+counter-blast of passion and that plain speaking from a quarter so
+unexpected served, in part at least, to sober him. He understood the
+thing that had happened, the thing that already he suspected must have
+happened; but he understood too that he alone was to blame for it--he
+and his cursed temper.
+
+“Who--who fooled me?” he stammered.
+
+“Gaubert--the fellow that calls himself Gaubert. He and his friends.
+They fooled you away. Then Gaubert returned with a tale that you
+had been killed and that there was a disturbance in the Champs aux
+Capuchins. Monsieur de Tressan was here, as ill-luck would have it,
+and Gaubert implored him to send soldiers thither to quell the riot.
+He dispatched the escort. I sought in vain to stay them. He would not
+listen to me. The troopers went, and then Monsieur Gaubert entered
+the inn, to join Monsieur de Condillac and six of his braves who were
+waiting there. They overpowered me, and carried mademoiselle off in the
+coach. I did what I could, but--”
+
+“How long have they been gone?” Garnache interrupted him to inquire.
+
+“But few minutes before you came.”
+
+“It would be, then, the coach that passed me near the Porte de Savoie.
+We must go after them, Rabecque. I made a short cut across the graveyard
+of Saint Francis, or I must have met the escort. Oh, perdition!” he
+cried, smiting his clenched right hand into his open left. “To have so
+much good work undone by a moment’s unguardedness.” Then abruptly he
+turned on his heels. “I am going to Monsieur de Tressan,” said he over
+his shoulder, and went out.
+
+As he reached the threshold of the porch, the escort rode up the street,
+returned at last. At sight of him the sergeant broke into a cry of
+surprise.
+
+“At least you are safe, monsieur,” he said. “We had heard that you were
+dead, and I feared it must be so, for all that the rest of the story
+that was told us was clearly part of a very foolish jest.”
+
+“Jest? It was no jest, _Vertudieu_!” said Garnache grimly. “You had best
+return to the Palais Seneschal. I have no further need of an escort,” he
+added bitterly. “I shall require a larger force.”
+
+And he stepped out into the rain, which had begun again a few minutes
+earlier, and was now falling in a steady downpour.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. THE SENESCHAL’S ADVICE
+
+Straight across to the Palais Seneschal went Garnache. And sorely though
+his temper might already have been tried that day, tempestuously though
+it had been vented, there were fresh trials in store for him, fresh
+storms for Tressan.
+
+“May I ask, Monsieur le Seneschal,” he demanded arrogantly, “to what end
+it was that you permitted yourself to order from its post the escort you
+had placed under my command?”
+
+“To what end?” returned the Seneschal, between sorrow and indignation.
+“Why, to the end that it might succour you if still in time. I had heard
+that if not dead already, you were in danger of your life.”
+
+The answer was one that disarmed Garnache, in spite of his mistrust
+of Tressan, and followed as it now was by the Seneschal’s profuse
+expressions of joy at seeing Garnache safe and well, it left him
+clearly unable to pursue the subject of his grievance in this particular
+connection. Instead, he passed on to entertain Tressan with the recital
+of the thing that had been done; and in reciting it his anger revived
+again, nor did the outward signs of sympathetic perturbation which
+the Seneschal thought it judicious to display do aught to mollify his
+feelings.
+
+“And now, monsieur,” he concluded, “there remains but one course to
+be pursued--to return in force, and compel them at the sword-point to
+surrender me mademoiselle. That accomplished, I shall arrest the Dowager
+and her son and every jackanapes within that castle. Her men can lie
+in Grenoble gaol to be dealt with by yourself for supporting her in an
+attempt to resist the Queen’s authority. Madame and her son shall go
+with me to Paris to answer there for their offence.”
+
+The Seneschal looked grave. He thoughtfully combed his beard with his
+forefinger, and his little eyes peered a shade fearfully at Garnache
+through his horn-rimmed spectacles--Garnache had found him at his
+never-failing pretence of work.
+
+“Why, yes,” he agreed, speaking slowly, “that way lies your duty.”
+
+“I rejoice, monsieur, to hear you say so. For I shall need your aid.”
+
+“My aid?” The Seneschal’s face assumed a startled look.
+
+“I shall require of you the necessary force to reduce that garrison.”
+
+The Seneschal blew out his cheeks almost to bursting point, then wagged
+his head and smiled wistfully.
+
+“And where,” he asked, “am I to find such a force?”
+
+“You have upwards of ten score men in quarters at Grenoble.”
+
+“If I had those men--which I have not--what, think you, could they do
+against a fortress such as Condillac? Monsieur deludes himself. If they
+resist, you’ll need ten times that number to bring them to their senses.
+They are well victualled; they have an excellent water-supply. My
+friend, they would just draw up the bridge, and laugh at you and your
+soldiers from the ramparts.”
+
+Garnache looked at him from under lowering brows. But for all his
+mistrust of the man--a mistrust most excellently founded--he was forced
+to confess that there was wisdom in what Tressan said.
+
+“I’ll sit down and besiege them if need be,” he announced.
+
+Again the Seneschal wagged his head. “You would have to be prepared to
+spend your winter there in that case, and it can be cold in the valley
+of Isere. Their garrison is small--some twenty men at most; but it is
+sufficient for their defence, and not too many mouths to feed. No, no,
+monsieur, if you would win your way by force you must count upon more
+than ten score men.”
+
+And now a flash of inspiration helped Tressan. It was his aim, as we
+know, to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. Break with Madame
+de Condillac his foolish hopeful heart would not permit him. Break with
+this man, who personified authority and the King, he dared not. He
+had sought--and it had given him much to do--to steer a middle course,
+serving the Dowager and appearing not to withstand the Parisian. Now it
+almost seemed to him as if he were come to an impasse beyond which he
+could no longer pursue that course, but must halt and declare his side.
+But the notion that now occurred to him helped him to win through
+this difficulty. For Madame de Condillac’s schemes he cared not a jot;
+whether they came safe to harbour or suffered shipwreck on the way
+was all one to him; whether Valerie de La Vauvraye married Marius de
+Condillac or the meanest cobbler in Grenoble was, similarly, a matter
+that never disturbed his mind. He would not even be concerned if he,
+himself, were to help the Dowager’s schemes to frustration, so long as
+she were to remain in ignorance of his defection, so long as outwardly
+he were to appear faithful to her interests.
+
+“Monsieur,” said he gravely, “the only course that promises you success
+is to return to Paris, and, raising sufficient men, with guns and other
+modern siege appliances such as we possess not here, come back and
+batter down the walls of Condillac.”
+
+There the Seneschal spoke good sense. Garnache realized it, so much
+so that he almost began to doubt whether he had not done the man an
+injustice in believing him allied to the other party. But, however fully
+he might perceive the wisdom of the advice, such a step was one that
+must wound his pride, must be an acknowledgment that his own resources,
+upon which the Queen had relied when she sent him single-handed to deal
+with this situation, had proved insufficient.
+
+He took a turn in the apartment without answering, tugging at his
+mustachios and pondering the situation what time the Seneschal
+furtively watched him in the candle-light. At last he came abruptly to
+a standstill by the Seneschal’s writing-table, immediately opposite
+Tressan. His hand fell to his side, his eyes took on a look of
+determination.
+
+“As a last resource your good advice may guide me, Monsieur le
+Seneschal,” said he. “But first I’ll see what can be done with such men
+as you have here.”
+
+“But I have no men,” answered Tressan, dismayed to see the failure of
+his effort.
+
+Garnache stared at him in an unbelief that was fast growing to
+suspicion. “No men?” he echoed dully. “No men?”
+
+“I might muster a score--no more than that.”
+
+“But, monsieur, it is within my knowledge that you have at least two
+hundred. I saw at least some fifty drawn up in the courtyard below here
+yesterday morning.”
+
+“I had them, monsieur,” the Seneschal made haste to cry, his hands
+upheld, his body leaning forward over his table. “I had them. But,
+unfortunately, certain disturbances in the neighbourhood of Montelimar
+have forced me to part with them. They were on the point of setting out
+when you saw them.”
+
+Garnache looked at him a moment without speaking. Then, sharply:
+
+“They must be recalled, monsieur,” said he.
+
+And now the Seneschal took refuge in a fine pretence of indignation.
+
+“Recalled?” he cried, and besides indignation there was some horror
+in his voice. “Recalled? And for what? That they may assist you in
+obtaining charge of a wretched girl who is so headstrong as to wish to
+marry other than her guardians have determined. A pretty affair that, as
+God’s my life! And for the adjustment of such a family dispute as this,
+a whole province is to go to ruin, a conflagration of rebellion is to
+spread unquenched? On my soul, sir, I begin to think that this mission
+of yours has served to turn your head. You begin to see it out of all
+proportion to its size.”
+
+“Monsieur, it may have turned my head, or it may not; but I shall not be
+amazed if in the end it be the means of losing you yours. Tell me now:
+What is the disturbance you speak of in Montelimar?” That was a question
+all Tressan’s ingenuity could not answer.
+
+“What affair is it of yours?” he demanded. “Are you Seneschal of
+Dauphiny, or am I? If I tell you that there is a disturbance, let that
+suffice. In quelling it I do but attend to my own business. Do you
+attend to yours--which seems to be that of meddling in women’s matters.”
+
+This was too much. There was such odious truth in it that the iron sank
+deep into Garnache’s soul. The very reflection that such a business
+should indeed be his, was of itself enough to put him in a rage, without
+having it cast in his teeth as Tressan had none too delicately done.
+
+He stormed and raged; he waved his arms and thumped the table, and
+talked of cutting men to ribbons--among which men no doubt he counted my
+Lord the Seneschal of Dauphiny. But from the storm of fierce invective,
+of threats and promises with which he filled the air, the Seneschal
+gathered with satisfaction the one clear statement that he would take
+his advice.
+
+“I’ll do as you say,” Garnache had ended. “I’ll get me back to Paris as
+fast as horse can carry me. When I return woe betide Condillac! And I
+shall send my emissaries into the district of Montelimar to inquire into
+these disturbances you tell of. Woe betide you if they find the country
+quiet. You shall pay a heavy price for having dispatched your soldiers
+thither to the end that they might not be here to further the Queen’s
+business.”
+
+With that he caught up his rain-sodden hat, flung it on his head, and
+stalked out of the room, and, so, out of the Palace.
+
+He left Grenoble next morning, and it was a very tame and crestfallen
+Garnache who quitted the Auberge du Veau qui Tete and rode out of the
+town to take the road to Paris. How they would laugh at him at the
+Luxembourg! Not even an affair of this kind was he fit to carry
+through; not even as a meddler in women’s matters as Tressan had
+called him--could he achieve success. Rabecque, reflecting his master’s
+mood--as becomes a good lackey--rode silent and gloomy a pace or two in
+the rear.
+
+By noon they had reached Voiron, and here, at a quiet hostelry, they
+descended to pause awhile for rest and refreshment. It was a chill,
+blustering day, and although the rain held off, the heavens were black
+with the promise of more to come. There was a fire burning in the
+general-room of the hostelry, and Garnache went to warm him at its
+cheerful blaze. Moodily he stood there, one hand on the high mantel
+shelf, one foot upon an andiron, his eyes upon the flames.
+
+He was disconsolately considering his position; considering how utterly,
+how irrevocably he had failed; pondering the gibes he would have to
+stomach on his return to Paris, the ridicule it would incumb him to live
+down. It had been a fine thing to breathe fire and blood and vengeance
+to Tressan yesterday, to tell him of the great deeds he would perform on
+his return. It was odds he never would return. They would send another
+in his place, if indeed they sent at all. For, after all, before he
+could reach Paris and the force required be in Dauphiny, a fortnight
+must elapse, let them travel never so quickly. By that time they must be
+singularly sluggish at Condillac if they did not so contrive that no
+aid that came should come in time for mademoiselle, now that they were
+warned that the Queen was stirring in the matter.
+
+Oh! he had blundered it all most cursedly. Had he but kept his temper
+yesterday at Grenoble; had he but had the wit to thwart their plans, by
+preserving an unruffled front to insult, he might have won through and
+carried mademoiselle out of their hands. As it was--! he let his arms
+fall to his sides in his miserable despair.
+
+“Your wine, monsieur,” said Rabecque at his elbow. He turned, and took
+the cup of mulled drink from his servant. The beverage warmed him in
+body; but it would need a butt of it to thaw the misery from his soul.
+
+“Rabecque,” he said with a pathetic grimness, “I think I am the most
+cursed blunderer that ever was entrusted with an errand.”
+
+The thing so obsessed his mind that he must speak of it, if it be only
+to his lackey. Rabecque’s sharp face assumed a chastened look. He sighed
+most dutifully. He sought for words of consolation. At last:
+
+“At least, monsieur has made them fear him up there at Condillac,” said
+he.
+
+“Fear me?” laughed Garnache. “Pish! Deride me, you would say.”
+
+“Fear you, I repeat, monsieur. Else why are they at such pains to
+strengthen the garrison?”
+
+“Eh?” he questioned. But his tone was not greatly interested. “Are they
+doing that? Are they strengthening it? How know you?”
+
+“I had it from the ostler at the Veau qui Tete that a certain Captain
+Fortunio--an Italian soldier of fortune who commands the men at
+Condillac--was at the Auberge de France last night, offering wine to
+whomsoever would drink with him, and paying for it out of Madame la
+Marquise’s purse. To such as accepted his hospitality he talked of the
+glory of a military career, particularly a free-lance’s; and to those
+who showed interest in what he said he offered a pike in his company.”
+
+“Enrolled he many, did you learn?”
+
+“Not one, monsieur, the ostler told me; and it seems he spent the
+evening watching him weave his spider’s web. But the flies were
+over-wary. They knew whence he came; they knew the business for which he
+desired to enrol them--for a rumour had gone round that Condillac was in
+rebellion against the Queen’s commands--and there were none so desperate
+at the Auberge de France as to risk their necks by enlisting, no matter
+what the wage he offered.”
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders. “No matter,” said he. “Get me another
+cup of wine.” But as Rabecque turned away to obey him there came a
+sudden gleam into the eye of Monsieur de Garnache which lightened the
+depression of his countenance.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X. THE RECRUIT
+
+In the great hall of the Chateau de Condillac sat the Dowager, her son,
+and the Lord Seneschal, in conference.
+
+It was early in the afternoon of the last Thursday in October, exactly a
+week since Monsieur de Garnache all but broken-hearted at the failure of
+his mission--had departed from Grenoble. They had dined, and the table
+was still strewn with vessels and the fragments of their meal, for
+the cloth had not yet been raised. But the three of them had left the
+board--the Seneschal with all that reluctance with which he was wont to
+part company with the table, no matter how perturbed in spirit he
+might be--and they had come to group themselves about the great open
+fireplace.
+
+A shaft of pale October sunshine entering through the gules of an
+escutcheon on the mullioned windows struck a scarlet light into silver
+and glass upon the forsaken board.
+
+Madame was speaking. She was repeating words that she had uttered at
+least twenty times a day during the past week.
+
+“It was a madness to let that fellow go. Had we but put him and his
+servant out of the way, we should be able now to sleep tranquil in our
+beds. I know their ways at Court. They might have marvelled a little at
+first that he should tarry so long upon his errand, that he should send
+them no word of its progress; but presently, seeing him no more, he
+would little by little have been forgotten, and with him the affair in
+which the Queen has been so cursedly ready to meddle.
+
+“As it is, the fellow will go back hot with the outrage put upon him;
+there will be some fine talk of it in Paris; it will be spoken of as
+treason, as defiance of the King’s Majesty, as rebellion. The Parliament
+may be moved to make outlaws of us, and the end of it all--who shall
+foresee?”
+
+“It is a long distance from Condillac to Paris, madame,” said her son,
+with a shrug.
+
+“And you will find them none so ready to send soldiers all this way,
+Marquise,” the Seneschal comforted her.
+
+“Bah! You make too sure of your security. You make too sure of what they
+will do, what leave undone. Time will show, my friends; and, mor-dieu! I
+am much at fault if you come not both to echo my regret that we did not
+dispose of Monsieur de Garnache and his lackey when we had them in our
+power.”
+
+Her eye fell with sinister promise upon Tressan, who shivered slightly
+and spread his hands to the blaze, as though his shiver had been of
+cold. But Marius did not so readily grow afraid.
+
+“Madame,” he said, “at the worst we can shut our gates and fling
+defiance at them. We are well-manned, and Fortunio is seeking fresh
+recruits.”
+
+“Seeking them, yes,” she sneered. “For a week has the fellow been
+spending money like water, addling the brains of half Grenoble with the
+best wine at the Auberge de France, yet not a single recruit has come
+in, so far.”
+
+Marius laughed. “Your pessimism leads you into rash conclusions,” he
+cried. “You are wrong. One recruit has come in.”
+
+“One!” she echoed. “A thousand devils! A brave number that! A fine
+return for the river of wine with which we have washed the stomachs of
+Grenoble.”
+
+“Still, it is a beginning,” ventured the Seneschal.
+
+“Aye, and, no doubt, an ending,” she flashed back at him. “And what
+manner of fool may this one be, whose fortunes were so desperate that he
+could throw them in with ours?”
+
+“He is an Italian--a Piedmontese who has tramped across Savoy and was on
+his way to Paris to make his fortune, when Fortunio caught him and made
+it clear to him that his fortune was made for him at Condillac. He is
+a lusty, stalwart fellow, speaking no word of French, who was drawn to
+Fortunio by discovering in him a fellow-countryman.”
+
+Mockery flashed from the Dowager’s beautiful eyes.
+
+“In that you have the reason of his enrolling himself. He knew no word
+of French, poor devil, so could not learn how rash his venture was.
+Could we find more such men as this one it might be well. But where
+shall we find them? Pish! my dear Marius, matters are little mended,
+nor ever will be, for the mistake we made in allowing Garnache to go his
+ways.”
+
+“Madame;” again ventured Tressan, “I think that you want for
+hopefulness.”
+
+“At least, I do not want for courage, Monsieur le Comte,” she answered
+him; “and I promise you that while I live--to handle a sword if need
+be--no Paris men shall set foot in Condillac.”
+
+“Aye,” grumbled Marius, “you can contemplate that, and it is all you
+do contemplate. You will not see, madame that our position is far from
+desperate; that, after all, there may be no need to resist the King. It
+is three months since we had news of Florimond. Much may happen in three
+months when a man is warring. It may well be that he is dead.”
+
+“I wish I knew he was--and damned,” she snapped, with a tightening of
+her scarlet lips.
+
+“Yes,” agreed Marius, with a sigh, “that were an end to all our
+troubles.”
+
+“I’m none so sure. There is still mademoiselle, with her new-formed
+friends in Paris--may a pestilence blight them all! There are still the
+lands of La Vauvraye to lose. The only true end to our troubles as they
+stand at present lies in your marrying this headstrong baggage.”
+
+“That the step should be rendered impossible, you can but blame
+yourself,” Marius reminded her.
+
+“How so?” she cried, turning sharply upon him.
+
+“Had you kept friends with the Church, had you paid tithes and saved
+us from this cursed Interdict, we should have no difficulty in getting
+hither a priest, and settling the matter out of hand, be Valerie willing
+or not.”
+
+She looked at him, scorn kindling in her glance. Then she swung round to
+appeal to Tressan.
+
+“You hear him, Count,” said she. “There is a lover for you! He would wed
+his mistress whether she love him or not--and he has sworn to me that he
+loves the girl.”
+
+“How else should the thing be done since she opposes it?” asked Marius,
+sulkily.
+
+“How else? Do you ask me how else? God! Were I a man, and had I your
+shape and face, there is no woman in the world should withstand me if
+I set my heart on her. It is address you lack. You are clumsy as a lout
+where a woman is concerned. Were I in your place, I had taken her by
+storm three months ago, when first she came to us. I had carried her out
+of Condillac, out of France, over the border into Savoy, where there are
+no Interdicts to plague you, and there I would have married her.”
+
+Marius frowned darkly, but before he could speak, Tressan was
+insinuating a compliment to the Marquise.
+
+“True, Marius,” he said, with pursed lips. “Nature has been very good to
+you in that she has made you the very counterpart of your lady mother.
+You are as comely a gentleman as is to be found in France--or out of
+it.”
+
+“Pish!” snapped Marius, too angered by the reflection cast upon his
+address, to be flattered by their praises of his beauty. “It is an easy
+thing to talk; an easy thing to set up arguments when we consider but
+the half of a question. You forget, madame, that Valerie is betrothed to
+Florimond and that she clings faithfully to her betrothal.”
+
+“_Vertudieu_!” swore the Marquise, “and what is this betrothal, what
+this faithfulness? She has not seen her betrothed for three years. She
+was a child at the time of their fiancailles. Think you her faithfulness
+to him is the constancy of a woman to her lover? Go your ways, you
+foolish boy. It is but the constancy to a word, to the wishes of her
+father. Think you constancy that has no other base than that would stand
+between her and any man who--as you might do, had you the address--could
+make her love him?”
+
+“I do say so,” answered Marius firmly.
+
+She smiled the pitying smile of one equipped with superior knowledge
+when confronted with an obstinate, uninformed mind.
+
+“There is a droll arrogance about you, Marius,” she told him, quietly.
+“You, a fledgling, would teach me, a woman, the ways of a woman’s heart!
+It is a thing you may live to regret.”
+
+“As how?” he asked.
+
+“Once already has mademoiselle contrived to corrupt one of our men,
+and send him to Paris with a letter. Out of that has sprung our present
+trouble. Another time she may do better. When she shall have bribed
+another to assist her to escape; when she, herself, shall have made
+off to the shelter of the Queen-mother, perhaps you will regret that my
+counsel should have fallen upon barren ground.”
+
+“It is to prevent any such attempt that we have placed her under guard,”
+ said he. “You are forgetting that.”
+
+“Forgetting it? Not I. But what assurance have you that she will not
+bribe her guard?”
+
+Marius laughed, rose, and pushed back his chair.
+
+“Madame,” said he, “you are back at your contemplation of the worst side
+of this affair; you are persisting in considering only how we may be
+thwarted. But set your mind at rest. Gilles is her sentinel. Every night
+he sleeps in her anteroom. He is Fortunio’s most trusted man. She will
+not corrupt him.”
+
+The Dowager smiled pensively, her eyes upon the fire. Suddenly she
+raised them to his face. “Berthaud was none the less trusted. Yet, with
+no more than a promise of reward at some future time should she succeed
+in escaping from us, did she bribe him to carry her letter to the Queen.
+What happened to Berthaud that may not happen to Gilles?”
+
+“You might change her sentry nightly,” put in the Seneschal.
+
+“Yes, if we knew whom we could trust; who would be above corruption.
+As it is”--she shrugged her shoulders “that would be but to afford her
+opportunities to bribe them one by one until they were all ready to act
+in concert.”
+
+“Why need she any sentinel at all?” asked Tressan, with some show of
+sense.
+
+“To ward off possible traitors,” she told him, and Marius smiled and
+wagged his head.
+
+“Madame is never done foreseeing the worst, monsieur.”
+
+“Which shows my wisdom. The men in our garrison are mercenaries, all
+attached to us only because we pay them. They all know who she is and
+what her wealth.”
+
+“Pity you have not a man who is deaf and dumb,” said Tressan, half in
+jest. But Marius looked up suddenly, his eyes serious.
+
+“We have as good,” said he. “There is the Italian knave Fortunio
+enrolled yesterday, as I have told you. He knows neither her wealth nor
+her identity; nor if he did could he enter into traffic with her, for he
+knows no French, and she no Italian.”
+
+The Dowager clapped her hands. “The very man!” she cried.
+
+But Marius, either from sheer perverseness, or because he did not share
+her enthusiasm, made answer: “I have faith in Gilles.”
+
+“Yes,” she mocked him, “and you had faith in Berthaud. Oh, if you have
+faith in Gilles, let him remain; let no more be said.”
+
+The obstinate boy took her advice, and shifted the subject, speaking to
+Tressan of some trivial business connected with the Seneschalship.
+
+But madame, woman-like, returned to the matter whose abandoning she had
+herself suggested. Marius, for all his affected disdain of it, viewed it
+with a certain respect. And so in the end they sent for the recruit.
+
+Fortunio--who was no other than the man Garnache had known as
+“Sanguinetti”--brought him, still clad in the clothes in which he had
+come. He was a tall, limber fellow, with a very swarthy skin and black,
+oily-looking hair that fell in short ringlets about his ears and neck,
+and a black, drooping mustache which gave him a rather hang-dog look.
+There was a thick stubble of beard of several days’ growth about his
+chin and face; his eyes were furtive in their glances, but of a deep
+blue that contrasted oddly with his blackness when he momentarily raised
+them.
+
+He wore a tattered jerkin, and his legs, in default of stockings, were
+swathed in soiled bandages and cross-gartered from ankle to knee. He
+stood in a pair of wooden shoes, from one of which peeped forth some
+wisps of straw, introduced, no doubt, to make the footgear fit. He
+slouched and shuffled in his walk, and he was unspeakably dirty.
+Nevertheless, he was girt with a sword in a ragged scabbard hanging from
+a frayed and shabby belt of leather.
+
+Madame scanned him with interest. The fastidious Marius eyed him with
+disgust. The Seneschal peered at him curiously through shortsighted
+eyes.
+
+“I do not think I have ever seen a dirtier ruffian,” said he.
+
+“I like his nose,” said madame quietly. “It is the nose of an intrepid
+man.”
+
+“It reminds me of Garnache’s,” laughed the Seneschal.
+
+“You flatter the Parisian,” commented Marius.
+
+The mercenary, meanwhile, stood blandly smiling at the party, showing at
+least a fine array of teeth, and wearing the patient, attentive air of
+one who realizes himself to be under discussion, yet does not understand
+what is being said.
+
+“A countryman of yours, Fortunio?” sneered Marius.
+
+The captain, whose open, ingenuous countenance dissembled as
+villainous a heart as ever beat in the breast of any man, disowned the
+compatriotism with a smile.
+
+“Hardly, monsieur,” said he. “‘Battista’ is a Piedmontese.” Fortunio
+himself was a Venetian.
+
+“Is he to be relied upon, think you?” asked madame. Fortunio shrugged
+his shoulders and spread his hands. It was not his habit to trust any
+man inordinately.
+
+“He is an old soldier,” said he. “He has trailed a pike in the
+Neapolitan wars. I have cross-questioned him, and found his answers bore
+out the truth of what he said.”
+
+“And what brings him to France?” asked Tressan. The captain smiled
+again, and there came again that expressive shrug of his. “A little
+over-ready with the steel,” said he.
+
+They told Fortunio that they proposed to place him sentry over
+mademoiselle instead of Gilles, as the Italian’s absolute lack of French
+would ensure against corruption. The captain readily agreed with them.
+It would be a wise step. The Italian fingered his tattered hat, his eyes
+on the ground.
+
+Suddenly madame spoke to him. She asked him for some account of himself
+and whence he came, using the Italian tongue, of which she had a passing
+knowledge. He followed her questions very attentively, at times with
+apparent difficulty, his eyes on her face, his head craned a little
+forward.
+
+Now and then Fortunio had to intervene, to make plainer to this ignorant
+Piedmontese mind the Marquise’s questions. His answers came in a
+deep, hoarse voice, slurred by the accent of Piedmont, and madame--her
+knowledge of Italian being imperfect--had frequently to have recourse to
+Fortunio to discover the meaning of what he said.
+
+At last she dismissed the pair of them, bidding the captain see that he
+was washed and more fittingly clothed.
+
+An hour later, after the Seneschal had taken his departure to ride home
+to Grenoble, it was madame herself, accompanied by Marius and Fortunio,
+who conducted Battista--such was the name the Italian had given--to
+the apartments above, where mademoiselle was now confined practically a
+prisoner.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI. VALERIE’S GAOLER
+
+My child, said the Dowager, and her eyes dwelt on Valerie with a look of
+studied gentleness, “why will you not be reasonable?”
+
+The constant reflection that Garnache was at large, making his way back
+to Paris to stir up vengeance for the outrage put upon him, was not
+without a certain chastening effect upon the Dowager. She had a way of
+saying that she had as good a stomach for a fight as any man in France,
+and a fight there should be if it came to it and Garnache should return
+to assail Condillac. Yet a certain pondering of the consequences, a
+certain counting of the cost--ordinarily unusual to her nature led her
+to have recourse to persuasion and to a gentleness no less unusual.
+
+Valerie’s eyes were raised to hers with a look that held more scorn than
+wonder. They were standing in the antechamber of Valerie’s room. Yonder
+at his post lounged the recruit “Battista,” looking a trifle cleaner
+than when first he had been presented to the Marquise, but still not
+clean enough for a lady’s antechamber. He was leaning stolidly against
+the sill of the window, his eyes on the distant waters of the Isere,
+which shone a dull copper colour in the afterglow of the October sunset.
+His face was vacant, his eyes pensive, as he stood there undisturbed by
+the flow of a language he did not understand.
+
+Fortunio and Marius had departed, and the Marquise--played upon by her
+unusual tremors--had remained behind for a last word with the obstinate
+girl.
+
+“In what, madame,” asked Valerie, “does my conduct fall short of
+reasonableness?”
+
+The Dowager made a movement of impatience. If at every step she were
+to be confronted by these questions, which had in them a savour of
+challenge, she was wasting time in remaining.
+
+“You are unreasonable, in this foolish clinging to a promise given for
+you.”
+
+“Given by me, madame,” the girl amended, knowing well to what promise
+the Dowager referred.
+
+“Given by you, then; but given at an age when you could not understand
+the nature of it. They had no right to bind you so.”
+
+“If it is for any to question that right, it is for me,” Valerie made
+answer, her eyes ever meeting the Dowager’s unflinchingly. “And I am
+content to leave that right unquestioned. I am content to fill the
+promise given. In honour I could not do less.”
+
+“Ah! In honour!” The Dowager sighed. Then she came a step nearer, and
+her face grew sweetly wistful. “But your heart, child; what of your
+heart?”
+
+“My heart concerns myself. I am the betrothed of Florimond--that is all
+that concerns the world and you. I respect and admire him more than any
+living man, and I shall be proud to become his wife when he returns, as
+his wife I shall become in spite of all that you and your son may do.”
+
+The Dowager laughed softly, as if to herself.
+
+“And if I tell you that Florimond is dead?”
+
+“When you give me proof of that, I shall believe it,” the girl replied.
+The Marquise looked at her, her face manifesting no offence at the
+almost insulting words.
+
+“And if I were to lay that proof before you?” she inquired, sadly
+almost.
+
+Valerie’s eyes opened a trifle wider, as if in apprehension. But her
+answer was prompt and her voice steady. “It still could have no effect
+upon my attitude towards your son.”
+
+“This is foolishness, Valerie--”
+
+“In you it is, madame,” the girl broke in; “a foolishness to think you
+can constrain a girl, compel her affections, command her love, by such
+means as you have employed towards me. You think that it predisposes me
+to be wooed, that it opens my heart to your son, to see myself gaoled
+that he may pay me his court.”
+
+“Gaoled, child? Who gaols you?” the Dowager cried, as if the most
+surprising utterance had fallen from Valerie’s lips.
+
+Mademoiselle smiled in sorrow and some scorn.
+
+“Am I not gaoled, then?” she asked. “What call you this? What does that
+fellow there? He is to lie outside my door at nights to see that none
+holds communication with me. He is to go with me each morning to the
+garden, when, by your gracious charity I take the air. Sleeping and
+waking the man is ever within hearing of any word that I may utter--”
+
+“But he has no French!” the Dowager protested.
+
+“To ensure, no doubt, against any attempt of mine to win him to my side,
+to induce him to aid me escape from this prison. Oh, madame, I tell you
+you do but waste time, and you punish me and harass yourself to little
+purpose. Had Marius been such a man as I might have felt it in my nature
+to love--which Heaven forbid!--these means by which you have sought to
+bring that thing about could but have resulted in making me hate him as
+I do.”
+
+The Dowager’s fears were banished from her mind at that, and with them
+went all thought of conciliating Valerie. Anger gleamed in her eyes; the
+set of her lips grew suddenly sneering and cruel, so that the beauty of
+her face but served to render it hateful the more.
+
+“So that you hate him, ma mie?” a ripple of mockery on the current of
+her voice, “and he a man such as any girl in France might be proud
+to wed. Well, well, you are not to be constrained, you say.” And
+the Marquise’s laugh was menacing and unpleasant. “Be not so sure,
+mademoiselle. Be not so sure of that. It may well betide that you shall
+come to beg upon your knees for this alliance with a man whom you tell
+me that you hate. Be not so sure you cannot be constrained.”
+
+Their eyes met; both women were white to the lips, but it was curbed
+passion in the one, and deadly fear in the other; for what the Dowager’s
+words left unsaid her eyes most eloquently conveyed. The girl shrank
+back, her hands clenched, her lip caught in her teeth.
+
+“There is a God in heaven, madame,” she reminded the Marquise.
+
+“Aye--in heaven,” laughed the Marquise, turning to depart. She paused by
+the door, which the Italian had sprung forward to open for her.
+
+“Marius shall take the air with you in the morning if it is fine. Ponder
+meanwhile what I have said.”
+
+“Does this man remain here, madame?” inquired the girl, vainly seeking
+to render her voice steady.
+
+“In the outer anteroom is his place: but as the key of this room is on
+his side of the door, he may enter here when he so pleases, or when he
+thinks that he has reason to. If the sight of him displeases you, you
+may lock yourself from it in your own chamber yonder.”
+
+The same she said in Italian to the man, who bowed impassively,
+and followed the Dowager into the outer room, closing the door upon
+mademoiselle. It was a chamber almost bare of furniture, save for a
+table and chair which had been placed there, so that the gaoler might
+take his meals.
+
+The man followed the Marquise across the bare floor, their steps
+resounding as they went, and he held the outer door for her.
+
+Without another word she left him, and where he stood he could hear her
+steps as she tripped down the winding staircase of stone. At last the
+door of the courtyard closed with a bang, and the grating of a key
+announced to the mercenary that he and his charge were both imprisoned
+in that tower of the Chateau de Condillac.
+
+Left alone in the anteroom, mademoiselle crossed to the window and
+dropped limply into a chair. Her face was still very white, her heart
+beating tumultuously, for the horrid threat that had been conveyed in
+the Dowager’s words had brought her her first thrill of real fear since
+the beginning of this wooing-by-force three months ago, a wooing which
+had become more insistent and less like a wooing day by day, until it
+had culminated in her present helpless position.
+
+She was a strong-souled, high-spirited girl, but tonight hope seemed
+extinguished in her breast. Florimond, too, seemed to have abandoned
+her. Either he had forgotten her, or he was dead, as the Dowager said.
+Which might be the true state of things she did not greatly care. The
+realization of how utterly she was in the power of Madame de Condillac
+and her son, and the sudden chance discovery of how unscrupulously that
+power might be wielded, filled her mind to the exclusion of all else.
+
+By the window she sat, watching, without heeding them, the fading
+colours in the sky. She was abandoned to these monsters, and it seemed
+they would devour her. She could hope for no help from outside since
+they had as she believed--slain Monsieur de Garnache. Her mind dwelt for
+a moment on that glimpse of rescue that had been hers a week ago, upon
+the few hours of liberty which she had enjoyed, but which only seemed
+now to increase the dark hopelessness of her imprisonment.
+
+Again with the eyes of her mind she beheld that grim, stalwart figure,
+saw his great nose, his greying hair, his fierce mustachios and his
+stern, quick eyes. Again she heard the rasp of his metallic voice with
+its brisk derision. She saw him in the hall below, his foot upon the
+neck of that popinjay of Condillac daring them all to draw a breath,
+should he forbid it; again in fancy she rode on the withers of his horse
+at the gallop towards Grenoble. A sigh escaped her. Surely that was the
+first man who was indeed a man she had ever set eyes on since her father
+died. Had Garnache been spared, she would have felt courage and she
+would have hoped, for there was something about him that suggested
+energy and resource such as it is good to lean upon in times of stress.
+Again she heard that brisk, metallic voice: “Are you content, madame?
+Have you had fine deeds enough for one day?”
+
+And then, breaking in upon her musings came the very voice of her
+day-dream, so suddenly, sounding so natural and lifelike that she almost
+screamed, so startled was she.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” it said, “I beg that you’ll not utterly lose heart. I
+have come back to the thing Her Majesty bade me do, and I’ll do it, in
+spite of that tigress and her cub.”
+
+She sat still as a statue, scarce breathing, her eyes fixed upon the
+violet sky. The voice had ceased, but still she sat on. Then it was
+slowly borne in upon her that that was no dream-voice, no trick of her
+overburdened mind. A voice, a living, actual voice had uttered those
+words in this room, here at her elbow.
+
+She turned, and again she almost screamed; for there, just behind her,
+his glittering eyes fixed upon her with singular intentness, stood the
+swarthy, black-haired Italian gaoler they had given her because he had
+no French.
+
+He had come up so quietly behind her that she had not heard his
+approach, and he was leaning forward now, with an odd suggestion of
+crouching in his attitude, like a beast about to spring. Yet his gaze
+riveted hers as with a fascination. And so, while she looked, his lips
+moved, and from them, in that same voice of her dreams, came from this
+man who had no French, the words:
+
+“Be not afraid, mademoiselle. I am that blunderer, Garnache, that
+unworthy fool whose temper ruined what chance of saving you he had a
+week ago.”
+
+She stared like one going mad.
+
+“Garnache!” said she, in a husky whisper. “You Garnache?”
+
+Yet the voice, she knew, was Garnache’s and none other. It was a voice
+not easily mistaken. And now, as she looked and looked, she saw that the
+man’s nose was Garnache’s, though oddly stained, and those keen eyes,
+they were Garnache’s too. But the hair that had been brown and flecked
+with grey was black; the reddish mustachios that had bristled like a
+mountain cat’s were black, too, and they hung limp and hid from sight
+the fine lines of his mouth. A hideous stubble of unshorn beard defaced
+his chin and face, and altered its sharp outline; and the clear, healthy
+skin that she remembered was now a dirty brown.
+
+Suddenly the face smiled, and it was a smile that reassured her and
+drove away the last doubt that she had. She was on her feet in an
+instant.
+
+“Monsieur, monsieur,” was all that she could say; but her longing was to
+fling her arms about the neck of this man, as she might have flung them
+about the neck of a brother or a father, and sob out upon his shoulder
+the sudden relief and revulsion that his presence brought.
+
+Garnache saw something of her agitation, and to relieve it he smiled and
+began to tell her the circumstances of his return and his presentation
+to Madame as a knave who had no French.
+
+“Fortune was very good to me, mademoiselle,” said he. “I had little hope
+that such a face as mine could be disguised, but I take no pride in what
+you see. It is the handiwork of Rabecque, the most ingenious lackey that
+ever served a foolish master. It helped me that having been ten years in
+Italy when I was younger, I acquired the language so well as to be able
+to impose even upon Fortunio. In that lay a circumstance which at once
+disarmed suspicion, and if I stay not so long as it shall take the dye
+to wear from my hair and beard and the staining from my face, I shall
+have little to fear.”
+
+“But, monsieur,” she cried, “you have everything to fear!” And alarm
+grew in her eyes.
+
+But he laughed again for answer. “I have faith in my luck, mademoiselle,
+and I think I am on the tide of it at present. I little hoped when I
+made my way into Condillac in this array that I should end, by virtue
+of my pretended ignorance of French, in being appointed gaoler to you. I
+had some ado to keep the joy from my eyes when I heard them planning it.
+It is a thing that has made all else easy.”
+
+“But what can you do alone, monsieur?” she asked him; and there was a
+note almost of petulance in her voice.
+
+He moved to the window, and leaned his elbow on the sill. The light was
+fast fading. “I know not yet. But I am here to contrive a means. I shall
+think and watch.”
+
+“You know in what hourly peril I am placed,” she cried, and suddenly
+remembering that he must have overheard and understood the Dowager’s
+words, a sudden heat came to her cheeks to recede again and leave them
+marble-pale. And she thanked Heaven that in the dusk and in the shadow
+where she stood he could but ill make out her face.
+
+“If you think that I have been rash in returning--”
+
+“No, no, not rash, monsieur; noble and brave above all praise. I would
+indeed I could tell you how noble and brave I account your action.”
+
+“It is as nothing to the bravery required to let Rabecque do this
+hideous work upon a face for which I have ever entertained some measure
+of respect.”
+
+He jested, sooner than enlighten her that it was his egregious pride
+had fetched him back when he was but a few hours upon his journey
+Pariswards, his inability to brook the ridicule that would be his when
+he announced at the Luxembourg that failure had attended him.
+
+“Ah, but what can you do alone?” she repeated.
+
+“Give me at least a day or two to devise some means; let me look round
+and take the measure of this gaol. Some way there must be. I have not
+come so far and so successfully to be beaten now. Still,” he continued,
+“if you think that I overrate my strength or my resource, if you
+would sooner that I sought men and made an assault upon Condillac,
+endeavouring to carry it and to let the Queen’s will prevail by force of
+arms, tell me so, and I am gone tomorrow.”
+
+“Whither would you go?” she cried, her voice strained with sudden
+affright.
+
+“I might seek help at Lyons or Moulins. I might find loyal soldiers who
+would be willing to follow me by virtue of my warrant to levy such help
+as I may require, if I but tell them that the help was refused me in
+Grenoble. I am not sure that it would be so, for, unfortunately, my
+warrant is for the Seneschal of Dauphiny only. Still, I might make the
+attempt.”
+
+“No, no,” she implored him, and in her eagerness to have him put all
+thought of leaving her from his mind, she caught him by the arm and
+raised a pleading face to his. “Do not leave me here, monsieur; of your
+pity do not leave me alone amongst them. Think me a coward if you will,
+monsieur: I am no less. They have made a coward of me.”
+
+He understood the thing she dreaded, and a great pity welled up from
+his generous heart for this poor unfriended girl at the mercy of the
+beautiful witch of Condillac and her beautiful rascally son. He patted
+the hand that clutched his arm.
+
+“I think, myself, that it will be best if I remain, now that I have come
+so far,” he said. “Let me ponder things. It may well be that I shall
+devise some way.”
+
+“May Heaven inspire you, monsieur. I shall spend the night in prayer, I
+think, imploring God and His saints to show you the way you seek.”
+
+“Heaven, I think, should hear your prayers, mademoiselle,” he answered
+musingly, his glance upon the white, saintly face that seemed to shine
+in the deepening gloom. Then, suddenly he stirred and bent to listen.
+
+“Sh! Some one is coming,” he whispered. And he sped quickly from her
+side and into the outer room, where he sank noiselessly on to his chair
+as the steps ascended the stone staircase and a glow of yellow light
+grew gradually in the doorway that opened on to it.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII. A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+
+That he might inspire the more confidence in the Dowager and her son
+Garnache organized and performed a little comedy at Condillac a couple
+of nights after his appointment as mademoiselle’s gaoler. He gave an
+alarm at dead midnight, and when half-clad men, followed presently
+by madame and Marian, rushed into the anteroom where he stood, a very
+picture of the wildest excitement, he drew their attention to two
+twisted sheets, tied end to end, hanging from the window which
+overlooked the moat; and in answer to the marquise’s questions he
+informed her that he had been disturbed by sounds of movements and
+upon entering the chamber he had discovered mademoiselle making these
+preparations for departure.
+
+Valerie, locked in the inner chamber, refused to come forth as the
+Marquise bade her, but her voice reassured Madame de Condillac of her
+presence, and so, since her attempt had failed, madame was content to
+let her be.
+
+“The little fool,” she said, peering down from the window into the
+night; “she would have been killed for certain. Her rope of sheets does
+not reach more than a third of the way down. She would have had over
+thirty feet to fall, and if that had not been enough to finish her, she
+would of a certainty have, been drowned in the moat.”
+
+She signified her satisfaction with the faithful “Battista’s” vigilance
+by a present of some gold pieces in the morning, and since the height of
+the window and the moat beneath it did not appear sufficient obstacles
+to mademoiselle’s attempts at effecting her escape, the Dowager had the
+window nailed down. Thus, only by breaking it could egress be obtained,
+and the breaking of it could not be effected without such a noise as
+must arouse “Battista.”
+
+Under Garnache’s instructions the comedy was carried a little further.
+Mademoiselle affected for her gaoler a most unconquerable aversion, and
+this she took pains to proclaim.
+
+One morning, three days after her attempted escape, she was taking the
+air in the garden of Condillac, “Battista,” ever watchful, a few paces
+behind her, when suddenly she was joined by Marius--a splendid, graceful
+figure in a riding-suit of brown velvet and biscuit-coloured hose, his
+points tipped with gold, his long boots of the finest marroquin leather,
+his liver-coloured hound at his heels. It was the last day of October,
+but the weather, from cold and wet that it had been for the past
+fortnight, had taken on a sudden improvement. The sun shone, the air
+was still and warm, and but for the strewn leaves and the faint smell
+of decay with which the breath of autumn is ever laden, one might have
+fancied it a day of early spring.
+
+It was not Valerie’s wont to pause when Marius approached. Since she
+might not prevent him from walking where he listed, she had long since
+abandoned the futility of bidding him begone when he came near her. But,
+at least, she had never stopped in her walk, never altered its pace; she
+had suffered what she might not avoid, but she had worn the outward air
+of suffering it with indifference. This morning, however, she made a
+departure from her long habit. Not only did she pause upon observing his
+approach, but she called to him as if she would have him hasten to her
+side. And hasten he did, a new light in his eyes that was mostly of
+surprise, but a little, also, of hope.
+
+She was gracious to him for once, and gave him good morning in a manner
+that bordered upon the pleasant. Wondering, he fell into step beside
+her, and they paced together the yew-bordered terrace, the ever-vigilant
+but discreet “Battista” following them, though keeping now a few paces
+farther in the rear.
+
+For a little while they appeared constrained, and their talk was of the
+falling leaves and the grateful change that had so suddenly come upon
+the weather. Suddenly she stopped and faced him.
+
+“Will you do me a favour, Marius?” she asked. He halted too, and turned
+to her, studying her gentle face, seeking to guess her mind in the
+clear hazel eyes she raised to his. His eyebrows lifted slightly with
+surprise. Nevertheless--
+
+“There is in all the world, Valerie, nothing you could ask me that I
+would not do,” he protested.
+
+She smiled wistfully. “How easy it is to utter words!” she sighed.
+
+“Marry me,” he answered, leaning towards her, his eyes devouring her
+now, “and you shall find my words very quickly turned to deeds.”
+
+“Ah,” said she, and her smile broadened and took on a scornful twist,
+“you make conditions now. If I will marry you, there is nothing you will
+not do for me; so that, conversely, I may take it that if I do not marry
+you, there is nothing you will do. But in the meantime, Marius, until
+I resolve me whether I will marry you or not, would you not do a little
+thing that I might ask of you?”
+
+“Until you resolve?” he cried, and his face flushed with the sudden hope
+he gathered from those words. Hitherto there had been no suggestion of
+a possible modification of attitude towards his suit. It had been
+repulsion, definite and uncompromising. Again he studied her face.
+Was she fooling him, this girl with the angel-innocence of glance? The
+thought of such a possibility cooled him instantly. “What is it you want
+of me?” he asked, his voice ungracious.
+
+“Only a little thing, Marius.” Her glance travelled back over her
+shoulder to the tall, limber fellow in leather jerkin and with
+cross-gartered legs who lounged a dozen steps behind them. “Rid me of
+that ruffian’s company,” said she.
+
+Marius looked back at “Battista,” and from him to Valerie. Then he
+smiled and made a slight movement with his shoulders.
+
+“But to what end?” he asked, as one who pleadingly opposes an argument
+that is unreasonable. “Another would replace him, and there is little to
+choose among the men that garrison Condillac.”
+
+“Little, perhaps; but that little matters.” Sure of her ground, and
+gathering from his tone and manner that the more ardently she begged
+this thing the less likely would it be that she should prevail, she
+pursued her intercessions with a greater heat. “Oh,” she cried, in a
+pretended rage, “it is to insult me to give me that unclean knave for
+perpetual company. I loathe and detest him. The very sight of him is too
+much to endure.”
+
+“You exaggerate,” said he coldly.
+
+“I do not; indeed I do not,” she rejoined, looking frankly, pleadingly
+into his face. “You do not realize what it is to suffer the insolent
+vigilance of such as he; to feel that your every step is under
+surveillance; to feel his eyes ever upon you when you are within his
+sight. Oh, it is insufferable!”
+
+Suddenly he gripped her arm, his face within a hand’s breadth of her
+own, his words falling hot and quickly on her ear.
+
+“It is yours to end it when you will, Valerie,” he passionately reminded
+her. “Give yourself into my keeping. Let it be mine to watch over you
+henceforth. Let me--”
+
+Abruptly he ceased. She had drawn back her head, her face was white to
+the lips, and in her eyes, as they dwelt on his at such close quarters,
+there appeared a look of terror, of loathing unutterable. He saw it, and
+releasing her arm he fell back as if she had struck him. The colour left
+his face too.
+
+“Or is it,” he muttered thickly, “that I inspire you, with much the same
+feeling as does he?”
+
+She stood before him with lowered eyelids, her bosom heaving still from
+the agitation of fear his closeness had aroused in her. He studied her
+in silence a moment, with narrowing eyes and tightening lips. Then
+anger stirred in him, and quenched the sorrow with which at first he had
+marked the signs of her repulsion. But anger in Marius de Condillac was
+a cold and deadly emotion that vented itself in no rantings, uttered
+no loud-voiced threats or denunciations, prompted no waving of arms or
+plucking forth of weapons.
+
+He stooped towards her again from his stately, graceful height.
+The cruelty hidden in the beautiful lines of his mouth took instant
+prominence in the smile that flickered round it.
+
+“I think that Battista makes a very excellent watchdog,” he said, and
+you would have thought him amused, as if at the foolish subterfuge of
+some little child. “You may be right to dislike him. He knows no French,
+so that it may not be yours to pervert and bribe him with promises of
+what you will do if he assists you to escape; but you will see that this
+very quality which renders him detestable to you renders him invaluable
+to us.”
+
+He laughed softly, as one well pleased with his own astuteness, doffed
+his hat with a politeness almost exaggerated, and whistling his dog he
+abruptly left her.
+
+Thus were Marius and his mother--to whom he bore the tale of Valerie’s
+request--tricked further into reposing the very fullest trust in the
+watchful, incorruptible “Battista.” Realizing that this would be so,
+Garnache now applied himself more unreservedly to putting into effect
+the plans he had been maturing. And he went about it with a zest that
+knew no flagging, with a relish that nothing could impair. Not that it
+was other than usual for Garnache to fling himself whole-heartedly into
+the conduct of any enterprise he might have upon his hands; but he
+had come into this affair at Condillac against his will; stress of
+circumstances it was had driven him on, step by step, to take a personal
+hand in the actual deliverance of Valerie.
+
+It was vanity and pride that had turned him back when already he was on
+the road to Paris; not without yet a further struggle would he accept
+defeat. To this end had he been driven, for the first time in his life,
+to the indignity of his foul disguise; and he, whose methods had ever
+been direct, had been forced to have recourse to the commonest of
+subterfuges. It was with anger in his heart that he had proceeded to
+play the part he had assumed. He felt it to be a thing unworthy of
+him, a thing that derogated from his self-respect. Had he but had the
+justification of some high political aim, he might have endured it
+with a better resignation; the momentous end to be served might have
+sanctioned the ignoble means adopted. But here was a task in itself
+almost as unworthy of him as the methods by which he now set about
+accomplishing it. He was to black his face and dye his beard and hair,
+stain his skin and garb himself in filthy rags, for no better end than
+that he might compass the enlargement of a girl from the captivity into
+which she had been forced by a designing lady of Dauphiny. Was that a
+task to set a soldier, a man of his years and birth and name? He had
+revolted at it; yet that stubborn pride of his that would not brook his
+return to Paris to confess himself defeated by a woman over this woman’s
+business, held him relentlessly to his distasteful course.
+
+And gradually the distaste of it had melted. It had begun to fall
+away five nights ago, when he had heard what passed between Madame de
+Condillac and Valerie. A great pity for this girl, a great indignation
+against those who would account no means too base to achieve their ends
+with her, a proper realization of the indignities she was suffering,
+caused him to shed some of his reluctance, some of his sense of injury
+to himself.
+
+His innate chivalry, that fine spirit of his which had ever prompted him
+to defend the weak against the oppressor, stirred him now, and stirred
+him to such purpose that, in the end, from taking up the burden of his
+task reluctantly, he came to bear it zestfully and almost gladly. He was
+rejoiced to discover himself equipped with histrionic gifts of which
+he had had no suspicion hitherto, and it delighted him to set them into
+activity.
+
+Now it happened that at Condillac there was a fellow countryman of
+“Battista’s,” a mercenary from Northern Italy, a rascal named Arsenio,
+whom Fortunio had enlisted when first he began to increase the garrison
+a month ago. Upon this fellow’s honesty Garnache had formed designs.
+He had closely observed him, and in Arsenio’s countenance he thought he
+detected a sufficiency of villainy to augur well for the prosperity
+of any scheme of treachery that might be suggested to him provided the
+reward were adequate.
+
+Garnache went about sounding the man with a wiliness peculiarly his own.
+Arsenio being his only compatriot at Condillac it was not wonderful
+that in his few daily hours of relief from his gaoler’s duty “Battista”
+ should seek out the fellow and sit in talk with him. The pair became
+intimate, and intercourse between them grew more free and unrestrained.
+Garnache waited, wishing to risk nothing by precipitancy, and watched
+for his opportunity. It came on the morrow of All Saints. On that Day of
+the Dead, Arsenio, whose rearing had been that of a true son of Mother
+Church, was stirred by the memory of his earthly mother, who had died
+some three years before. He was silent and moody, and showed little
+responsiveness to Garnache’s jesting humour. Garnache, wondering what
+might be toward in the fellow’s mind, watched him closely.
+
+Suddenly the little man--he was a short, bowlegged, sinewy
+fellow--heaved a great sigh as he plucked idly at a weed that grew
+between two stones of the inner courtyard, where they were seated on the
+chapel steps.
+
+“You are a dull comrade to-day, compatriot,” said Garnache, clapping him
+on the shoulder.
+
+“It is the Day of the Dead,” the fellow answered him, as though that
+were an ample explanation. Garnache laughed.
+
+“To those that are dead it no doubt is; so was yesterday, so will
+to-morrow be. But to us who sit here it is the day of the living.”
+
+“You are a scoffer,” the other reproached him, and his rascally face was
+oddly grave. “You don’t understand.”
+
+“Enlighten me, then. Convert me.”
+
+“It is the day when our thoughts turn naturally to the dead, and mine
+are with my mother, who has lain in her grave these three years. I am
+thinking of what she reared me and of what I am.”
+
+Garnache made a grimace which the other did not observe. He stared at
+the little cut-throat, and there was some dismay in his glance. What
+ailed the rogue? Was he about to repent him of his sins, and to have
+done with villainy and treachery; was he minded to slit no more gullets
+in the future, be faithful to the hand that paid him, and lead a
+godlier life? Peste! That was a thing that would nowise suit Monsieur
+de Garnache’s ends just then. If Arsenio had a mind to reform, let him
+postpone that reformation until Garnache should have done with him. So
+he opened his lips and let out a deep guffaw of mockery.
+
+“We shall have you turning monk,” said he, “a candidate for canonization
+going barefoot, with flagellated back and shaven head. No more wine, no
+more dice, no more wenches, no more--”
+
+“Peace!” snapped the other.
+
+“Say ‘Pax,”’ suggested Garnache, “‘Pax tecum,’ or ‘vobiscum.’ It is thus
+you will be saying it later.”
+
+“If my conscience pricks me, is it aught to you? Have you no conscience
+of your own?”
+
+“None. Men wax lean on it in this vale of tears. It is a thing invented
+by the great to enable them to pursue the grinding and oppression of the
+small. If your master pays you ill for the dirty work you do for him
+and another comes along to offer you some rich reward for an omission in
+that same service, you are warned that if you let yourself be tempted,
+your conscience will plague you afterwards. Pish! A clumsy, childish
+device that, to keep you faithful.”
+
+Arsenio looked up. Words that defamed the great were ever welcome to
+him; arguments that showed him he was oppressed and imposed upon sounded
+ever gratefully in his ears. He nodded his approval of “Battista’s”
+ dictum.
+
+“Body of Bacchus!” he swore, “you are right in that, compatriot. But my
+case is different. I am thinking of the curse that Mother Church has
+put upon this house. Yesterday was All Saints, and never a Mass heard I.
+To-day is All Souls, and never a prayer may I offer up in this place of
+sin for the rest of my mother’s soul.”
+
+“How so?” quoth Garnache, looking in wonder at this religiously minded
+cut-throat.
+
+“How so? Is not the House of Condillac under excommunication, and every
+man who stays in it of his own free will? Prayers and Sacraments are
+alike forbidden here.”
+
+Garnache received a sudden inspiration. He leapt to his feet, his face
+convulsed as if at the horror of learning of a hitherto undreamt-of
+state of things. He never paused to give a moment’s consideration to the
+cut-throat’s mind, so wonderfully constituted as to enable him to break
+with impunity every one of the commandments every day of the week for
+the matter of a louis d’or or two, and yet be afflicted by qualms of
+conscience at living under a roof upon which the Church had hurled her
+malediction.
+
+“What are you saying, compatriot? What is it that you tell me?”
+
+“The truth,” said Arsenio, with a shrug. “Any man who wilfully abides in
+the services of Condillac”--and instinctively he lowered his voice
+lest the Captain or the Marquise should be within earshot--, “is
+excommunicate.”
+
+“By the Host!” swore the false Piedmontese. “I am a Christian man
+myself, Arsenio, and I have lived in ignorance of this thing?”
+
+“That ignorance may be your excuse. But now that you know--” Arsenio
+shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“Now that I know, I had best have a care of my soul and look about me
+for other employment.”
+
+“Alas!” sighed Arsenio; “it is none so easy to find.”
+
+Garnache looked at him. Garnache began to have in his luck a still
+greater faith than hitherto. He glanced stealthily around; then he sat
+down again, so that his mouth was close to Arsenio’s ear.
+
+“The pay is beggarly here, yet I have refused a fortune offered me by
+another that I might remain loyal to my masters at Condillac. But this
+thing that you tell me alters everything. By the Host! yes.”
+
+“A fortune?” sneered Arsenio.
+
+“Aye, a fortune--at least, fifty pistoles. That is a fortune to some of
+us.”
+
+Arsenio whistled. “Tell me more,” said he.
+
+Garnache rose with the air of one about to depart.
+
+“I must think of it,” said he, and he made shift to go. But the other’s
+hand fell with a clenching grip upon his arm.
+
+“Of what must you think, fool?” said he. “Tell me this service you have
+been offered. I have a conscience that upbraids me. If you refuse these
+fifty pistoles, why should not I profit by your folly?”
+
+“There would not be the need. Two men are required for the thing I speak
+of, and there are fifty pistoles for each. If I decide to undertake the
+task, I’ll speak of you as a likely second.”
+
+He nodded gloomily to his companion, and shaking off his hold he set out
+to cross the yard. But Arsenio was after him and had fastened again upon
+his arm, detaining him.
+
+“You fool!” said he; “you’d not refuse this fortune?”
+
+“It would mean treachery,” whispered Garnache.
+
+“That is bad,” the other agreed, and his face fell. But remembering what
+Garnache had said, he was quick to brighten again. “Is it to these
+folk here at Condillac?” he asked. Garnache nodded. “And they would
+pay--these people that seek our service would pay you fifty pistoles?”
+
+“They seek my service only, as yet. They might seek yours were I to
+speak for you.”
+
+“And you will, compatriot. You will, will you not? We are comrades, we
+are friends, and we are fellow-countrymen in a strange land. There is
+nothing I would not do for you, Battista. Look, I would die for you if
+there should come the need! Body of Bacchus! I would. I am like that
+when I love a man.”
+
+Garnache patted his shoulder. “You are a good fellow, Arsenio.”
+
+“And you will speak for me?”
+
+“But you do not know the nature of the service,” said Garnache. “You may
+refuse it when it is definitely offered you.”
+
+“Refuse fifty pistoles? I should deserve to be the pauper that I am
+if such had been my habits. Be the service what it may, my conscience
+pricks me for serving Condillac. Tell me how the fifty pistoles are to
+be earned, and you may count upon me to put my hand to anything.”
+
+Garnache was satisfied. But he told Arsenio no more that day, beyond
+assuring him he would speak for him and let him know upon the morrow.
+Nor on the morrow, when they returned to the subject at Arsenio’s
+eager demand, did Garnache tell him all, or even that the service was
+mademoiselle’s. Instead he pretended that it was some one in Grenoble
+who needed two such men as they.
+
+“Word has been brought me,” he said mysteriously. “You must not ask me
+how.”
+
+“But how the devil are we to reach Grenoble? The Captain will never let
+us go,” said Arsenio, in an ill-humour.
+
+“On the night that you are of the watch, Arsenio, we will depart
+together without asking the Captain’s leave. You shall open the postern
+when I come to join you here in the courtyard.”
+
+“But what of the man at the door yonder?” And he jerked his thumb
+towards the tower where mademoiselle was a captive, and where at night
+“Battista” was locked in with her. At the door leading to the courtyard
+a sentry was always posted for greater security. That door and that
+sentry were obstacles which Garnache saw the futility of attempting
+to overcome without aid. That was why he had been forced to enlist
+Arsenio’s assistance.
+
+“You must account for him, Arsenio,” said he.
+
+“Thus?” inquired Arsenio coolly, and he passed the edge of his hand
+significantly across his throat. Garnache shook his head.
+
+“No,” said he; “there will be no need for that. A blow over the head
+will suffice. Besides, it may be quieter. You will find the key of the
+tower in his belt. When you have felled him, get it and unlock the door;
+then whistle for me. The rest will be easy.”
+
+“You are sure he has the key?”
+
+“I have it from madame herself. They were forced to leave it with him to
+provide for emergencies. Mademoiselle’s attempted escape by the window
+showed them the necessity for it.” He did not add that it was the
+implicit confidence they reposed in “Battista” himself that had overcome
+their reluctance to leave the key with the sentry.
+
+To seal the bargain, and in earnest of all the gold to come, Garnache
+gave Arsenio a couple of gold louis as a loan to be repaid him when
+their nameless employer should pay him his fifty pistoles in Grenoble.
+
+The sight and touch of the gold convinced Arsenio that the thing was no
+dream. He told Garnache that he believed he would be on guard-duty
+on the night of the following Wednesday--this was Friday--and so for
+Wednesday next they left the execution of their plans unless, meantime,
+a change should be effected in the disposition of the sentries.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII. THE COURIER
+
+Monsieur de Garnache was pleased with the issue of his little affair
+with Arsenio.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” he told Valerie that evening, “I was right to have faith
+in my luck, right to believe that the tide of it is flowing. All we need
+now is a little patience; everything has become easy.”
+
+It was the hour of supper. Valerie was at table in her anteroom, and
+“Battista” was in attendance. It was an added duty they had imposed upon
+him, for, since her attempt to escape, mademoiselle’s imprisonment had
+been rendered more rigorous than ever. No servant of the chateau was
+allowed past the door of the outer anteroom, now commonly spoken of as
+the guardroom of the tower. Valerie dined daily in the salon with Madame
+de Condillac and Marius, but her other meals were served her in her
+own apartments. The servants who brought the meals from the kitchen
+delivered them to “Battista” in the guardroom, and he it was who laid
+the cloth and waited upon mademoiselle. At first this added duty had
+irritated him more than all that he had so far endured. Had he Martin
+Marie Rigobert de Garnache lived to discharge the duties of a lackey,
+to bear dishes to a lady’s table and to remain at hand to serve her?
+The very thought had all but set him in a rage. But presently he grew
+reconciled to it. It afforded him particular opportunities of being in
+mademoiselle’s presence and of conferring with her; and for the sake
+of such an advantage he might well belittle the unsavoury part of the
+affair.
+
+A half-dozen candles burned in two gleaming silver sconces on the table;
+in her tall-backed leather chair mademoiselle sat, and ate and drank but
+little, while Garnache told her of the preparations he had made.
+
+“If my luck but holds until Wednesday next,” he concluded, “you may
+count upon being well out of Condillac. Arsenio does not dream that you
+come with us, so that even should he change his mind, at least we
+have no cause to fear a betrayal. But he will not change his mind. The
+prospect of fifty pistoles has rendered it immutable.”
+
+She looked up at him with eyes brightened by hope and by the
+encouragement to count upon success which she gathered from his
+optimism.
+
+“You have contrived it marvellously well,” she praised him. “If we
+succeed--”
+
+“Say when we succeed, mademoiselle,” he laughingly corrected her.
+
+“Very well, then--when we shall have succeeded in leaving Condillac,
+whither am I to go?”
+
+“Why, with me, to Paris, as was determined. My man awaits me at Voiron
+with money and horses. No further obstacle shall rise to hamper us once
+our backs are turned upon the ugly walls of Condillac. The Queen shall
+make you welcome and keep you safe until Monsieur Florimond comes to
+claim his bride.”
+
+She sipped her wine, then set down the glass and leaned her elbow on the
+table, taking her chin in her fine white hand. “Madame tells me that he
+is dead,” said she, and Garnache was shocked at the comparative calmness
+with which she said it. He looked at her sharply from under his sooted
+brows. Was she, after all, he wondered, no different from other women?
+Was she cold and calculating, and had she as little heart as he had come
+to believe was usual with her sex, that she could contemplate so calmly
+the possibility of her lover being dead? He had thought her better, more
+natural, more large-hearted and more pure. That had encouraged him to
+stand by her in these straits of hers, no matter at what loss of dignity
+to himself. It began to seem that his conclusions had been wrong.
+
+His silence caused her to look up, and in his face she read something of
+what was passing in his thoughts. She smiled rather wanly.
+
+“You are thinking me heartless, Monsieur de Garnache?”
+
+“I am thinking you--womanly.”
+
+“The same thing, then, to your mind. Tell me, monsieur, do you know much
+of women?”
+
+“God forbid! I have found trouble enough in my life.”
+
+“And you pass judgment thus upon a sex with which you have no
+acquaintance?”
+
+“Not by acquaintance only is it that we come to knowledge. There are
+ways of learning other than by the road of experience. One may learn of
+dangers by watching others perish. It is the fool who will be satisfied
+alone with the knowledge that comes to him from what he undergoes
+himself.”
+
+“You are very wise, monsieur,” said she demurely, so demurely that he
+suspected her of laughing at him. “You were never wed?”
+
+“Never, mademoiselle,” he answered stiffly, “nor ever in any danger of
+it.”
+
+“Must you, indeed, account it a danger?”
+
+“A deadly peril, mademoiselle,” said he; whereupon they both laughed.
+
+She pushed back her chair and rose slowly. Slowly she passed from the
+table and stepped towards the window. Turning she set her back to it,
+and faced him.
+
+“Monsieur de Garnache,” said she, “you are a good man, a true and noble
+gentleman. I would that you thought a little better of us. All women are
+not contemptible, believe me. I will pray that you may yet mate with one
+who will prove to you the truth of what I say.”
+
+He smiled gently, and shook his head.
+
+“My child,” said he, “I am not half the noble fellow you account me. I
+have a stubborn pride that stands me at times in the stead of virtue.
+It was pride brought me back here, for instance. I could not brook the
+laughter that would greet me in Paris did I confess that I was beaten by
+the Dowager of Condillac. I tell you this to the end that, thinking
+less well of me, you may spare me prayers which I should dread to see
+fulfilled. I have told you before, mademoiselle, Heaven is likely to
+answer the prayers of such a heart as yours.”
+
+“Yet but a moment back you deemed me heartless,” she reminded him.
+
+“You seemed so indifferent to the fate of Florimond de Condillac.”
+
+“I must have seemed, then, what I am not,” she told him, “for I am far
+from indifferent to Florimond’s fate. The truth is, monsieur, I do
+not believe Madame de Condillac. Knowing me to be under a promise that
+naught can prevail upon me to break, she would have me believe that
+nature has dissolved the obligation for me. She thinks that were I
+persuaded of Florimond’s death, I might turn an ear to the wooing
+of Marius. But she is mistaken, utterly mistaken; and so I sought to
+convince her. My father willed that I should wed Florimond. Florimond’s
+father had been his dearest friend. I promised him that I would do his
+will, and by that promise I am bound. But were Florimond indeed dead,
+and were I free to choose, I should not choose Marius were he the only
+man in all the world.”
+
+Garnache moved nearer to her.
+
+“You speak,” said he, “as if you were indifferent in the matter of
+wedding Florimond, whilst I understand that your letter to the Queen
+professed you eager for the alliance. I may be impertinent, but,
+frankly, your attitude puzzles me.”
+
+“I am not indifferent,” she answered him, but calmly, without
+enthusiasm. “Florimond and I were playmates, and as a little child I
+loved him and admired him as I might have loved and admired a brother
+perhaps. He is comely, honourable, and true. I believe he would be the
+kindest husband ever woman had, and so I am content to give my life into
+his keeping. What more can be needed?”
+
+“Never ask me, mademoiselle; I am by no means an authority,” said
+he. “But you appear to have been well schooled in a most excellent
+philosophy.” And he laughed outright. She reddened under his amusement.
+
+“It was thus my father taught me,” said she, in quieter tones; “and
+he was the wisest man I ever knew, just as he was the noblest and the
+bravest.”
+
+Garnache bowed his head. “God rest his soul!” said he with respectful
+fervour.
+
+“Amen,” the girl replied, and they fell silent.
+
+Presently she returned to the subject of her betrothed.
+
+“If Florimond is living, this prolonged absence, this lack of news
+is very strange. It is three months since last we heard of him--four
+months, indeed. Yet he must have been apprised of his father’s death,
+and that should have occasioned his return.”
+
+“Was he indeed apprised of it?” inquired Garnache. “Did you, yourself,
+communicate the news to him?”
+
+“I?” she cried. “But no, monsieur. We do not correspond.”
+
+“That is a pity,” said Garnache, “for I believe that the knowledge of
+the Marquis’s death was kept from him by his stepmother.”
+
+“Mon Dieu!” she exclaimed, in horror. “Do you mean that he may still be
+in ignorance of it?”
+
+“Not that. A month ago a courier was dispatched to him by the
+Queen-Mother. The last news of him some four months old, as you have
+said--reported him at Milan in the service of Spain. Thither was the
+courier sent to find him and to deliver him letters setting forth what
+was toward at Condillac.”
+
+“A month ago?” she said. “And still we have no word. I am full of fears
+for him, monsieur.”
+
+“And I,” said Garnache, “am full of hope that we shall have news of him
+at any moment.”
+
+That he was well justified of his hope was to be proven before they were
+many days older. Meanwhile Garnache continued to play his part of gaoler
+to the entire satisfaction and increased confidence of the Condillacs,
+what time he waited patiently for the appointed night when it should be
+his friend Arsenio’s turn to take the guard.
+
+On that fateful Wednesday “Battista” sought out--as had now become his
+invariable custom--his compatriot as soon as the time of his noontide
+rest was come, the hour at which they dined at Condillac. He found
+Arsenio sunning himself in the outer courtyard, for it seemed that year
+that as the winter approached the warmth increased. Never could man
+remember such a Saint Martin’s Summer as was this.
+
+In so far as the matter of their impending flight was concerned,
+“Battista” was as brief as he could be.
+
+“Is all well?” he asked. “Shall you be on guard to-night?”
+
+“Yes. It is my watch from sunset till dawn. At what hour shall we be
+stirring?”
+
+Garnache pondered a moment, stroking that firm chin of his, on which the
+erstwhile stubble had now grown into a straggling, unkempt beard--and
+it plagued him not a little, for a close observer might have discovered
+that it was of a lighter colour at the roots. His hair, too, was
+beginning to lose its glossy blackness. It was turning dull, and
+presently, no doubt, it would begin to pale, so that it was high time he
+spread his wings and took flight from Condillac.
+
+“We had best wait until midnight. It will give them time to be soundly
+in their slumbers. Though, should there be signs of any one stirring
+even then, you had better wait till later. It were foolish to risk
+having our going prevented for the sake of leaving a half-hour earlier.”
+
+“Depend upon me,” Arsenio answered him. “When I open the door of your
+tower I shall whistle to you. The key of the postern hangs on the
+guardroom wall. I shall possess myself of that before I come.”
+
+“Good,” said Garnache, “we understand each other.”
+
+And on that they might have parted there and then, but that there
+happened in that moment a commotion at the gate. Men hurried from the
+guardhouse, and Fortunio’s voice sounded loud in command. A horseman had
+galloped up to Condillac, walked his horse across the bridge--which
+was raised only at night--and was knocking with the butt of his whip an
+imperative summons upon the timbers of the gate.
+
+By Fortunio’s orders it was opened, and a man covered with dust, astride
+a weary, foam-flecked horse, rode under the archway of the keep into the
+first courtyard of the chateau.
+
+Garnache eyed him in surprise and inquiry, and he read in the man’s
+appearance that he was a courier. The horseman had halted within a few
+paces of the spot where “Battista” and his companion stood, and seeing
+in the vilely clad Garnache a member of the Condillac household, he
+flung him his reins, then got down stiffly from his horse.
+
+Fortunio, bristling with importance, his left hand on the hilt of his
+rapier, the fingers of his right twirling at his long fair mustachios,
+at once confronted him and craved his business.
+
+“I am the bearer of letters for Madame the Dowager Marquise de
+Condillac,” was the reply; whereupon, with an arrogant nod, Fortunio
+bade the fellow go with him, and issued an order that his horse should
+be cared for.
+
+Arsenio was speaking in Garnache’s ear. The man’s nature was
+inquisitive, and he was indulging idle conjectures as to what might
+be the news this courier brought. Garnache’s mind, actuated by very
+different motives, was engaged upon the same task, so much so that not
+a word heard he of what his supposed compatriot was whispering. Whence
+came this courier? Why had not that fool Fortunio asked him, so that
+Garnache might have overheard his answer? Was he from Paris and the
+Queen, or was he, perchance, from Italy and Florimond? These were
+questions to which it imported him to have the answers. He must know
+what letters the fellow brought. The knowledge might guide him now;
+might even cause him to alter the plans he had formed.
+
+He stood in thought whilst, unheeded by him, Arsenio prattled at his
+elbow. He bethought him of the old minstrel’s gallery at the end of the
+hall in which the Condillacs were dining and whither the courier would
+be conducted. He knew the way to that gallery, for he had made a very
+close study of the chateau against the time when he might find himself
+in need of the knowledge.
+
+With a hurried excuse to Arsenio he moved away, and, looking round to
+see that he was unobserved, he was on the point of making his way to the
+gallery when suddenly he checked himself. What went he there to do? To
+play the spy? To become fellow to the lackey who listens at keyholes?
+Ah, no! That was something no service could demand of him. He might owe
+a duty to the Queen, but there was also a duty that he owed himself, and
+this duty forbade him from going to such extremes. Thus spake his Pride,
+and he mistook its voice for that of Honour. Betide what might, it was
+not for Garnache to play the eavesdropper. Not that, Pardieu!
+
+And so he turned away, his desires in conflict with that pride of his,
+and gloomily he paced the courtyard, Arsenio marvelling what might have
+come to him. And well was it for him that pride should have detained
+him; well would it seem as if his luck were indeed in the ascendant and
+had prompted his pride to save him from a deadly peril. For suddenly
+some one called “Battista!”
+
+He heard, but for the moment, absorbed as he was in his own musings,
+he overlooked the fact that it was the name to which he answered at
+Condillac.
+
+Not until it was repeated more loudly, and imperatively, did he turn to
+see Fortunio beckoning him. With a sudden dread anxiety, he stepped
+to the captain’s side. Was he discovered? But Fortunio’s words set his
+doubts to rest at once.
+
+“You are to re-conduct Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to her apartments at
+once.”
+
+Garnache bowed and followed the captain up the steps and into the
+chateau that he might carry out the order; and as he went he shrewdly
+guessed that it was the arrival of that courier had occasioned the
+sudden removal of mademoiselle.
+
+When they were alone together--he and she--in her anteroom in the
+Northern Tower, she turned to him before he had time to question her as
+he was intending.
+
+“A courier has arrived,” said she.
+
+“I know; I saw him in the courtyard. Whence is he? Did you learn it?”
+
+“From Florimond.” She was white with agitation.
+
+“From the Marquis de Condillac?” he cried, and he knew not whether to
+hope or fear. “From Italy?”
+
+“No, monsieur. I do not think from Italy. From what was said I gathered
+that Florimond is already on his way to Condillac. Oh, it made a fine
+stir. It left them no more appetite for dinner, and they seem to have
+thought it could have left me none for mine, for they ordered my instant
+return to my apartments.”
+
+“Then you know nothing--save that the courier is from the Marquis?”
+
+“Nothing; nor am I likely to,” she answered, and her arms dropped limply
+to her sides, her eyes looked entreatingly up into his gloomy face.
+
+But Garnache could do no more than rap out an oath. Then he stood still
+a moment, his eyes on the window, his chin in his hand, brooding.
+His pride and his desire to know more of that courier’s message were
+fighting it out again in his mind, just as they fought it out in the
+courtyard below. Suddenly his glance fell on her, standing there, so
+sweet, so frail, and so disconsolate. For her sake he must do the thing,
+repulsive though it might be.
+
+“I must know more,” he exclaimed. “I must learn Florimond’s whereabouts,
+if only that we may go to meet him when we leave Condillac to-night.”
+
+“You have arranged definitely for that?” she asked, her face lighting.
+
+“All is in readiness,” he assured her. Then, lowering his voice without
+apparent reason, and speaking quickly and intently, “I must go find out
+what I can,” he said. “There may be a risk, but it is as nothing to
+the risk we run of blundering matters through ignorance of what may be
+afoot. Should any one come--which is unlikely, for all those interested
+will be in the hall until the courier is dealt with--and should they
+inquire into my absence, you are to know nothing of it since you have no
+Italian and I no French. All that you will know will be that you believe
+I went but a moment since to fetch water. You understand?”
+
+She nodded.
+
+“Then lock yourself in your chamber till I return.”
+
+He caught up a large earthenware vessel in which water was kept for his
+own and mademoiselle’s use, emptied it through the guard-room window
+into the moat below, then left the room and made his way down the steps
+to the courtyard.
+
+He peered out. Not a soul was in sight. This inner courtyard was little
+tenanted at that time of day, and the sentry at the door of the tower
+was only placed there at nightfall. Alongside this there stood another
+door, opening into a passage from which access might be gained to any
+part of the chateau. Thrusting behind that door the earthenware
+vessel that he carried, Garnache sped swiftly down the corridor on his
+eavesdropping errand. Still his mind was in conflict. At times he cursed
+his slowness, at times his haste and readiness to undertake so dirty a
+business, wishing all women at the devil since by the work of women was
+he put to such a shift as this.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV. FLORIMOND’S LETTER
+
+In the great hall of Condillac, where the Marquise, her son, and
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye had been at dinner, a sudden confusion had
+been spread by the arrival of that courier so soon as it was known that
+he bore letters from Florimond, Marquis de Condillac.
+
+Madame had risen hastily, fear and defiance blending in her face,
+and she had at once commanded mademoiselle’s withdrawal. Valerie had
+wondered might there not be letters--or, leastways, messages--for
+herself from her betrothed. But her pride had suppressed the eager
+question that welled up to her lips. She would, too, have questioned the
+courier concerning Florimond’s health; she would have asked him how the
+Marquis looked, and where the messenger had left him. But of all this
+that she craved to know, nothing could she bring herself to ask before
+the Marquise.
+
+She rose in silence upon hearing the Dowager order Fortunio to summon
+Battista that he might re-conduct mademoiselle to her apartments,
+and she moved a few paces down the hall, towards the door, in proud,
+submissive readiness to depart. Yet she could not keep her eyes from the
+dust-stained courier, who, having flung his hat and whip upon the floor,
+was now opening his wallet, the Dowager standing before him to receive
+his papers.
+
+Marius, affecting an insouciance he did not feel, remained at table,
+his page behind his chair, his hound stretched at his feet; and he now
+sipped his wine, now held it to the light that he might observe the
+beauty of its deep red colour.
+
+At last Fortunio returned, and mademoiselle took her departure, head in
+the air and outwardly seeming nowise concerned in what was taking place.
+With her went Fortunio. And the Marquise, who now held the package she
+had received from the courier, bade the page depart also.
+
+When the three were at last alone, she paused before opening the letter
+and turned again to the messenger. She made a brave figure in the
+flood of sunlight that poured through the gules and azures of the long
+blazoned windows, her tall, lissome figure clad in a close-fitting robe
+of black velvet, her abundant glossy black hair rolled back under its
+white coif, her black eyes and scarlet lips detaching from the ivory of
+her face, in which no trace of emotion showed, for all the anxiety that
+consumed her.
+
+“Where left you the Marquis de Condillac?” she asked the fellow.
+
+“At La Rochette, madame,” the courier answered,’ and his answer brought
+Marius to his feet with an oath.
+
+“So near?” he cried out. But the Dowager’s glance remained calm and
+untroubled.
+
+“How does it happen that he did not hasten himself, to Condillac?” she
+asked.
+
+“I do not know, madame. I did not see Monsieur le Marquis. It was his
+servant brought me that letter with orders to ride hither.”
+
+Marius approached his mother, his brow clouded.
+
+“Let us see what he says,” he suggested anxiously. But his mother did
+not heed him. She stood balancing the package in her hand.
+
+“Can you tell us, then, nothing of Monsieur le Marquis?”
+
+“Nothing more than I have told you, madame.”
+
+She bade Marius call Fortunio, and then dismissed the courier, bidding
+her captain see to his refreshment.
+
+Then, alone at last with her son, she hastily tore the covering from
+the letter, unfolded it and read. And Marius, moved by anxiety, came to
+stand beside and just behind her, where he too might read. The letter
+ran:
+
+“MY VERY DEAR MARQUISE,--I do not doubt but that it will pleasure you
+to hear that I am on my way home, and that but for a touch of fever that
+has detained us here at La Rochette, I should be at Condillac as soon as
+the messenger who is the bearer of these presents. A courier from Paris
+found me a fortnight since in Milan, with letters setting forth that my
+father had been dead six months, and that it was considered expedient at
+Court that I should return home forthwith to assume the administration
+of Condillac. I am lost in wonder that a communication of this nature
+should have been addressed to me from Paris instead of from you, as
+surely it must have been your duty to advise me of my father’s decease
+at the time of that untoward event. I am cast down by grief at this evil
+news, and the summons from Court has brought me in all haste from Milan.
+The lack of news from Condillac has been for months a matter of surprise
+to me. My father’s death may be some explanation of this, but scarcely
+explanation enough. However, madame, I count upon it that you will be
+able to dispel such doubts as I am fostering. I count too, upon being
+at Condillac by the end of week, but I beg that neither you nor my
+dear Marius will allow this circumstance to make any difference to
+yourselves, just as, although I am returning to assume the government of
+Condillac as the Court has suggested to me, I hope that yourself and my
+dear brother will continue to make it your home for as long as it shall
+pleasure you. So long shall it pleasure me.
+
+“I am, my dear marquise, your very humble and very affectionate servant
+and stepson,
+
+“FLORIMOND”
+
+When she had read to the end, the Dowager turned back and read aloud
+the passage: “However, madame, I count upon it that you will be able to
+dispel such doubts as I am fostering.” She looked at her son, who had
+shifted his position, so that he was now confronting her.
+
+“He has his suspicions that all is not as it should be,” sneered Marius.
+
+“Yet his tone is amiable throughout. It cannot be that they said too
+much in that letter from Paris.” A little trill of bitter laughter
+escaped her. “We are to continue to make this our home for as long as it
+shall pleasure us. So long shall it pleasure him!”
+
+Then, with a sudden seriousness, she folded the letter and, putting her
+hands behind her, looked up into her son’s face.
+
+“Well?” she asked. “What are you going to do?”
+
+“Strange that he makes no mention of Valerie” said Marius pensively.
+
+“Pooh! A Condillac thinks lightly of his women. What are you going to
+do?”
+
+His handsome countenance, so marvellously like her own, was overcast. He
+looked gloomily at his mother for a moment; then with a slight twitch
+of the shoulders he turned and moved past her slowly in the direction
+of the hearth. He leaned his elbow on the overmantel and rested his brow
+against his clenched right hand, and stood so awhile in moody thought.
+She watched him, a frown between her arrogant eyes.
+
+“Aye, ponder it,” said she. “He is at La Rochette, within a day’s ride,
+and only detained there by a touch of fever. In any case he promises to
+be here by the end of the week. By Saturday, then, Condillac will have
+passed out of our power; it will be lost to you irretrievably. Will you
+lose La Vauvraye as well?”
+
+He let his hand fall to his side, and turned, fully to face her.
+
+“What can I do? What can we do?” he asked, a shade of petulance in his
+question.
+
+She stepped close up to him and rested her hand lightly upon his
+shoulder.
+
+“You have had three months in which to woo that girl, and you have
+tarried sadly over it, Marius. You have now at most three days in which
+to accomplish it. What will you do?”
+
+“I have been maladroit perhaps,” he said, with bitterness. “I have
+been over-patient with her. I have counted too much upon the chance of
+Florimond’s being dead, as seemed from the utter lack of news of him.
+Yet what could I do? Carry her off by force and compel at the dagger’s
+point some priest to marry us?”
+
+She moved her hand from his shoulder and smiled, as if she derided him
+and his heat.
+
+“You want for invention, Marius,” said she. “And yet I beg that you will
+exert your mind, or Sunday next shall find us well-nigh homeless. I’ll
+take no charity from the Marquis de Condillac, nor, I think, will you.”
+
+“If all fails,” said he, “we have still your house in Touraine.”
+
+“My house?” she echoed, her voice shrill with scorn. “My hovel, you
+would say. Could you abide there--in such a sty?”
+
+“_Vertudieu_! If all else failed, we might be glad of it.”
+
+“Glad of it? Not I, for one. Yet all else will fail unless you bestir
+yourself in the next three days. Condillac is as good as lost to
+you already, since Florimond is upon the threshold. La Vauvraye most
+certainly will be lost to you as well unless you make haste to snatch it
+in the little moment that is left you.”
+
+“Can I achieve the impossible, madame?” he cried, and his impatience
+waxed beneath this unreasonable insistence of his mother’s.
+
+“Who asks it of you?”
+
+“Do not you, madame?”
+
+“I? Pish! All that I urge is that you take Valerie across the border
+into Savoy where you can find a priest to marry you, and get it done
+this side of Saturday.”
+
+“And is not that the impossible? She will not go with me, as you well
+know, madame.”
+
+There was a moment’s silence. The Dowager shot him a glance; then her
+eyes fell. Her bosom stirred as if some strange excitement moved
+her. Fear and shame were her emotions; for a way she knew by which
+mademoiselle might be induced to go with him--not only willingly, but
+eagerly, she thought--to the altar. But she was his mother, and even her
+harsh nature shuddered before the task of instructing him in this vile
+thing. Why had the fool not wit enough to see it for himself?
+
+Observing her silence Marius smiled sardonically.
+
+“You may well ponder it,” said he. “It is an easy matter to tell me what
+I should do. Tell me, rather, how it should be done.”
+
+His blindness stirred her anger, and her anger whelmed her hesitation.
+
+“Were I in your place, Marius, I should find a way,” said she, in a
+voice utterly expressionless, her eyes averted ever from his own.
+
+He scanned her curiously. Her agitation was plain to him, and it puzzled
+him, as did the downcast glance of eyes usually so bold and insolent in
+their gaze. Then he pondered her tone, so laden with expression by its
+very expressionlessness, and suddenly a flood of light broke upon his
+mind, revealing very clearly and hideously her meaning. He caught his
+breath with a sudden gasp and blenched a little. Then his lips tightened
+suddenly.
+
+“In that case, madame,” he said, after a pause, and speaking as if he
+were still without revelation of her meaning, “I can but regret that you
+are not in my place. For, as it is, I am thinking we shall have to make
+the best of the hovel in Touraine.”
+
+She bit her lip in the intensity of her chagrin and shame. She was no
+fool, nor did she imagine from his words that her meaning had been lost
+upon him. She knew that he had understood, and that he chose to pretend
+that he had not. She looked up suddenly, her dark eyes blazing, a splash
+of colour in either cheek.
+
+“Fool!” she snapped at him; “you lily-livered fool! Are you indeed
+my son? Are you--by God!--that you talk so lightly of yielding?” She
+advanced a step in his direction. “Through your cowardice you may be
+content to spend your days in beggary; not so am I; nor shall I be,
+so long as I have an arm and a voice. You may go hence if your courage
+fails you outright; but I’ll throw up the bridge and entrench myself
+within these walls. Florimond de Condillac sets no foot in here while I
+live; and if he should come within range of musket-shot, it will be the
+worse for him.”
+
+“I think you are mad, madame--mad so to talk of resisting him, as you
+are mad to call me coward. I’ll leave you till you are come to a more
+tranquil frame of mind.” And turning upon his heel, his face on fire
+from the lash of her contempt, he strode down the hall and passed out,
+leaving her alone.
+
+White again, with heaving bosom and clenched hands, she stood a moment
+where he had left her, then dropped into a chair, and taking her chin
+in her hand she rested her elbow on her knee. Thus she remained, the
+firelight tinting her perfect profile, on which little might be read of
+the storm that was raging in her soul. Another woman in her place would
+have sought relief in tears, but tears came rarely to the beautiful eyes
+of the Marquise de Condillac.
+
+She sat there until the sun had passed from the windows behind her and
+the corners of the room were lost in the quickening shadows. At last she
+was disturbed by the entrance of a lackey, who announced that Monsieur
+le Comte de Tressan, Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny, was come to Condillac.
+
+She bade the fellow call help to clear the board, where still was set
+their interrupted noontide meal, and then to admit the Seneschal.
+With her back to the stirring, bustling servants she stood, pensively
+regarding the flames, and a smile that was mocking rather than aught
+else spread upon her face.
+
+If all else failed her, she told herself, there would be no Touraine
+hovel for her. She could always be Comtesse de Tressan. Let Marius work
+out alone the punishment of his cowardice.
+
+Away in the Northern Tower, where mademoiselle was lodged, she sat in
+eager talk with Garnache, who had returned unobserved and successful
+from his journey of espionage.
+
+He had told her what from the conversation of Marius and his mother he
+had learned touching the contents of that letter. Florimond lay as near
+as La Rochette, detained there by a touch of fever, but promising to be
+at Condillac by the end of the week. Since that was so, Valerie opined
+there was no longer the need to put themselves to the trouble of the
+escape they had planned. Let them wait until Florimond came.
+
+But Garnache shook his head. He had heard more; and for all that he
+accounted her at present safe from Marius, yet he made no false estimate
+of that supple gentleman’s character, was not deluded by his momentary
+show of niceness. As the time of Florimond’s arrival grew nearer, he
+thought it very possible that Marius might be rendered desperate. There
+was grave danger in remaining. He said naught of this, yet he convinced
+mademoiselle that it were best to go.
+
+“Though there will no longer be the need of a toilsome journey as far
+as Paris,” he concluded. “A four hours’ ride to La Rochette, and you may
+embrace your betrothed.”
+
+“Did he speak of me in his letter, know you, monsieur?” she inquired.
+
+“I heard them say that he did not,” Garnache replied. “But it may well
+be that he had good reason. He may suspect more than he has written.”
+
+“In that case,” she asked--and there was a wounded note in her
+voice--“Why should a touch of fever keep him at La Rochette? Would a
+touch of fever keep you from the woman you loved, monsieur, if you knew,
+or even suspected, that she was in durance?”
+
+“I do not know, mademoiselle. I am an old man who has never loved, and
+so it would be unfair of me to pass judgment upon lovers. That they
+think not as other folk is notorious; their minds are for the time
+disordered.”
+
+Nevertheless he looked at her where she sat by the window, so gentle, so
+lissome, so sweet, and so frail, and he had a shrewd notion that were he
+Florimond de Condillac, whether he feared her in durance or not, not the
+fever, nor the plague itself should keep him for the best part of a week
+at La Rochette within easy ride of her.
+
+She smiled gently at his words, and turned the conversation to the
+matter that imported most.
+
+“Tonight then, it is determined that we are to go?”
+
+“At midnight or a little after. Be in readiness, mademoiselle, and
+do not keep me waiting when I rap upon your door. Haste may be of
+importance.”
+
+“You may count upon me, my friend,” she answered him, and stirred by a
+sudden impulse she held out her hand. “You have been very good to me,
+Monsieur de Garnache. You have made life very different for me since
+your coming. I had it in my mind to blame you once for your rashness in
+returning alone. I was a little fool. You can never know the peace that
+has come to me from having you at hand. The fears, the terrors that
+possessed me before you came have all been dispelled in this last week
+that you have been my sentry in two senses.”
+
+He took the hand she held out to him, and looked down at her out of his
+grimy, disfigured face, an odd tenderness stirring him. He felt as might
+have felt a father towards his daughter--at least, so thought he then.
+
+“Child,” he answered her, “you overrate it. I have done no less than I
+could do, no more than any other would have done.”
+
+“Yet more than Florimond has done--and he my betrothed. A touch of fever
+was excuse enough to keep him at La Rochette, whilst the peril of death
+did not suffice to deter you from coming hither.”
+
+“You forget, mademoiselle, that, maybe, he does not know your
+circumstances.”
+
+“Maybe he does not,” said she, with a half-sigh. Then she looked up
+into his face again. “I am sad at the thought of going, monsieur,” she
+surprised him by saying.
+
+“Sad?” he cried. Then he laughed. “But what can there be to sadden you?”
+
+“This, monsieur: that after to-night it is odds I shall never see you
+more.” She said it without hesitation and without coquetry, for her
+upbringing had been simple and natural in an atmosphere different far
+from that in which had been reared the courtly women he had known. “You
+will return to Paris and the great world, and I shall live out my life
+in this, little corner of Dauphiny. You will forget me in the bustle of
+your career, monsieur; but I shall always hold your memory very dear
+and very gratefully. You are the only friend I have ever known since my
+father died excepting Florimond, though it is so long since I have seen
+him, and he never came to me in times of stress as you have done.”
+
+“Mademoiselle,” he answered, touched despite himself more touched than
+he could have believed possible to his callous, world-worn nature--“you
+make me very proud; you make me feel a little better than I am, for if
+I have earned your regard and friendship, there must be some good in old
+Garnache. Believe me, mademoiselle, I too shall not forget.”
+
+And thereafter they remained a spell in silence, she sitting by the
+window, gazing out into the bright October sky, he standing by her
+chair, thoughtfully considering her brown head so gracefully set upon
+her little shoulders. A feeling came to him that was odd and unusual; he
+sought to interpret it, and he supposed it to mean that he wished that
+at some time in the dim past he might have married some woman who would
+have borne him for daughter such a one as this.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV. THE CONFERENCE
+
+The matter that brought Monsieur de Tressan to Condillac--and brought
+him in most fearful haste--was the matter of the courier who had that
+day arrived at the chateau.
+
+News of it had reached the ears of my Lord Seneschal. His mind had been
+a prey to uneasiness concerning this business of rebellion in which he
+had so rashly lent a hand, and he was anxious to know whence came
+this courier and what news he brought. But for all his haste he had
+paused--remembering it was the Marquise he went to visit--to don the
+gorgeous yellow suit with the hanging sleeves which he had had from
+Paris, and the crimson sash he had bought at Taillemant’s, all in the
+very latest mode.
+
+Thus arrayed, his wig well curled and a clump of it caught in ribbon of
+flame-coloured silk on the left side, his sword hanging from belt and
+carriages richly wrought with gold, and the general courtier-like effect
+rather marred by the heavy riding-boots which he would have liked to
+leave behind yet was constrained to wear, he presented himself before
+the Dowager, hiding his anxiety in a melting smile, and the latter in
+the profoundest of bows.
+
+The graciousness of his reception overwhelmed him almost, for in his
+supreme vanity he lacked the wit to see that this cordiality might be
+dictated by no more than the need they had of him at Condillac. A lackey
+placed a great chair for him by the fire that he might warm himself
+after his evening ride, and the Dowager, having ordered lights, sat
+herself opposite him with the hearth between them.
+
+He simpered awhile and toyed with trivialities of speech before he gave
+utterance to the matter that absorbed him. Then, at last, when they were
+alone, he loosed the question that was bubbling on his lips.
+
+“I hear a courier came to Condillac to-day.”
+
+For answer she told him what he sought to learn, whence came that
+courier, and what the message that he brought.
+
+“And so, Monsieur de Tressan,” she ended, “my days at Condillac are
+numbered.”
+
+“Why so?” he asked, “since you say that Florimond has adopted towards
+you a friendly tone. Surely he would not drive his father’s widow
+hence?”
+
+She smiled at the fire in a dreamy, pensive manner.
+
+“No,” said she, “he would not drive me hence. He has offered me the
+shelter of Condillac for as long as it may pleasure me to make it my
+home.”
+
+“Excellent!” he exclaimed, rubbing his little fat hands and screwing the
+little features of his huge red face into the grotesque semblance of a
+smile. “What need to talk of going, then?”
+
+“What need?” she echoed, in a voice dull and concentrated. “Do you ask
+that, Tressan? Do you think I should elect to live upon the charity of
+this man?”
+
+For all that the Lord Seneschal may have been dull-witted, yet he had
+wit enough to penetrate to the very marrow of her meaning.
+
+“You must hate Florimond very bitterly,” said he. She shrugged her
+shoulders.
+
+“I possess, I think, the faculty of feeling strongly. I can love well,
+monsieur, and I can hate well. It is one or the other with me. And as
+cordially as I love my own son Marius, as cordially do I detest this
+coxcomb Florimond.”
+
+She expressed no reasons for her hatred of her late husband’s elder son.
+Hers were not reasons that could easily be put into words. They were
+little reasons, trivial grains of offence which through long years had
+accumulated into a mountain. They had their beginning in the foolish
+grievance that had its birth with her own son, when she had realized
+that but for that rosy-cheeked, well-grown boy borne to the Marquis by
+his first wife, Marius would have been heir to Condillac. Her love of
+her own child and her ambitions for him, her keen desire to see him fill
+an exalted position in the world, caused her a thousand times a day to
+wish his half-brother dead. Yet Florimond had flourished and grown, and
+as he grew he manifested a character which, with all its imperfections,
+was more lovable than the nature of her own offspring. And their common
+father had never seen aught but the faults of Marius and the virtues
+of Florimond. She had resented this, and Marius had resented it; and
+Marius, having inherited with his mother’s beauty his mother’s arrogant,
+dominant spirit, had returned with insolence such admonitions as from
+time to time his father gave him, and thus the breach had grown. Later,
+since he could not be heir to Condillac, the Marquise’s eyes, greedy of
+advancement for him, had fallen covetously upon the richer La Vauvraye,
+whose lord had then no son, whose heiress was a little girl.
+
+By an alliance easy to compass, since the lords of Condillac and La
+Vauvraye were lifelong friends, Marius’s fortunes might handsomely
+have been mended. Yet when she herself bore the suggestion of it to
+the Marquis, he had seized upon it, approved it, but adopted it for
+Florimond’s benefit instead.
+
+Thereafter war had raged fiercely in the family of Condillac--a war
+between the Marquis and Florimond on the one side, and the Marquise and
+Marius on the other. And so bitterly was it waged that it was by the old
+Marquis’s suggestion that at last Florimond had gone upon his travels to
+see the world and carry arms in foreign service.
+
+Her hopes that he would take his death, as was a common thing when
+warring, rose high--so high as to become almost assurance, a thing to be
+reckoned with. Florimond would return no more, and her son should fill
+the place to which he was entitled by his beauty of person and the high
+mental gifts his doting mother saw in him.
+
+Yet the months grew into years, and at long intervals full of hope for
+the Marquise news came of Florimond, and the news was ever that he was
+well and thriving, gathering honours and drinking deep of life.
+
+And now, at last, when matters seemed to have been tumbled into her lap
+that she might dispose of them as she listed; now, when in her anxiety
+to see her son supplant his step-brother in the possession of La
+Vauvraye--if not, perhaps, in that of Condillac as well she had done
+a rashness which might end in making her and Marius outlaws, news
+came that this hated Florimond was at the door; tardily returned, yet
+returned in time to overthrow her schemes and to make her son the pauper
+that her husband’s will had seemed to aim at rendering him.
+
+Her mind skimmed lightly over all these matters, seeking somewhere some
+wrong that should stand out stark and glaring, upon which she might
+seize, and offer it to the Seneschal as an explanation of her hatred.
+But nowhere could she find the thing she sought. Her hatred had for
+foundation a material too impalpable to be fashioned into words.
+Tressan’s voice aroused her from her thoughts.
+
+“Have you laid no plans, madame?” he asked her. “It were surely a
+madness now to attempt to withstand the Marquis.”
+
+“The Marquis? Ah yes--Florimond.” She sat forward out of the shadows in
+which her great chair enveloped her, and let candle and firelight play
+about the matchless beauty of her perfect face. There was a flush upon
+it, the flush of battle; and she was about to tell the Seneschal that
+not while one stone of Condillac should stand upon another, not while a
+gasp of breath remained in her frail body, would she surrender. But
+she checked her rashness. Well might it be that in the end she should
+abandon such a purpose. Tressan was ugly as a toad, the most absurd,
+ridiculous bridegroom that ever led woman to the altar. Yet rumour
+ran that he was rich, and as a last resource, for the sake of his
+possessions she might bring herself to endure his signal shortcomings.
+
+“I have taken no resolve as yet,” said she, in a wistful voice. “I
+founded hopes upon Marius which Marius threatens to frustrate. I think I
+had best resign myself to the poverty of my Touraine home.”
+
+And then the Seneschal realized that the time was now. The opportunity
+he might have sought in vain was almost thrust upon him. In the spirit
+he blessed Florimond for returning so opportunely; in the flesh he rose
+from the chair and, without more ado, he cast himself upon his knees
+before the Dowager. He cast himself down, and the Dowager experienced
+a faint stirring of surprise that she heard no flop such as must attend
+the violent falling of so fat a body. But the next instant, realizing
+the purpose of his absurd posture, she shrank back with a faint gasp,
+and her face was mercifully blurred to his sight once more amid the
+shadows of her chair. Thus was he spared the look of utter loathing, of
+unconquerable, irrepressible disgust that leapt into her countenance.
+
+His voice quivered with ridiculous emotion, his little fat red fingers
+trembled as he outheld them in a theatrical gesture of supplication.
+
+“Never contemplate poverty, madame, until you have discarded me,” he
+implored her. “Say but that you will, and you shall be lady of Tressan.
+All that I have would prove but poor adornment to a beauty such as
+yours, and I should shrink from offering it you, were it not that, with
+it all, I can offer you the fondest heart in France. Marquise--Clotilde,
+I cast myself humbly at your feet. Do with me as you will. I love you.”
+
+By an effort she crushed down her loathing of him--a loathing that grew
+a hundredfold as she beheld him now transformed by his amorousness into
+the semblance almost of a satyr--and listened to his foolish rantings.
+
+As Marquise de Condillac it hurt her pride to listen and not have him
+whipped for his audacity; as a woman it insulted her. Yet the Marquise
+and the woman she alike repressed. She would give him no answer--she
+could not, so near was she to fainting with disdain of him--yet must
+she give him hope against the time when, should all else fail, she might
+have to swallow the bitter draught he was now holding to her lips. So
+she temporized.
+
+She controlled her voice into a tone of gentle sadness; she set a mask
+of sorrow upon her insolent face.
+
+“Monsieur, monsieur,” she sighed, and so far overcame her nausea as for
+an instant to touch his hand in a little gesture of caress, “you must
+not speak so to a widow of six months, nor must I listen.”
+
+The quivering grew in his hands and voice; but no longer did they shake
+through fear of a rebuff: they trembled now in the eager strength of the
+hope he gathered from her words. She was so beautiful, so peerless, so
+noble, so proud--and he so utterly unworthy--that naught but her plight
+had given him courage to utter his proposal. And she answered him in
+such terms!
+
+“You give me hope, Marquise? If I come again--?”
+
+She sighed, and her face, which was once more within the light, showed a
+look of sad inquiry.
+
+“If I thought that what you have said, you have said out of pity,
+because you fear lest my necessities should hurt me, I could give you
+no hope at all. I have my pride, mon ami. But if what you have said
+you would still have said though I had continued mistress of Condillac,
+then, Tressan, you may repeat it to me hereafter, at a season when I may
+listen.”
+
+His joy welled up and overflowed in him as overflows a river in time of
+spate.
+
+He bent forward, caught her hand, and bore it to his lips.
+
+“Clotilde!” he cried, in a smothered voice; then the door opened, and
+Marius stepped into the long chamber.
+
+At the creaking sound of the opening door the Seneschal bestirred
+himself to rise. Even the very young care not so to be surprised,
+how much less, then, a man well past the prime of life? He came up
+laboriously--the more laboriously by virtue of his very efforts to show
+himself still nimble in his mistress’s eyes. Upon the intruder he turned
+a crimson, furious face, perspiration gleaming like varnish on brow and
+nose. At sight of Marius, who stood arrested, scowling villainously upon
+the pair, the fire died suddenly from his glance.
+
+“Ah, my dear Marius,” said he, with a flourish and an air of being
+mightily at his ease. But the young man’s eyes went over and beyond him
+to rest in a look of scrutiny upon his mother. She had risen too, and he
+had been in time to see the startled manner of her rising. In her cheeks
+there was a guilty flush, but her eyes boldly met and threw back her
+son’s regard.
+
+Marius came slowly down the room, and no word was spoken. The Seneschal
+cleared his throat with noisy nervousness. Madame stood hand on hip, the
+flush fading slowly, her glance resuming its habitual lazy insolence. By
+the fire Marius paused and kicked the logs into a blaze, regardless of
+the delicate fabric of his rosetted shoes.
+
+“Monsieur le Seneschal,” said madame calmly, “came to see us in the
+matter of the courier.”
+
+“Ah!” said Marius, with an insolent lifting of his brows and a sidelong
+look at Tressan; and Tressan registered in his heart a vow that when he
+should have come to wed the mother, he would not forget to take payment
+for that glance from her pert son.
+
+“Monsieur le Comte will remain and sup with us before riding back to
+Grenoble,” she added.
+
+“Ah!” said he again, in the same tone. And that for the moment was all
+he said. He remained by the fire, standing between them where he
+had planted himself in the flesh, as if to symbolize the attitude he
+intended in the spirit.
+
+But one chance he had, before supper was laid, of a word alone with his
+mother, in her own closet.
+
+“Madame,” he said, his sternness mingling with alarm, “are you mad that
+you encourage the suit of this hedgehog Tressan?”
+
+She looked him up and down with a deliberate eye, her lip curling a
+little.
+
+“Surely, Marius, it is my own concern.”
+
+“Not so,” he answered her, and his grasp fastened almost viciously on
+her wrist. “I think that it is mine as well. Mother, bethink you,” and
+his tone changed to an imploring key, “bethink you what you would do!
+Would you--you--mate with such a thing as that?”
+
+His emphasis of the pronoun was very eloquent. Not in all the words of
+the French language could he have told her better how high he placed her
+in his thoughts, how utterly she must fall, how unutterably be soiled by
+an alliance with Tressan.
+
+“I had hoped you would have saved me from it, Marius,” she answered him,
+her eyes seeming to gaze down into the depths of his. “At La Vauvraye I
+had hoped to live out my widowhood in tranquil dignity. But--” She let
+her arms fall sharply to her sides, and uttered a little sneering laugh.
+
+“But, mother,” he cried, “between the dignity of La Vauvraye and the
+indignity of Tressan, surely there is some middle course?”
+
+“Aye,” she answered scornfully, “starvation on a dunghill in
+Touraine--or something near akin to it, for which I have no stomach.”
+
+He released her wrist and stood with bent head, clenching and
+unclenching his long white hands, and she watched him, watching in him
+the working of his proud and stubborn spirit.
+
+“Mother,” he cried at last, and the word sounded absurd between them, by
+so little did he seem the younger of the twain, “mother, you shall not
+do it you must not!”
+
+“You leave me little alternative--alas!” sighed she. “Had you been more
+adroit you had been wed by now, Marius, and the future would give us no
+concern. As it is, Florimond comes home, and we--” She spread her hands
+and thrust out her nether lip in a grimace that was almost ugly. Then:
+“Come,” she said briskly. “Supper is laid, and my Lord Seneschal will be
+awaiting us.”
+
+And before he could reply she had swept past him and taken her way
+below. He followed gloomily, and in gloom sat he at table, never
+heeding the reckless gaiety of the Seneschal and the forced mirth of the
+Marquise. He well understood the sort of tacit bargain that his mother
+had made with him. She had seen her advantage in his loathing of the
+proposed union with Tressan, and she had used it to the full. Either he
+must compel Valerie to wed him this side of Saturday or resign himself
+to see his mother--his beautiful, peerless mother--married to this skin
+of lard that called itself a man.
+
+Living, he had never entertained for his father a son’s respect, nor,
+dead, did he now reverence his memory as becomes a son. But in that
+hour, as he sat at table, facing this gross wooer of his mother’s, his
+eyes were raised to the portrait of the florid-visaged haughty Marquis
+de Condillac, where it looked down upon them from the panelled wall, and
+from his soul he offered up to that portrait of his dead sire an apology
+for the successor whom his widow destined him.
+
+He ate little, but drank great draughts, as men will when their mood
+is sullen and dejected, and the heat of the wine, warming his veins and
+lifting from him some of the gloom that had settled over him, lent him
+anon a certain recklessness very different from the manner of his sober
+moments.
+
+Chancing suddenly to raise his eyes from the cup into which he had been
+gazing, absorbed as gazes a seer into his crystal, he caught on the
+Seneschal’s lips so odious a smile, in the man’s eyes so greedy, hateful
+a leer as he bent them on the Marquise, that he had much ado not to
+alter the expression of that flabby face by hurling at it the cup he
+held.
+
+He curbed himself; he smiled sardonically upon the pair; and in that
+moment he swore that be the cost what it might, he would frustrate the
+union of those two. His thoughts flew to Valerie, and the road they took
+was fouled with the mud of ugly deeds. A despair, grim at first, then
+mocking, took possession of him. He loved Valerie to distraction. Loved
+her for herself, apart from all worldly advantages that must accrue to
+him from an alliance with her. His mother saw in that projected marriage
+no more than the acquisition of the lands of La Vauvraye, and she may
+even have thought that he himself saw no more. In that she was wrong;
+but because of it she may have been justified of her impatience with him
+at the tardiness, the very clumsiness with which he urged his suit. How
+was she to know that it was just the sincerity of his passion made
+him clumsy? For like many another, normally glib, self-assured, and
+graceful, Marius grew halting, shy, and clumsy only where he loved.
+
+But in the despair that took him now the quality of his passion seemed
+to change. Partly it was the wine, partly the sight of this other
+lover--of whom there must be an end--whose very glance seemed to him an
+insult to his mother. His imagination had taken fire that night, and it
+had ripened him for any villainy. The Seneschal and the wine, between
+them, had opened the floodgates of all that was evil in his nature, and
+that evil thundered out in a great torrent that bid fair to sweep all
+before it.
+
+And suddenly, unexpectedly for the others, who were by now resigned to
+his moody silence, the evil found expression. The Marquise had spoken
+of something--something of slight importance--that must be done before
+Florimond returned. Abruptly Marius swung round in his seat to face
+his mother. “Must this Florimond return?” he asked, and for all that he
+uttered no more words, so ample in their expression were those four that
+he had uttered and the tone of them, that his meaning left little work
+to the imagination.
+
+Madame turned to stare at him, surprise ineffable in her glance--not
+at the thing that he suggested, but at the abruptness with which the
+suggestion came. The cynical, sneering tone rang in her ears after the
+words were spoken, and she looked in his face for a confirmation of
+their full purport.
+
+She observed the wine-flush on his cheek, the wine-glitter in his eye,
+and she remarked the slight smile on his lips and the cynical assumption
+of nonchalance with which he fingered the jewel in his ear as he
+returned her gaze. She beheld now in her son a man more purposeful than
+she had ever known before.
+
+A tense silence had followed his words, and the Lord Seneschal gaped
+at him, some of the colour fading from his plethoric countenance,
+suspecting as he did the true drift of Marius’s suggestion. At last it
+was madame who spoke--very softly, with a narrowing of the eyes.
+
+“Call Fortunio,” was all she said, but Marius understood full well the
+purpose for which she would have Fortunio called.
+
+With a half-smile he rose, and going to the door he bade his page who
+was idling in the anteroom go summon the captain. Then he paced slowly
+back, not to the place he had lately occupied at table, but to the
+hearth, where he took his stand with his shoulders squared to the
+overmantel.
+
+Fortunio came, fair-haired and fresh-complexioned as a babe, his supple,
+not ungraceful figure tawdrily clad in showy clothes of poor material
+the worse for hard usage and spilt wine. The Countess bade him sit, and
+with her own hands she poured a cup of Anjou for him.
+
+In some wonder, and, for all his ordinary self-possession, with a little
+awkwardness, the captain did her bidding, and with an apologetic air he
+took the seat she offered him.
+
+He drank this wine, and here was a spell of silence till Marius, grown
+impatient, brutally put the thing for which the Marquise sought delicate
+words.
+
+“We have sent for you, Fortunio,” said he, in a blustering tone, “to
+inquire of you what price you’d ask to cut the throat of my brother, the
+Marquis de Condillac.”
+
+The Seneschal sank back in his chair with a gasp. The captain, a frown
+between his frank-seeming, wide-set eyes, started round to look at the
+boy. The business was by no means too strong for the ruffler’s stomach,
+but the words in which it was conveyed to him most emphatically were.
+
+“Monsieur de Condillac,” said he, with an odd assumption of dignity, “I
+think you have mistaken your man. I am a soldier, not a cut-throat.”
+
+“But yes,” the Marquise soothed him, throwing herself instantly into the
+breach, and laying a long, slender hand upon the frayed green velvet
+of the captain’s sleeve. “What my son means and what he says are vastly
+different things.”
+
+“It will sorely tax your wits, madame,” laughed Marius brutally, “to
+make clear that difference.”
+
+And then the Seneschal nervously cleared his throat and muttering that
+it waxed late and he must be riding home, made shift to rise. Him, too,
+the Marquise at once subdued. She was not minded that he should go just
+yet. It might be useful to her hereafter to have had him present at this
+conference, into which she meant to draw him until she should have made
+him one with them, a party to their guilt. For the task she needed not
+over many words: just one or two and a melting glance or so, and the
+rebellion in his bosom was quelled at once.
+
+But with the captain her wiles were not so readily successful. He had no
+hopes of winning her to wife--haply no desire, since he was not a man
+of very great ambitions. On the other hand, he had against him the
+very worst record in France, and for all that he might embark upon this
+business under the auspices of the Lord Seneschal himself, he knew not
+how far the Lord Seneschal might dare to go thereafter to save him from
+a hanging, should it come to that.
+
+He said as much in words. In a business of this kind, he knew from
+experience, the more difficulties he advanced, the better a bargain
+he drove in the end; and if he was to be persuaded to risk his neck in
+this, he should want good payment. But even for good payment on this
+occasion he was none too sure as yet that he would let himself be
+persuaded.
+
+“Monsieur Fortunio,” the Marquise said, very softly, “heed not Monsieur
+Marius’s words. Attend to me. The Marquis de Condillac, as no doubt you
+will have learned for yourself, is lying at La Rochette. Now it happens
+that he is noxious to us--let the reasons be what they may. We need a
+friend to put him out of our way. Will you be that friend?”
+
+“You will observe,” sneered Marius, “how wide a difference there is
+between what the Marquise suggests and my own frank question of what
+price you would take to cut my brother’s throat.”
+
+“I observe no difference, which is what you would say,” Fortunio
+answered truculently, his head well back, his brown eyes resentful
+of offence--for none can be so resentful of imputed villainy as your
+villain who is thorough-paced. “And,” he concluded, “I return you the
+same answer, madame--that I am no cut-throat.”
+
+She repressed her anger at Marius’s sneering interference, and made a
+little gesture of dismay with her eloquent white hands.
+
+“But we do not ask you to cut a throat.”
+
+“I have heard amiss, then,” said he, his insolence abating nothing.
+
+“You have heard aright, but you have understood amiss. There are other
+ways of doing these things. If it were but the cutting of a throat,
+should we have sent for you? There are a dozen in the garrison would
+have sufficed for our purpose.”
+
+“What is it, then, you need?” quoth he.
+
+“We want an affair contrived with all decency. The Marquis is at the
+Sanglier Noir at La Rochette. You can have no difficulty in finding
+him, and having found him, less difficulty still in giving or provoking
+insult.”
+
+“Excellent,” murmured Marius from the background. “It is such an
+enterprise as should please a ready swordsman of your calibre,
+Fortunio.”
+
+“A duel?” quoth the fellow, and his insolence went out of him, thrust
+out by sheer dismay; his mouth fell open. A duel was another affair
+altogether. “But, Sangdieu! what if he should slay me? Have you thought
+of that?”
+
+“Slay you?” cried the Marquise, her eyes resting on his face with an
+expression as of wonder at such a question. “You jest, Fortunio.”
+
+“And he with the fever,” put in Marius, sneering.
+
+“Ah!” muttered Fortunio. “He has the fever? The fever is something.
+But--but--accidents will happen.”
+
+“Florimond was ever an indifferent swordsman,” murmured Marius dreamily,
+as if communing with himself.
+
+The captain wheeled upon him once more.
+
+“Why, then, Monsieur Marius,” said he, “since that is so and you are
+skilled--as skilled as am I, or more--and he has a fever, where is the
+need to hire me to the task?”
+
+“Where?” echoed Marius. “What affair may that be of yours? We ask you
+to name a price on which you will do this thing. Have done with
+counter-questions.”
+
+Marius was skilled with the foils, as Fortunio said, but he cared not
+for unbaited steel, and he was conscious of it, so that the captain’s
+half-sneer had touched him on the raw. But he was foolish to take that
+tone in answer. There was a truculent, Southern pride in the ruffler
+which sprang immediately into life and which naught that they could say
+thereafter would stamp out.
+
+“Must I say again that you mistake your man?” was his retort, and as
+he spoke he rose, as though to signify that the subject wearied him and
+that his remaining to pursue it must be idle. “I am not of those to
+whom you can say: ‘I need such a one killed, name me the price at which
+you’ll be his butcher’.”
+
+The Marquise wrung her hands in pretty mimicry of despair, and poured
+out soothing words, as one might pour oil upon stormy waters. The
+Seneschal sat in stolid silence, a half-scared spectator of this odd
+scene, what time the Marquise talked and talked until she had brought
+Fortunio back to some measure of subjection.
+
+Such reasoning as she made use of she climaxed by an offer of no less a
+sum than a hundred pistoles. The captain licked his lips and pulled at
+his mustachios. For all his vaunted scorn of being a butcher at a price,
+now that he heard the price he seemed not half so scornful.
+
+“Tell me again the thing that you need doing and the manner of it,” said
+he, as one who was moved to reconsider. She told him, and when she had
+done he made a compromise.
+
+“If I go upon this business, madame, I go not alone.”
+
+“Oh, as for that,” said Marius, “it shall be as you will. Take what men
+you want with you.”
+
+“And hang with them afterwards, maybe,” he sneered, his insolence
+returning. “The hundred pistoles would avail me little then. Look you,
+Monsieur de Condillac, and you, madame, if I go, I’ll need to take with
+me a better hostage than the whole garrison of this place. I’ll need for
+shield some one who will see to it that he is not hurt himself, just as
+I shall see to it that he is hurt before I am.”
+
+“What do you mean? Speak out, Fortunio,” the Marquise bade him.
+
+“I mean, madame, that I will go, not to do this thing, but to stand by
+and render help if help be needed. Let Monsieur de Condillac go, and
+I will go with him, and I will undertake to see to it that he returns
+unhurt and that we leave the other stark.”
+
+Both started, and the Seneschal leaned heavily upon the table. He was
+not, with all his faults, a man of blood, and this talk of butchery
+turned him sick and faint.
+
+Vainly now did the Marquise seek to alter the captain’s resolution; but
+in this she received a sudden check from Marius himself. He cut in upon
+her arguments to ask the captain:
+
+“How can you promise so much? Do you mean that you and I must fall upon
+him? You forget that he will have men about him. A duel is one thing,
+a rough-and-tumble another, and we shall fare none so well in this, I’m
+thinking.”
+
+The captain closed one eye, and a leer of subtle cunning overspread his
+face.
+
+“I’ve thought of that,” said he. “Neither a duel nor a rough-and-tumble
+do I propose, but something between the two; something that shall seem a
+duel yet be a rough-and-tumble.”
+
+“Explain yourself.”
+
+“What further explanation does it ask? We come upon Monsieur le Marquis
+where his men are not. We penetrate, let us say, into his chamber. I
+turn the key in the door. We are alone with him and you provoke him. He
+is angry, and must fight you there and then. I am your friend; I must
+fill the office of second for both sides. You engage, and I stand aside
+and let you fight it out. You say he is indifferently skilled with the
+sword, and, in addition, that he has a fever. Thus you should contrive
+to put your steel through him, and a duel it will have been. But if by
+luck or skill he should have you in danger, I shall be at hand to flick
+in my sword at the right moment and make an opening through which you
+may send yours home.”
+
+“Believe me it were better--” began the Dowager. But Marius, who of a
+sudden was much taken with the notion, again broke in.
+
+“Are you to be depended upon to make no mistake, Fortunio?”
+
+“Per Bacco!” swore the ruffler. “A mistake must cost me a hundred
+pistoles. I think you may depend upon me there. If I err at all, it will
+be on the side of eagerness to see you make short work of him. You have
+my answer now, monsieur. If we talk all night, you shall not move me
+further. But if my proposal suits you, I am your man.”
+
+“And I yours, Fortunio,” answered Marius, and there was a ring almost of
+exultation in his voice.
+
+The Dowager looked from one to the other, as if she were weighing the
+men and satisfying herself that Marius ran no risk. She put a question
+or two to her son, another to the captain; then, seeming satisfied with
+what had been agreed, she nodded her head and told them they had best be
+stirring with the dawn.
+
+“You will have light enough by half-past six. Do not delay later in
+taking the road. And see that you are back here by nightfall; I shall be
+anxious till you are returned.”
+
+She poured wine again for the captain, and Marius coming up to the table
+filled himself a glass, which he tossed off. The Marquise was speaking
+to Tressan.
+
+“Will you not drink to the success of the venture?” she asked him, in a
+coaxing tone, her eyes upon his own. “I think we are like to see the
+end of our troubles now, monsieur, and Marius shall be lord both of
+Condillac and La Vauvraye.”
+
+And the gross, foolish Seneschal, under the spell of her magnificent
+eyes, slowly raised his cup to his lips and drank to the success of that
+murderous business. Marius stood still, a frown between his eyes haled
+thither by the mention of La Vauvraye. He might be winning it, as his
+mother said, but he would have preferred to have won it differently.
+Then the frown was smoothed away; a sardonic smile replaced it; another
+cup of wine he poured himself. Then, without word to any there, he
+turned on his heel and went from the room, a trifle unsteady in his
+gait, yet with such lines of purposefulness in the way he bore himself
+that the three of them stared after him in dull surprise.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI. THE UNEXPECTED
+
+In her apartments in the Northern Tower Valerie had supped, and--to
+spare Monsieur de Garnache the full indignity of that part of the
+offices he was charged with--she had herself removed the cloth and set
+the things in the guard-room, where they might lie till morning. When
+that was done--and despite her protests, Garnache had insisted upon
+lending a hand--the Parisian reminded her that it was already after
+nine, and urged her to make such preparations as incumbed her for their
+journey.
+
+“My preparations are soon made,” she assured him with a smile. “I need
+but what I may carry in a cloak.”
+
+They fell to talking of their impending flight, and they laughed
+together at the discomfiture that would be the Dowager’s and her son’s
+when, in the morning, they came to discover the empty cage. From that
+they passed on to talk of Valerie herself, of her earlier life at
+La Vauvraye, and later the conversation shifted to Garnache, and she
+questioned him touching the warring he had seen in early youth, and
+afterwards asked him for particulars of Paris--that wonderful city which
+to her mind was the only earthly parallel of Paradise--and of the life
+at Court.
+
+Thus in intimate talk did they while away the time of waiting, and in
+the hour that sped they came, perhaps, to know more of each other than
+they had done hitherto. Intimate, indeed, had they unconsciously become
+already. Their singular position, locked together in that tower--a
+position utterly impossible under any but the conditions that attended
+it--had conduced to that good-fellowship, whilst the girl’s trust and
+dependence upon the man, the man’s observance of that trust, and his
+determination to show her that it had not been misplaced, had done the
+rest.
+
+But to-night they seemed to have drawn nearer in spirit to each other,
+and that, maybe, it was that prompted Valerie to sigh, and in her sweet,
+unthinking innocence to say again:
+
+“I am truly sorry, Monsieur de Garnache, that our sojourn here is coming
+to an end.”
+
+He was no coxcomb, and he set no false value on the words. He laughed
+for answer, as he rejoined:
+
+“Not so am I, mademoiselle. Nor shall I know peace of mind again until
+this ill-omened chateau is a good three leagues or so behind us. Sh!
+What was that?”
+
+He came instantly to his feet, his face intent and serious. He had been
+sitting at his ease in an armchair, over the back of which he had tossed
+the baldric from which his sword depended. The clang of the heavy door
+below, striking the wall as it was pushed open, had reached his ears.
+
+“Can it be time already?” asked mademoiselle; yet a panic took her, and
+she blenched a little.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+“Impossible,” said he; “it is not more than ten o’clock. Unless that
+fool Arsenio has blundered--” He stopped. “Sh!” he whispered. “Some one
+is coming here.”
+
+And suddenly he realized the peril that might lie in being found thus in
+her company. It alarmed him more than did the visit itself, so unusual
+at this hour. He saw that he had not time to reach the guard-room;
+he would be caught in the act of coming forth, and that might be
+interpreted by the Dowager or her son--if it should happen to be one
+or the other of them--as a hurried act of flight such as guilt might
+prompt. Perhaps he exaggerated the risk; but their fortunes at Condillac
+had reached a point where they must not be jeopardized by any chance
+however slight.
+
+“To your chamber, mademoiselle,” he whispered fearfully, and he pointed
+to the door of the inner room. “Lock yourself in. Quick! Sh!” And he
+signed frantically to her to go silently.
+
+Swift and quietly as a mouse she glided from the room and softly closed
+the door of her chamber and turned the key in a lock, which Garnache had
+had the foresight to keep well oiled. He breathed more freely when it
+was done.
+
+A step sounded in the guard-room. He sank without a rustle into the
+chair from which he had risen, rested his head against the back of it,
+closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and dissembled sleep.
+
+The steps came swiftly across the guard-room floor, soft, as of one
+lightly shod; and Garnache wondered was it the mother or the son, just
+as he wondered what this ill-come visitor might be seeking.
+
+The door of the antechamber was pushed gently open--it had stood
+ajar--and under the lintel appeared the slender figure of Marius, still
+in his brown velvet suit as Garnache last had seen him. He paused a
+moment to peer into the chamber. Then he stepped forward, frowning to
+behold “Battista” so cosily ensconced.
+
+“Ola there!” he cried, and kicked the sentry’s outstretched legs, the
+more speedily to wake him. “Is this the watch you keep?”
+
+Garnache opened his eyes and stared a second dully at the disturber
+of his feigned slumbers. Then, as if being more fully awakened he
+recognized his master, he heaved himself suddenly to his feet and bowed.
+
+“Is this the watch you keep?” quoth Marius again, and Garnache, scanning
+the youth’s face with foolishly smiling eyes, noted the flush on his
+cheek, the odd glitter in his handsome eyes, and even caught a whiff
+of wine upon his breath. Alarm grew in Garnache’s mind, but his face
+maintained its foolish vacancy, its inane smile. He bowed again and,
+with a wave of the hands towards the inner chamber,
+
+“La damigella a la,” said he.
+
+For all that Marius had no Italian he understood the drift of the
+words, assisted as they were by the man’s expressive gesture. He sneered
+cruelly.
+
+“It would be an ugly thing for you, my ugly friend, if she were not,”
+ he answered. “Away with you. I shall call you when I need you.” And he
+pointed to the door.
+
+Garnache experienced some dismay, some fear even. He plied his wits,
+and he determined that he had best seem to apprehend from his gestures
+Marius’s meaning; but apprehend it in part only, and go no further than
+the other side of that door.
+
+He bowed, therefore, for the third time, and with another of his foolish
+grins he shuffled out of the chamber, pulling the door after him, so
+that Marius should not see how near at hand he stayed.
+
+Marius, without further heeding him, stepped to mademoiselle’s door and
+rapped on a panel with brisk knuckles.
+
+“Who is there?” she inquired from within.
+
+“It is I--Marius. Open, I have something I must say to you.”
+
+“Will it not keep till morning?”
+
+“I shall be gone by then,” he answered impatiently, “and much depends
+upon my seeing you ere I go. So open. Come!”
+
+There followed a pause, and Garnache in the outer room set his teeth and
+prayed she might not anger Marius. He must be handled skillfully, lest
+their flight should be frustrated at the last moment. He prayed, too,
+that there might be no need for his intervention. That would indeed be
+the end of all--a shipwreck within sight of harbour. He promised himself
+that he would not lightly intervene. For the rest this news of Marius’s
+intended departure filled him with a desire to know something of the
+journey on which he was bound:
+
+Slowly mademoiselle’s door opened. White and timid she appeared.
+
+“What do you want, Marius?”
+
+“Now and always and above all things the sight of you, Valerie,” said
+he, and the flushed cheek, the glittering eye, and wine-laden breath
+were as plain to her as they had been to Garnache, and they filled her
+with a deeper terror. Nevertheless she came forth at his bidding.
+
+“I see that you were not yet abed,” said he. “It is as well. We must
+have a talk.” He set a chair for her and begged her to be seated; then
+he perched himself on the table, his hands gripping the edges of it on
+either side of him, and he turned his eyes upon her.
+
+“Valerie,” he said slowly, “the Marquis de Condillac, my brother, is at
+La Rochette.”
+
+“He is coming home!” she cried, clasping her hands and feigning surprise
+in word and glance.
+
+Marius shook his head and smiled grimly.
+
+“No,” said he. “He is not coming home. That is--not unless you wish it.”
+
+“Not unless I wish it? But naturally I wish it!”
+
+“Then, Valerie, if you would have what you wish, so must I. If Florimond
+is ever to come to Condillac again, you must be my wife.”
+
+He leaned towards her now, supported by his elbow, so that his face was
+close to hers, a deeper flush upon it, a brighter glitter in his black
+eyes, his vinous breath enveloping and suffocating her. She shrank back,
+her hands locking themselves one in the other till the knuckles showed
+white.
+
+“What--what is it you mean?” she faltered.
+
+“No more than I have said; no less. If you love him well enough to
+sacrifice yourself,” and his lips curled sardonically at the word, “then
+marry me and save him from his doom.”
+
+“What doom?” Her voice came mechanically, her lips seeming scarce to
+move.
+
+He swung down from the table and stood before her.
+
+“I will tell you,” he said, in a voice very full of promise. “I love
+you, Valerie, above all else on earth or, I think, in heaven; and I’ll
+not yield you to him. Say ‘No’ to me now, and at daybreak I start for La
+Rochette to win you from him at point of sword.”
+
+Despite her fears she could not repress a little smile of scorn.
+
+“Is that all?” said she. “Why, if you are so rash, it is yourself,
+assuredly, will be slain.”
+
+He smiled tranquilly at that reflection upon his courage and his skill.
+
+“So might it befall if I went alone,” said he. She understood. Her eyes
+dilated with horror, with loathing of him. The angry words that sprang
+to her lips were not to be denied.
+
+“You cur, you cowardly assassin!” she blazed at him. “I might have
+guessed that in some such cutthroat manner would your vaunt of winning
+me at the sword-point be accomplished.”
+
+She watched the colour fade from his cheeks, and the ugly, livid hue
+that spread in its room to his very lips. Yet it did not daunt her. She
+was on her feet, confronting him ere he had time to speak again. Her
+eyes flashed, and her arm pointed quivering to the door.
+
+“Go!” she bade him, her voice harsh for once. “Out of my sight! Go! Do
+your worst, so that you leave me. I’ll hold no traffic with you.”
+
+“Will you not?” said he, through setting teeth, and suddenly he caught
+the wrist of that outstretched arm. But she saw nothing of immediate
+danger. The only danger that she knew was the danger that threatened
+Florimond, and little did that matter since at midnight she was to
+leave Condillac to reach La Rochette in time to warn her betrothed. The
+knowledge gave her confidence and an added courage.
+
+“You have offered me your bargain,” she told him. “You have named your
+price and you have heard my refusal. Now go.”
+
+“Not yet awhile,” said he, in a voice so odiously sweet that Garnache
+caught his breath.
+
+He drew her towards him. Despite her wild struggles he held her fast
+against his breast. Do what she would, he rained his hot kisses on her
+face and hair, till at last, freeing a hand, she smote him with all her
+might across the face.
+
+He let her go then. He fell back with an oath, a patch of fingermarks
+showing red on his white countenance.
+
+“That blow has killed Florimond de Condillac,” he told her viciously.
+“He dies at noon to-morrow. Ponder it, my pretty.”
+
+“I care not what you do so that you leave me,” she answered defiantly,
+restraining by a brave effort the tears of angry distress that welled
+up from her stricken heart. And no less stricken, no less angry was
+Garnache where he listened. It was by an effort that he had restrained
+himself from bursting in upon them when Marius had seized her. The
+reflection that were he to do so all would irretrievably be ruined alone
+had stayed him.
+
+Marius eyed the girl a moment, his face distorted by the rage that was
+in him.
+
+“By God!” he swore, “if I cannot have your love, I’ll give you cause
+enough to hate me.”
+
+“Already have you done that most thoroughly,” said she. And Garnache
+cursed this pertness of hers which was serving to dare him on.
+
+The next moment there broke from her a startled cry. Marius had seized
+her again and was crushing her frail body in his arms.
+
+“I shall kiss your lips before I go, ma mie,” said he, his voice thick
+now with a passion that was not all of anger. And then, while he still
+struggled to have his way with her, a pair of arms took him about the
+waist like hoops of steel.
+
+In his surprise he let her free, and in that moment he was swung back
+and round and cast a good six paces down the room.
+
+He came to a standstill by the table, at which he clutched to save
+himself from falling, and turned bewildered, furious eyes upon
+“Battista,” by whom he now dimly realized that he had been assailed.
+
+Garnache’s senses had all left him in that moment when Valerie had cried
+out. He cast discretion to the winds; reason went out of him, and only
+blind anger remained to drive him into immediate action. And as suddenly
+as that flood of rage had leaped, as suddenly did it ebb now that he
+found himself face to face with the outraged Condillac and began to
+understand the magnitude of the folly he had committed.
+
+Everything was lost now, utterly and irretrievably--lost as a dozen
+other fine emprises had been by his sudden and ungoverned frenzy. God!
+What a fool he was! What a cursed, drivelling fool! What, after all, was
+a kiss or two, compared with all the evil that might now result from his
+interference? Haply Marius would have taken them and departed, and at
+midnight they would have been free to go from Condillac.
+
+The future would not have been lacking in opportunities to seek out and
+kill Marius for that insult.
+
+Why could he not have left the matter to the future? But now, with
+Florimond to be murdered on the morrow at La Rochette, himself likely
+to be murdered within the hour at Condillac, Valerie was at their mercy
+utterly.
+
+Wildly and vainly did he strive even then to cover up the foolish thing
+that he had done. He bowed apologetically to Marius; he waved his hands
+and filled the air with Italian phrases, frenziedly uttered, as if by
+the very vigour of them he sought to drive explanation into his master’s
+brain. Marius watched and listened, but his rage nowise abated; it grew,
+instead, as if that farrago of a language he did not understand were
+but an added insult. An oath was all he uttered. Then he swung round
+and caught Garnache’s sword from the chair beside him, where it still
+rested, and Garnache in that moment cursed the oversight. Whipping
+the long, keen blade from its sheath, Marius bore down upon the rash
+meddler.
+
+“Par Dieu!” he swore between his teeth. “We’ll see the colour of your
+dirty blood, you that lay hands upon a gentleman.”
+
+But before he could send home the weapon, before Garnache could move to
+defend himself, Valerie had slipped between them. Marius looked into
+her white, determined face, and was smitten with surprise. What was this
+hind to her that she should interfere at the risk of taking the sword
+herself?
+
+Then a slow smile spread upon his face. He was smarting still under
+her disdain and resistance, as well as under a certain sense of the
+discomfiture this fellow had put upon him. He saw a way to hurt her, to
+abase her pride, and cut her to the very soul with shame.
+
+“You are singularly concerned in this man’s life,” said he, an odious
+undercurrent of meaning in his voice.
+
+“I would not have you murder him,” she answered, “for doing no more than
+madame your mother bade him.”
+
+“I make no doubt he has proved a very excellent guard,” he sneered.
+
+Even now all might have been well. With that insult Marius might
+consider that he had taken payment for the discomfiture he had suffered.
+He might have bethought him that, perhaps, as she said, “Battista”
+ had done no more than observe the orders he had received--a trifle
+excessively, maybe, yet faithfully nevertheless. Thinking thus, he might
+even have been content to go his ways and take his fill of vengeance by
+slaying Florimond upon the morrow. But Garnache’s rash temper, rising
+anew, tore that last flimsy chance to shreds.
+
+The insult that mademoiselle might overlook might even not have fully
+understood--set him afire with indignation for her sake. He forgot his
+role, forgot even that he had no French.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” he cried, and she gasped in her affright at this ruinous
+indiscretion, “I beg that you will stand aside.” His voice was low and
+threatening, but his words were woefully distinct.
+
+“Par la mort Dieu!” swore Marius, taken utterly aback. “What may your
+name be--you who hitherto have had no French?”
+
+Almost thrusting mademoiselle aside, Garnache stood out to face him, the
+flush of hot anger showing through the dye on his cheeks.
+
+“My name,” said he, “is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache, and my
+business now to make an end of one at least of this obscene brood of
+Condillac.”
+
+And, without more ado, he caught up a chair and held it before him in
+readiness to receive the other’s onslaught.
+
+But Marius hung back an instant--at first in sheer surprise, later in
+fear. He had some knowledge of the fellow’s methods. Even the sword he
+wielded gave him little confidence opposed to Garnache with a chair. He
+must have help. His eyes sought the door, measuring the distance. Ere he
+could reach it Garnache would cut him off. There was nothing for it
+but to attempt to drive the Parisian back. And so with a sudden rush he
+advanced to the attack. Garnache fell back and raised his chair, and in
+that instant mademoiselle once more intervened between them.
+
+“Stand aside, mademoiselle,” cried Garnache, who now, grown cool, as was
+his way when once he was engaged, saw clearly through the purpose formed
+by Marius. “Stand aside, or we shall have him giving the alarm.”
+
+He leapt clear of her to stop Marius’s sudden rush for the door. On the
+very threshold the young man was forced to turn and defend himself, lest
+his brains be dashed out by that ponderous weapon Garnache was handling
+with a rare facility. But the mischief was done, in that he had reached
+the threshold. Backing, he defended himself and gained the anteroom.
+Garnache followed, but the clumsy chair was defensive rather than
+offensive, and Marius’s sword meanwhile darted above it and below it,
+forcing him to keep a certain distance.
+
+And now Marius raised his voice and shouted with all the power of his
+lungs:
+
+“To me! To me! Fortunio! Abdon! To me, you dogs! I am beset.”
+
+From the courtyard below rose an echo of his words, repeated in a shout
+by the sentinel, who had overheard them, and they caught the swift fall
+of the fellow’s feet as he ran for help. Furious, picturing to himself
+how the alarm would spread like a conflagration through the chateau,
+cursing his headstrong folly yet determined that Marius at least should
+not escape him, Garnache put forth his energies to hinder him from
+gaining the door that opened on to the stairs. From the doorway of the
+antechamber mademoiselle, with a white face and terrified eyes, watched
+the unequal combat and heard the shouts for help. Anon despair might
+whelm her at the thought of how they had lost their opportunity of
+escaping; but for the present she had no thought save for the life of
+that brave man who was defending himself with an unwieldy chair.
+
+Garnache leapt suddenly aside to take his opponent in the flank and
+thus turn him from his backward progress towards the outer door. The
+manoeuvre succeeded, and gradually, always defending himself, Garnache
+circled farther round him until he was between Marius and the threshold.
+
+And now there came a sound of running feet on the uneven stones of the
+courtyard. Light gleamed on the staircase, and breathless voices were
+wafted up to the two men. Garnache bethought him that his last hour was
+assuredly at hand. Well, if he must take his death, he might as well
+take it here upon Marius’s sword as upon another’s. So he would risk
+it for the sake of leaving upon Marius some token by which he might
+remember him. He swung his chair aloft, uncovering himself for a second.
+The young man’s sword darted in like a shaft of light. Nimbly Garnache
+stepped aside to avoid it, and moved nearer his opponent. Down crashed
+the chair, and down went Marius, stunned and bleeding, under its
+terrific blow. The sword clattered from his hand and rolled, with a
+pendulum-like movement, to the feet of Garnache.
+
+The Parisian flung aside his chair and stooped to seize that very
+welcome blade. He rose, grasping the hilt and gathering confidence from
+the touch of that excellently balanced weapon, and he swung round even
+as Fortunio and two of his braves appeared in the doorway.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII. HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+
+Never was there a man with a better stomach for a fight than Martin de
+Garnache, nor did he stop to consider that here his appetite in that
+direction was likely to be indulged to a surfeit. The sight of those
+three men opposing him, swords drawn and Fortunio armed in addition
+with a dagger, drove from his mind every other thought, every other
+consideration but that of the impending battle.
+
+He fell on guard to receive their onslaught, his eyes alert, his lips
+tight set, his knees like springs of steel, slightly flexed to support
+his well-poised body.
+
+But they paused a moment in the extremity of their surprise, and
+Fortunio called to him in Italian to know the meaning of this attitude
+of his as well as that of Marius, who lay huddled where he had fallen.
+
+Garnache, reckless now, disdaining further subterfuge nor seeking to
+have recourse to subtleties that could avail him nothing, retorted in
+French with the announcement of his true name. At that, perceiving that
+here was some deep treachery at work, they hesitated no longer.
+
+Led by Fortunio they attacked him, and the din they made in the next few
+minutes with their heavy breathing, their frequent oaths, their stamping
+and springing this way and that, and, ringing above all, the clash and
+clatter of sword on sword, filled the chamber and could be heard in the
+courtyard below.
+
+Minutes sped, yet they gained no advantage on this single man; not one,
+but a dozen swords did he appear to wield, so rapid were his passes, so
+ubiquitous his point. Had he but stood his ground there might have been
+a speedy end to him, but he retreated slowly towards the door of the
+antechamber. Valerie still stood there, watching with fearful eyes and
+bated breath that tremendous struggle which at any moment she expected
+to see terminate in the death of her only friend.
+
+In her way she was helping Garnache, though she little realized it. The
+six tapers in the candle-branch she held aloft afforded the only light
+for that stormy scene, and that light was in the eyes of Garnache’s
+assailants, showing him their faces yet leaving his own in shadow.
+
+He fell back steadily towards that door. He could not see it; but there
+was not the need. He knew that it was in a direct line with the one
+that opened upon the stairs, and by the latter he steered his backward
+course. His aim was to gain the antechamber, although they guessed it
+not, thinking that he did but retreat through inability to stand his
+ground. His reasons were that here in this guardroom the best he could
+do would be to put his back to the wall, where he might pick off one or
+two before they made an end of him. The place was too bare to suit
+his urgent, fearful need. Within the inner room there was furniture to
+spare, with which he might contrive to hamper his opponents and give
+them such a lusty fight as would live in the memory of those who might
+survive it for as long as they should chance to live thereafter.
+
+He had no thought of perishing himself, although, to any less concerned,
+his death, sooner or later, must seem inevitable--the only possible
+conclusion to this affray, taken as he was. His mind was concerned only
+with this fight; his business to kill, and not himself to be slain. He
+knew that presently others would come to support these three. Already,
+perhaps, they were on their way, and he husbanded his strength against
+their coming. He was proudly conscious of his own superior skill, for
+he had studied the art of fence in Italy--its home--during his earlier
+years, and there was no trick of sword-play with which he was not
+acquainted, no ruse of service in a rough-and-tumble in which he was
+unversed. He was proudly conscious, too, of his supple strength, his
+endurance, and his great length of reach, and upon all these he counted
+to help him make a decent fight.
+
+Valerie, watching him, guessed his purpose to be the gaining of the
+inner chamber, the crossing of the threshold on which she was standing.
+She drew back a pace or two, almost mechanically, to give him room. The
+movement went near to costing him his life. The light no longer falling
+so pitilessly upon Fortunio’s eyes, the captain saw more clearly than
+hitherto, and shot a swift, deadly stroke straight at the region of
+Garnache’s heart. The Parisian leapt back when it was within an inch of
+his breast; one of the bravoes followed up, springing a pace in advance
+of his companions and lengthening his arm in a powerful lunge. Garnache
+caught the blade almost on his hilt, and by the slightest turn of
+the wrist made a simultaneous presentment of his point at the other’s
+outstretched throat. It took the fellow just above the Adam’s apple, and
+with a horrid, gurgling cry he sank, stretched as he still was in the
+attitude of that murderous lunge that had proved fatal only to himself.
+
+Garnache had come on guard again upon the instant. Yet in the briefest
+of seconds during which his sword had been about its work of death,
+Fortunio’s rapier came at him a second time. He beat the blade aside
+with his bare left hand and stopped with his point the rush of the
+other bravo. Then he leapt back again, and his leap brought him to
+the threshold of the anteroom. He retreated quickly a pace, and then
+another. He was a sword’s length within the chamber, and now he stood,
+firm as a rock and engaged Fortunio’s blade which had followed him
+through the doorway. But he was more at his ease. The doorway was
+narrow. Two men abreast could not beset him, since one must cumber the
+movements of the other. If they came at him one at a time, he felt that
+he could continue that fight till morning, should there still by then be
+any left to face him.
+
+A wild exultation took him, an insane desire to laugh. Surely
+was sword-play the merriest game that was ever devised for man’s
+entertainment. He straightened his arm, and his steel went out like a
+streak of lightning. But for the dagger on which he caught its edge,
+the blade had assuredly pierced the captain’s heart. And now, fighting
+still, Garnache called to Valerie. He had need of her assistance to make
+his preparations ere others came.
+
+“Set down your tapers, mademoiselle,” he bade her, “on the mantel shelf
+at my back. Place the other candle branch there too.”
+
+Swiftly, yet with half-swimming senses, everything dim to her as to one
+in a nightmare, she ran to do his bidding; and now the light placed so
+at his back, gave him over his opponents the same slight advantage that
+he had enjoyed before. In brisk tones he issued his fresh orders.
+
+“Can you move the table, mademoiselle?” he asked her. “Try to drag it
+here, to the wall on my left, as close to the door as you can bring it.”
+
+“I will try, monsieur,” she panted through dry lips; and again she moved
+to do his bidding. Quickened by the need there was, her limbs, which
+awhile ago had seemed on the point of refusing their office, appeared to
+gather more than ordinary strength. She was unconsciously sobbing in her
+passionate anxiety to render him what help was possible. Frenziedly she
+caught at the heavy oaken table, and began to drag it across the room as
+Garnache had begged her. And now, Fortunio seeing what was toward, and
+guessing Garnache’s intentions, sought by a rush to force his way into
+the Chamber. But Garnache was ready for him. There was a harsh grind of
+steel on steel, culminating in a resounding rush, and Fortunio was back
+in the guard-room, whither he had leapt to save his skin. A pause fell
+at that, and Garnache lowered his point to rest his arm until they
+should again come at him. From beyond the doorway the captain called
+upon him to yield. He took the summons as an insult, and flew into a
+momentary passion.
+
+“Yield?” he roared. “Yield to you, you cut-throat scum? You shall have
+my sword if you will come for it, but you shall have it in your throat.”
+
+Angered in his turn, Fortunio inclined his head to his companion’s ear,
+issuing an order. In obedience to it, it was the bravo now who advanced
+and engaged Garnache. Suddenly he dropped on to his knees, and over his
+head Garnache found his blade suddenly opposed by Fortunio’s. It was a
+clever trick, and it all but did Garnache’s business then. Yet together
+with the surprise of it there came to him the understanding of what was
+intended. Under his guard the kneeling man’s sword was to be thrust up
+into his vitals. As a cry of alarm broke from mademoiselle, he leapt
+aside and towards the wall, where he was covered from Fortunio’s weapon,
+and turning suddenly he passed his sword from side to side through the
+body of the kneeling mercenary.
+
+The whole thing he had performed mechanically, more by instinct than
+by reason; and when it was done, and the tables were thus effectively
+turned upon his assailants, he scarcely realized how he had accomplished
+it.
+
+The man’s body cumbered now the doorway, and behind him Fortunio stood,
+never daring to advance lest a thrust of that sword which he could not
+see--Garnache still standing close against the wall--should serve him
+likewise.
+
+Garnache leaned there, in that friendly shelter, to breathe, and he
+smiled grimly under cover of his mustache. So long as he had to deal
+with a single assailant he saw no need to move from so excellent a
+position. Close beside him, leaning heavily against the table she had
+dragged thus far, stood Valerie, her face livid as death, her heart
+sick within her at the horror inspired her by that thing lying on the
+threshold. She could not take her eyes from the crimson stain that
+spread slowly on the floor, coming from under that limply huddled mass
+of arms and legs.
+
+“Do not look, mademoiselle,” Garnache implored her softly. “Be brave,
+child; try to be brave.”
+
+She sought to brace her flagging courage, and by an effort she averted
+her eyes from that horrid heap and fixed them upon Garnache’s calm,
+intrepid face. The sight of his quietly watchful eyes, his grimly
+smiling lips, seemed to infuse courage into her anew.
+
+“I have the table, monsieur,” she told him. “I can bring it no nearer to
+the wall.”
+
+He understood that this was not because her courage or her strength
+might be exhausted, but because he now occupied the spot where he had
+bidden her place it. He motioned her away, and when she had moved he
+darted suddenly and swiftly aside and caught the table, his sword still
+fast in his two first fingers, which he had locked over the quillons.
+He had pushed its massive weight halfway across the door before Fortunio
+grasped the situation. Instantly the captain sought to take advantage of
+it, thinking to catch Garnache unawares. But no sooner did he show his
+nose inside the doorpost than Garnache’s sword flashed before his eyes,
+driving him back with a bloody furrow in his cheek.
+
+“Have a care, Monsieur le Capitaine,” Garnache mocked him. “Had you come
+an inch farther it might have been the death of you.”
+
+A clatter of steps sounded upon the stairs, and the Parisian bent once
+more to his task, and thrust the table across the open doorway. He had a
+moment’s respite now, for Fortunio stung--though lightly--was not likely
+to come again until he had others to support him. And while the others
+came, while the hum of their voices rose higher, and finally their steps
+clattered over the bare boards of the guard-room floor, Garnache had
+caught up and flung a chair under the table to protect him from an
+attack from below, while he had piled another on top to increase and
+further strengthen the barricade.
+
+Valerie watched him agonizedly, leaning now against the wall, her hands
+pressed across her bosom, as if to keep down its tempestuous heaving.
+Yet her anguish was tempered by a great wonder and a great admiration of
+this man who could keep such calm eyes and such smiling lips in the face
+of the dreadful odds by which he was beset, in the face of the certain
+death that must ultimately reach him before he was many minutes older.
+And in her imagination she conjured up a picture of him lying there torn
+by their angry swords and drenched in blood, his life gone out of him,
+his brave spirit, quenched for ever--and all for her unworthy sake.
+Because she-- little, worthless thing that she was--would not marry
+as they listed, this fine, chivalrous soul was to be driven from its
+stalwart body.
+
+An agony of grief took her now, and she fell once more to those awful
+sobs that awhile ago had shaken her. She had refused to marry Marius
+that Florimond’s life should be spared, knowing that before Marius could
+reach him she herself would have warned her betrothed. Yet even had that
+circumstance not existed, she was sure that still she would have refused
+to do the will of Marius. But equally sure was she that she would not so
+refuse him were he now to offer as the price of her compliance the life
+of Garnache, which she accounted irrevocably doomed.
+
+Suddenly his steady, soothing voice penetrated her anguished musings.
+
+“Calm yourself, mademoiselle; all is far from lost as yet.”
+
+She thought that he but spoke so to comfort her; she did not follow the
+working of his warlike mind, concentrated entirely upon the business
+of the moment, with little thought--or care, for that matter--for what
+might betide anon. Yet she made an effort to repress her sobs. She
+would be brave, if only to show herself worthy of the companionship and
+friendship of so brave a man.
+
+Across his barricade he peered into the outer room to ascertain with
+what fresh opponents he might have to reckon, and he was surprised to
+see but four men standing by Fortunio, whilst behind them among the
+thicker shadows, he dimly made out a woman’s figure and, beside her,
+another man who was short and squat.
+
+He bethought him that the hour, and the circumstance that most of the
+mercenaries would be in their beds, accounted for the reinforcement not
+being greater.
+
+The woman moved forward, and he saw as he had suspected, that it was the
+Dowager herself. The squat figure beside her, moving with her into the
+shaft of light that fell from the doorway Garnache defended, revealed
+to him the features of Monsieur de Tressan. If any doubt he had still
+entertained concerning the Seneschal’s loyalty, that doubt was now
+dispelled.
+
+And now the Dowager uttered a sudden cry of fear. She had caught sight
+of the fallen Marius, and she hurried to his side. Tressan sped after
+her and between them they raised the boy and helped him to a chair,
+where he now sat, passing a heavy hand across his no doubt aching brow.
+Clearly he was recovering, from which Garnache opined with regret that
+his blow had been too light. The Dowager turned to Fortunio, who had
+approached her, and her eyes seemed to take fire at something that he
+told her.
+
+“Garnache?” the Parisian heard her say, and he saw Fortunio jerk his
+thumb in the direction of the barricade.
+
+She appeared to forget her son; she stepped suddenly from his side, and
+peered through the doorway at the stalwart figure of Garnache, dimly to
+be seen through the pile of furniture that protected him to the height
+of his breast. No word said she to the Parisian. She stood regarding him
+a moment with lips compressed and a white, startled, angry face. Then:
+
+“It was by Marius’s contrivance that he was placed sentry over the
+girl,” he heard her tell Fortunio, and he thought she sneered.
+
+She looked at the two bodies on the floor, one almost at her feet, the
+other just inside the doorway, now almost hidden in the shadows of the
+table. Then she issued her commands to the men, and fiercely she bade
+them pull down that barricade and take the dog alive.
+
+But before they could move to do her bidding, Garnache’s voice rang
+imperatively through the chamber.
+
+“A word with you ere they begin, Monsieur de Tressan,” he shouted, and
+such was the note of command he assumed that the men stood arrested,
+looking to the Dowager for fresh orders. Tressan changed colour, for
+all that there was surely naught to fear, and he fingered his beard
+perplexedly, looking to the Marquise for direction. She flashed him a
+glance, lifted one shoulder disdainfully, and to the men:
+
+“Fetch him out,” said she, and she pointed to Garnache. But again
+Garnache stayed them.
+
+“Monsieur de Tressan,” he called impressively, “to your dying day--and
+that will be none so distant--shall you regret it if you do not hear
+me.”
+
+The Seneschal was stirred by those words and the half-threat,
+half-warning; they seemed to cover. He paused a moment, and this time
+his eyes avoided the Marquise’s. At last, taking a step forward,
+
+“Knave,” said he, “I do not know you.”
+
+“You know me well enough. You have heard my name. I am Martin Marie
+Rigobert de Garnache, Her Majesty’s emissary into Dauphiny to procure
+the enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the Chateau de
+Condillac, where she is detained by force and for the serving of
+unscrupulous ends. Now you know me and my quality.”
+
+The Dowager stamped her foot.
+
+“Fetch him out!” she commanded harshly.
+
+“Hear me first, Monsieur le Seneschal, or it will be the worse for
+you.” And the Seneschal, moved by that confident promise of evil, threw
+himself before the men-at-arms.
+
+“A moment, I beseech you, Marquise,” he cried, and the men, seeing his
+earnestness and knowing his quality, stood undecided, buffeted as they
+were between his will and the Marquise’s. “What have you to say to me?”
+ Tressan demanded, seeking to render arrogant his tone.
+
+“This: That my servant knows where I am, and that should I fail within a
+very few days to come forth safe and sound from Condillac to rejoin
+him, he is to ride to Paris with certain letters I have given him. Those
+letters incriminate you to the full in this infamous matter here at
+Condillac. I have set forth in them how you refused me help, how you
+ignored the Queen’s commands of which I was the bearer; and should it be
+proved, in addition, that through your treachery and insubordination my
+life has been lost, I promise you that nothing in all this world will
+save you from a hanging.”
+
+“Never listen, monsieur,” cried the Dowager, seeing Tressan start back
+like a man in sudden fear. “It is no more than the ruse of a desperate
+man.”
+
+“Heed me or not, at your choice,” Garnache retorted, addressing himself
+ever to Tressan. “You have had your warning. I little thought to see you
+here to-night. But seeing you confirms my worst suspicions, and if I
+am to die, I can die easy in my conscience at the thought that in
+sacrificing you to Her Majesty’s wrath I have certainly not sacrificed
+an innocent man.”
+
+“Madame--” the Seneschal began, turning to the Dowager. But she broke in
+impatiently upon his intended words, upon the prayer that bubbled to his
+lips that she should pause a while ere she made an end of this Parisian.
+
+“Monsieur,” said she, “you may bargain with him when he is taken. We
+will have him alive. Go in,” she bade her men, her voice so resolute now
+that none dared tarry longer. “Fetch the knave out--alive.”
+
+Garnache smiled at mademoiselle as the words were uttered.
+
+“They want me alive,” said he. “That is a hopeful state of things. Bear
+up, child; I may need your help ere we are through.”
+
+“You shall find me ready, monsieur,” she assured him for all her
+tremors. He looked at the pale face, composed now by an effort of her
+will, and at the beautiful hazel eyes which strove to meet his with calm
+and to reflect his smile, and he marvelled at her courage as much as did
+she at his.
+
+Then the assault began, and he could have laughed at the way in which
+a couple of those cut-throats--neither wishing to have the honour of
+meeting him singly--hindered each other by seeking to attack him at
+once.
+
+At last the Dowager commanded one of them to go in. The fellow came,
+and he was driven back by the sword that darted at him from above the
+barricade.
+
+There matters might have come to a deadlock, but that Fortunio came
+forward with one of his men to repeat the tactics which had cost him
+a life already. His fellow went down on his knees, and drove his sword
+under the table and through the frame of the chair, seeking to prick
+Garnache in the legs. Simultaneously the captain laid hold of an arm
+of the chair above and sought to engage Garnache across it. The ruse
+succeeded to the extent of compelling the Parisian to retreat. The table
+seemed likely to be his undoing instead of helping him. He dropped like
+lightning to one knee, seeking to force the fellow out from underneath.
+But the obstacles which should have hindered his assailants hindered
+Garnache even more at this juncture. In that instant Fortunio whipped
+the chair from the table-top, and flung it forward. One of its legs
+caught Garnache on the sword arm, deadening it for a second. The sword
+fell from his hand, and Valerie shrieked aloud, thinking the battle
+at an end. But the next moment he was on his feet, his rapier firmly
+gripped once more, for all that his arm still felt a trifle numbed. As
+seconds passed the numbness wore away, but before that had taken place
+the table had been thrust forward, and the man beneath it had made it
+impossible for Garnache to hinder this. Suddenly he called to Valerie.
+
+“A cloak, mademoiselle! Get me a cloak!” he begged. And she, stemming
+her fears once more, ran to do his bidding.
+
+She caught up a cloak that lay on a chair by the door of her
+bed-chamber, and brought it to him. He twisted it twice round his left
+arm, letting its folds hang loose, and advanced again to try conclusions
+with the gentleman underneath. He cast the garment so that it enmeshed
+the sword when next it was advanced. Stepping briskly aside, he was up
+to the table, and his busy blade drove back the man who assailed him
+across it. He threw his weight against it, and thrust it back till it
+was jammed hard once more against the doorposts, leaving the chair at
+his very feet. The man beneath had recovered his sword by this, and
+again he sought to use it. That was the end of him. Again Garnache
+enmeshed it, kicked away the chair, or, rather, thrust it aside with his
+foot, stooped suddenly, and driving his blade under the table felt it
+sink into the body of his tormentor.
+
+There was a groan and a spluttering cough, and then before Garnache
+could recover he heard mademoiselle crying out to him to beware. The
+table was thrust suddenly forward almost on top of him; its edge caught
+his left shoulder, and sent him back a full yard, sprawling upon the
+ground.
+
+To rise again, gasping for air--for the fall had shaken him--was the
+work of an instant. But in that instant Fortunio had thrust the table
+clear of the doorway, and his men were pouring into the room.
+
+They came at Garnache in a body, with wild shouts and fierce mockery,
+and he hurriedly fell on guard and gave way before them until his
+shoulders were against the wainscot and he had at least the assurance
+that none could take him in the rear. Three blades engaged his own.
+Fortunio had come no farther than the doorway, where he stood his torn
+cheek drenched in blood, watching the scene the Marquise beside him, and
+Tressan standing just behind them, very pale and scared.
+
+Yet Garnache’s first thought even in that moment of dire peril was for
+Valerie. He would spare her the sight that must before many moments be
+spread to view within that shambles.
+
+“To your chamber, mademoiselle,” he cried to her. “You hinder me,” he
+added by way of compelling her obedience. She did his bidding, but only
+in part. No farther went she than the doorway of her room, where she
+remained standing, watching the fray as earlier she had stood and
+watched it from the door of the antechamber.
+
+Suddenly she was moved by inspiration. He had gained an advantage
+before, by retreating through a doorway into an inner room. Might he not
+do the same again, and be in better case if he were to retreat now to
+her own chamber? Impulsively she called to him.
+
+“In here, Monsieur de Garnache. In here.”
+
+The Marquise looked across at her, and smiled in mockery. Garnache was
+too well occupied, she thought, to attempt any such rashness. If he but
+dared remove his shoulders from the wall there would be a speedier end
+to him than as things were.
+
+Not so, however, thought Garnache. The cloak twisted about his left
+arm gave him some advantage, and he used it to the full. He flicked
+the slack of it in the face of one, and followed it up by stabbing the
+fellow in the stomach before he could recover guard, whilst with another
+wave of that cloak he enmeshed the sword that shot readily into the
+opening he had left.
+
+Madame cursed, and Fortunio echoed her imprecations. The Seneschal
+gasped, his fears lost in amazement at so much valour and dexterity.
+
+Garnache swung away from the wall now, and set his back to mademoiselle,
+determined to act upon her advice. But even in that moment he asked
+himself for the first time since the commencement of that carnage--to
+what purpose? His arms were growing heavy with fatigue, his mouth was
+parched, and great beads of perspiration stood upon his brow. Soon he
+would be spent, and they would not fail to take a very full advantage of
+it.
+
+Hitherto his mind had been taken up with the battle only, and if he
+had thought of retreating, it was but to the end that he might gain a
+position of some vantage. Now, conscious of his growing fatigue, his
+thoughts turned them at last to the consideration of flight. Was there
+no way out of it? Must he kill every man in Condillac before he could
+hope to escape?
+
+Whimsically, and almost mechanically, he set himself, in his mind,
+to count the men. There were twenty mercenaries all told, excluding
+Fortunio and himself. On Arsenio he might rely not to attack him,
+perhaps even to come to his assistance at the finish. That left
+nineteen. Four he had already either killed outright or effectively
+disabled; so that fifteen remained him. The task of dealing with those
+other fifteen was utterly beyond him. Presently, no doubt, the two now
+opposing him would be reinforced by others. So that if any possible way
+out existed, he had best set about finding it at once.
+
+He wondered could he cut down these two, make an end of Fortunio, and,
+running for it, attempt to escape through the postern before the rest of
+the garrison had time to come up with him or guess his purpose. But the
+notion was too wild, its accomplishment too impossible.
+
+He was fighting now with his back to mademoiselle and his face to the
+tall window, through the leaded panes of which he caught the distorted
+shape of a crescent moon. Suddenly the idea came to him. Through that
+window must lie his way. It was a good fifty feet above the moat, he
+knew, and if he essayed to leap it, it must be an even chance that he
+would be killed in leaping. But the chance of death was a certain one
+if he tarried where he was until others came to support his present
+opponents. And so he briskly determined upon the lesser risk.
+
+He remembered that the window was nailed down, as it had remained since
+mademoiselle’s pretended attempt at flight. But surely that should prove
+no formidable obstacle.
+
+And now that his resolve was taken his tactics abruptly changed.
+Hitherto he had been sparing of his movements, husbanding his strength
+against the long battle that seemed promised him. Suddenly he assumed
+the offensive where hitherto he had but acted in self-defence, and a
+most deadly offensive was it. He plied his cloak, untwisting it from his
+arm and flinging it over the head and body of one of his assailants, so
+that he was enmeshed and blinded by it. Leaping to the fellow’s flank,
+Garnache, with a terrific kick, knocked his legs from under him so that
+he fell heavily. Then, stooping suddenly, the Parisian ran his blade
+under the other brave’s guard and through the fellow’s thigh. The man
+cried out, staggered, and then went down utterly disabled.
+
+One swift downward thrust Garnache made at the mass that wriggled
+under his cloak. The activity of its wriggles increased in the next few
+seconds, then ceased altogether.
+
+Tressan felt wet from head to foot with a sweat provoked by horror of
+what he saw. The Dowager’s lips were pouring forth a horrid litany
+of guard-room oaths, and meanwhile Garnache had swung round to meet
+Fortunio, the last of all who had stood with him.
+
+The captain came on boldly, armed with sword and dagger, and in that
+moment, feeling himself spent, Garnache bitterly repented having
+relinquished his cloak. Yet he made a stubborn fight, and whilst
+they fenced and stamped about that room, Marius came to watch them,
+staggering to his mother’s side and leaning heavily upon Tressan’s
+shoulder. The Marquise turned to him, her face livid to the lips.
+
+“That man must be the very fiend,” Garnache heard her tell her son. “Run
+for help, Tressan, or, God knows, he may escape us yet. Go for men, or
+we shall have Fortunio killed as well. Bid them bring muskets.”
+
+Tressan, moving like one bereft of wits, went her errand, while the two
+men fought on, stamping and panting, circling and lunging, their breath
+coming in gasps, their swords grinding and clashing till sparks leapt
+from them.
+
+The dust rose up to envelop and almost choke them, and more than once
+they slipped in the blood with which the floor was spattered, whilst
+presently Garnache barely recovered and saved himself from stumbling
+over the body of one of his victims against which his swiftly moving
+feet had hurtled.
+
+And the Dowager, who watched the conflict and who knew something of
+sword-play, realized that, tired though Garnache might be, unless
+help came soon or some strange chance gave the captain the advantage,
+Fortunio would be laid low with the others.
+
+His circling had brought the Parisian round, so that his back was now to
+the window, his face to the door of the bedchamber, where mademoiselle
+still watched in ever-growing horror. His right shoulder was in line
+with the door of the antechamber, which madame occupied, and he never
+saw her quit Marius’s side and creep slyly into the room to speed
+swiftly round behind him.
+
+The only one from whom he thought that he might have cause to fear
+treachery was the man whom he had dropped with a thigh wound, and he was
+careful to keep beyond the reach of any sudden sword-thrust from that
+fellow.
+
+But if he did not see the woman’s movements, mademoiselle saw them,
+and the sight set her eyes dilating with a new fear. She guessed the
+Dowager’s treacherous purpose. And no sooner had she guessed it than,
+with a choking sob, she told herself that what madame could do that
+could she also.
+
+Suddenly Garnache saw an opening; Fortunio’s eyes, caught by the
+Dowager’s movements, strayed for a moment past his opponent, and the
+thing would have been fatal to the captain but that in that moment,
+as Garnache was on the point of lunging, he felt himself caught from
+behind, his arms pinioned to his sides by a pair of slender ones that
+twined themselves about him, and over his shoulder, the breath of it
+fanning his hot cheek, came a vicious voice--
+
+“Stab now, Fortunio!”
+
+The captain asked nothing better. He raised his weary sword-arm and
+brought his point to the level of Garnache’s breast, but in that instant
+its weight became leaden. Imitating the Marquise, Valerie had been in
+time. She seized Fortunio’s half-lifted arm and flung all her weight
+upon it.
+
+The captain cursed her horridly in a frenzy of fear, for he saw that
+did Garnache shake off the Marquise there would be an end of himself. He
+sought to wrench himself free of her detaining grasp, and the exertion
+brought him down, weary as he was, and with her weight hanging to him.
+He sank to his knees, and the girl, still clinging valiantly, sank with
+him, calling to Garnache that she held the captain fast.
+
+Putting forth all his remaining strength, the Parisian twisted from the
+Dowager’s encircling grasp and hurled her from him with a violence he
+nowise intended.
+
+“Yours, madame, are the first woman’s arms that ever Martin de Garnache
+has known,” said he. “And never could embrace of beauty have been less
+welcome.”
+
+Panting, he caught up one of the overturned chairs. Holding it by the
+back he made for the window. He had dropped his sword, and he called
+to mademoiselle to hold the captain yet an instant longer. He swung his
+chair aloft and dashed it against the window. There was a thundering
+crash of shivered glass and a cool draught of that November night came
+to sweeten the air that had been fouled by the stamping of the fighters.
+
+Again he swung up his chair and dashed it at the window, and yet again,
+until no window remained, but a great, gaping opening with a fringe of
+ragged glass and twisted leadwork.
+
+In that moment Fortunio struggled to his feet, free of the girl, who
+sank, almost in a swoon. He sprang towards Garnache. The Parisian turned
+and flung his now shattered chair toward the advancing captain. It
+dropped at his feet, and his flying shins struck against an edge of
+it, bringing him, hurt and sprawling, to the ground. Before he could
+recover, a figure was flying through the open gap that lately had been a
+window.
+
+Mademoiselle sat up and screamed.
+
+“You will be killed, Monsieur de Garnache! Dear God, you will be
+killed!” and the anguish in her voice was awful.
+
+It was the last thing that reached the ears of Monsieur de Garnache as
+he tumbled headlong through the darkness of the chill November night.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. IN THE MOAT
+
+Fortunio and the Marquise reached the window side by side, and they were
+in time to hear a dull splash in the waters fifty feet below them. There
+was a cloud over the little sickle of moon, and to their eyes, fresh
+from the blaze of candle-light, the darkness was impenetrable.
+
+“He is in the moat,” cried the Marquise excitedly, and Valerie, who sat
+on the floor whither she had slipped when Fortunio shook her off, rocked
+herself in an agony of fear.
+
+To the horrors about her--the huddled bodies lying so still upon the
+floor, the bloody footprints everywhere, the shattered furniture,
+and the groans of the man with the wounded thigh--to all this she was
+insensible. Garnache was dead, she told herself; he was surely dead; and
+it seemed as if the very thought of it were killing, too, a part of her
+own self.
+
+Unconsciously she sobbed her fears aloud. “He is dead,” she moaned; “he
+is dead.”
+
+The Marquise overheard that piteous cry, and turned to survey the girl,
+her brows lifting, her lips parting in an astonishment that for a second
+effaced the horrors of that night. Suspicion spread like an oil stain
+in her evil mind. She stepped forward and caught the girl by one of her
+limp arms. Marius, paler than his stunning had left him, leaned more
+heavily against the door-post, and looked on with bloodshot eyes.
+If ever maiden avowed the secret of her heart, it seemed to him that
+Valerie avowed it then.
+
+The Marquise shook her angrily.
+
+“What was he to you, girl? What was he to you?” she demanded shrilly.
+
+And the girl, no more than half conscious of what she was saying, made
+answer:
+
+“The bravest gentleman, the noblest friend I have ever known.”
+
+Pah! The Dowager dropped her arm and turned to issue a command to
+Fortunio. But already the fellow had departed. His concern was not with
+women, but with the man who had escaped him. He must make certain that
+the fall had killed Garnache.
+
+Breathless and worn as he was, all spattered now with blood from the
+scratch in his cheek, which lent him a terrific aspect, he dashed
+from that shambles and across the guard-room. He snatched up a lighted
+lantern that had been left in the doorway and leapt down the stairs
+and into the courtyard. Here he came upon Monsieur de Tressan with a
+half-dozen fellows at his heels, all more or less half clad, but all
+very fully armed with swords and knives, and one or two with muskets.
+
+Roughly, with little thought for the dignity of his high office, he
+thrust the Lord Seneschal aside and turned the men. Some he ordered off
+to the stables to get horses, for if Garnache had survived his leap and
+swum the moat, they must give chase. Whatever betide, the Parisian must
+not get away. He feared the consequences of that as much for himself as
+for Condillac. Some five or six of the men he bade follow him, and never
+pausing to answer any of Tressan’s fearful questions, he sped across
+the courtyard, through the kitchens--which was the nearest way--into the
+outer quadrangle. Never pausing to draw breath, spent though he was, he
+pursued his flight under the great archway of the keep and across the
+drawbridge, the raising of which had been that night postponed to await
+the Lord Seneschal’s departure.
+
+Here on the bridge he paused and turned in a frenzy to scream to his
+followers that they should fetch more torches. Meanwhile he snatched the
+only one at hand from the man-at-arms that carried it.
+
+His men sprang into the guard-room of the keep, realizing from his
+almost hysterical manner the urgent need for haste. And while he waited
+for them, standing there on the bridge, his torch held high, he scanned
+by its lurid red light the water as far as eye could reach on either
+side of him.
+
+There was a faint movement on the dark, oily surface for all that no
+wind stirred. Not more than four or five minutes could have elapsed
+since Garnache’s leap, and it would seem as if the last ripple from the
+disturbance of his plunge had not yet rolled itself out. But otherwise
+there was nothing here, nor did Fortunio expect aught. The window of the
+Northern Tower abutted on to the other side of the chateau, and it was
+there he must look for traces of the fugitive or for his body.
+
+“Hasten!” he shouted over his shoulder. “Follow me!” And without waiting
+for them he ran across the bridge and darted round the building, his
+torch scattering a shower of sparks behind him on the night, and sending
+little rills of blood-red light down the sword which he still carried.
+
+He gained the spot where Garnache must have fallen, and he stood below
+the radiance that clove the night from the shattered window fifty feet
+above, casting the light of his torch this way and that over the
+black bosom of the moat. Not a ripple moved now upon that even, steely
+surface. Voices sounded behind him, and with them a great glare of
+ruddy light came to herald the arrival of his men. He turned to them and
+pointed with his sword away from the chateau.
+
+“Spread yourselves!” he shouted. “Make search yonder. He cannot have
+gone far.”
+
+And they, but dimly realizing whom they sought, yet realizing that they
+sought a man, dashed off and spread themselves as he had bidden them,
+to search the stretch of meadowland, where ill must betide any fugitive,
+since no cover offered.
+
+Fortunio remained where he was at the edge of the moat. He stooped,
+and waving his torch along the ground he moved to the far angle of the
+chateau, examining the soft, oozy clay. It was impossible that a man
+could have clambered out over that without leaving some impression. He
+reached the corner and found the clay intact; at least, nowhere could
+he discover a mark of hands or a footprint set as would be that of a man
+emerging from the water.
+
+He retraced his steps and went back until he had reached the eastern
+angle of the chateau, yet always with the same result. He straightened
+himself at last, and his manner was more calm; his frenzied haste was
+gone, and deliberately he now raised his torch and let its light shine
+again over the waters. He pondered them a moment, his dark eyes musing
+almost regretfully.
+
+“Drowned!” he said aloud, and sheathed his sword.
+
+From the window overhead a voice hailed him. He looked up and saw the
+Dowager, and, behind her, the figure of her son. Away in the meadows
+the lights of his men’s torches darted hither and thither like playful
+jack-o’-lanterns.
+
+“Have you got him, Fortunio?”
+
+“Yes, madame,” he answered with assurance. “You may have his body when
+you will. He is underneath here.” And he pointed to the water.
+
+They appeared to take his word for it, for they questioned him no
+further. The Marquise turned to mademoiselle, who was still sitting on
+the floor.
+
+“He is drowned, Valerie,” she said slowly, watching the girl’s face.
+
+Valerie looked up. Her eyes were very wide, and her lips moved for a
+second. Then she fell forward without a word. This last horror, treading
+on the heels of all those that already had assailed her, proved too
+great a strain for her brave spirit. She had swooned.
+
+Tressan entered at that moment, full of questions as to what might be
+toward, for he had understood nothing in the courtyard. The Marquise
+called to him to help her with the girl, Marius being still too faint,
+and between them they bore her to her chamber, laid her on the bed, and,
+withdrawing, closed the door upon her. Then she signed to Marius and the
+Seneschal.
+
+“Come,” she said; “let us go. The sight and smell of the place are
+turning me sick, although my stomach is strong enough to endure most
+horrors.”
+
+She took up one of the candle-branches to light them, and they went
+below and made their way to the hall, where they found Marius’s page,
+Gaston, looking very pale and scared at the din that had filled the
+chateau during the past half-hour or so. With him was Marius’s hound,
+which the poor boy had kept by him for company and protection in that
+dreadful time.
+
+The Marquise spoke to him kindly, and she stooped to pat the dog’s
+glossy head. Then she bade Gaston set wine for them, and when it was
+fetched the three of them drank in brooding, gloomy silence.
+
+The draught invigorated Marius, it cheered Tressan’s drooping spirits,
+and it quenched the Dowager’s thirst. The Seneschal turned to her
+again with his unanswered questions touching the end of that butchery
+above-stairs. She told him what Fortunio had said that Garnache was
+drowned as a consequence of his mad leap from the window.
+
+Into Tressan’s mind there sprang the memory of the thing Garnache had
+promised should befall him in such a case. It drove the colour from his
+cheeks and brought great lines of fearful care into sharp relief about
+his mouth and eyes.
+
+“Madame, we are ruined!” he groaned.
+
+“Tressan,” she answered him contemptuously, “you are chicken-hearted.
+Listen to me. Did he not say that he had left his man behind him when he
+came to Condillac? Where think you that he left his man?”
+
+“Maybe in Grenoble,” answered the Seneschal, staring.
+
+“Find out,” she told him impressively, her eyes on his, and calm as
+though they had never looked upon such sights as that very night had
+offered them. “If not in Grenoble, certainly, at least, somewhere in
+this Dauphiny of which you are the King’s Lord Seneschal. Turn the whole
+province inside out, man, but find the fellow. Yours is the power to
+do it. Do it, then, and you will have no consequences to fear. You have
+seen the man?”
+
+“Ay, I have seen him. I remember him; and his name, I bethink me, is
+Rabecque.”
+
+He took courage; his face looked less dejected.
+
+“You overlook nothing, madame,” he murmured. “You are truly wonderful.
+I will start the search this very night. My men are almost all at
+Montelimar awaiting my commands. I’ll dispatch a messenger with orders
+that they are to spread themselves throughout Dauphiny upon this quest.”
+
+The door opened, and Fortunio entered. He was still unwashed and
+terrible to look upon, all blood-bespattered. The sight of him drove a
+shudder through Tressan. The Marquise grew solicitous.
+
+“How is your wound, Fortunio?” was her first question.
+
+He made a gesture that dismissed the matter.
+
+“It is nothing. I am over full-blooded, and if I am scratched, I bleed,
+without perceiving it, enough to drain another man.”
+
+“Here, drink, mon capitaine,” she urged him, very friendly, filling
+him a cup with her own hands. “And you, Marius?” she asked. “Are you
+recovering strength?”
+
+“I am well,” answered Marius sullenly. His defeat that evening had
+left him glum and morose. He felt that he had cut a sorry figure in the
+affair, and his vanity was wounded. “I deplore I had so little share in
+the fight,” he muttered.
+
+“The lustiest fight ever I or any man beheld,” swore Fortunio. “Dieu!
+But he was a fighter, that Monsieur de Garnache, and he deserved a
+better end than drowning.”
+
+“You are quite sure that he is drowned?”
+
+Fortunio replied by giving his reasons for that conclusion, and they
+convinced both the Marquise and her son indeed they had never deemed
+it possible that the Parisian could have survived that awful leap. The
+Dowager looked at Marius, and from him to the captain.
+
+“Do you think, you two, that you will be fit for tomorrow’s business?”
+
+“For myself,” laughed Fortunio, “I am ready for it now.”
+
+“And I shall be when I have rested,” answered Marius grimly.
+
+“Then get you both to rest, you will be needing it,” she bade them.
+
+“And I, too, madame,” said the Seneschal, bending over the hand she held
+out to him. “Good-night to you all.” He would have added a word to wish
+them luck in the morrow’s venture; but for the life of him he dared not.
+He turned, made another of his bows, and rolled out of the room.
+
+Five minutes later the drawbridge was being raised after his departure,
+and Fortunio was issuing orders to the men he had recalled from their
+futile search to go clear the guard-room and antechamber of the Northern
+Tower, and to bear the dead to the chapel, which must serve as a
+mortuary for the time. That done he went off to bed, and soon after the
+lights were extinguished in Condillac; and save for Arsenio, who was, on
+guard, sorely perturbed by all that had befallen and marvelling at the
+rashness of his friend “Battista”--for he had no full particulars of the
+business--the place was wrapped in sleep.
+
+Had they been less sure that Garnache was drowned, maybe they had
+slumbered less tranquilly that night at Condillac. Fortunio had been
+shrewd in his conclusions, yet a trifle hasty; for whilst, as a matter
+of fact, he was correct in assuming that the Parisian had not
+crawled out of the moat--neither at the point he had searched, nor
+elsewhere--yet was he utterly wrong to assume him at the bottom of it.
+
+Garnache had gone through that window prepared to leap into
+another--and, he hoped, a better world. He had spun round twice in the
+air and shot feet foremost through the chill waters of the moat, and
+down until his toes came in contact with a less yielding substance, yet
+yielding nevertheless. Marvelling that he should have retained until now
+his senses, he realized betimes that he was touching mud--that he was
+really ankle deep in it. A vigorous, frantic kick with both legs at once
+released him, and he felt himself slowly re-ascending to the surface.
+
+It has been often said that a drowning man in his struggles sees his
+whole life mirrored before him. In the instants of Garnache’s ascent
+through the half stagnant waters of that moat he had reviewed the entire
+situation and determined upon the course he should pursue. When he
+reached the surface, he must see to it that he broke it gently, for at
+the window above were sure to be watchers, looking to see how he had
+fared. Madame, he remembered, had sent Tressan for muskets. If he had
+returned with them and they should perceive him from above, a bullet
+would be sent to dispose of him, and it were a pity to be shot now after
+having come through so much.
+
+His head broke the surface and emerged into the chill darkness of the
+night. He took a deep breath of cold but very welcome air, and moving
+his arms gently under water, he swam quietly, not to the edge of the
+moat but to the chateau wall, close under which he thought he would be
+secure from observation. He found by good fortune a crevice between two
+stones; he did not see it, his fingers found it for him as they groped
+along that granite surface. He clung there a moment and pondered the
+situation. He heard voices above, and looking up he saw the glare of
+light through the opening he had battered.
+
+And now he was surprised to feel new vigour running through him. He had
+hurled himself from that window with scarce the power to leap, bathed in
+perspiration and deeming his strength utterly spent. The ice-cold waters
+of the moat had served, it would seem, to brace him, to wash away his
+fatigue, and to renew his energies. His mind was singularly clear and
+his senses rendered superacute, and he set himself to consider what he
+had best do.
+
+Swim to the edge of the moat and, clambering out, take to his legs was
+naturally the first impulse. But, reflecting upon the open nature of the
+ground, he realized that that must mean his ruin. Presently they would
+come to see how he had fared, and failing to find him in the water they
+would search the country round about. He set himself in their place. He
+tried to think as they would think, the better that he might realize
+how they would act, and then an idea came to him that might be worth
+heeding. In any case his situation was still very desperate; on that
+score he allowed himself no illusions. That they would take his drowning
+for granted, and never come to satisfy themselves, he was not optimist
+enough to assume.
+
+He abandoned his grip of the wall and began to swim gently toward the
+eastern angle. If they came out, they must lower the bridge; he would
+place himself so that in falling it should cover him and screen him from
+their sight. He rounded the angle of the building, and now the friendly
+cloud that had hung across the moon moved by, and a faint, silver
+radiance was upon the water under his eyes. But yonder, ahead of him,
+something black lay athwart the moat. At once he knew it for the bridge.
+It was down. And he had the explanation in that he remembered that the
+Lord Seneschal had not yet left Condillac. It mattered little to him one
+way or the other. The bridge was there, and he made the best of it.
+
+A few swift, silent strokes brought him to it. He hesitated a moment
+before venturing into the darkness underneath; then, bethinking him that
+it was that or discovery, he passed under. He made for the wall, and as
+he groped along he found a chain depending and reaching down into the
+water. He caught at it with both hands and hung by it to await events.
+
+And now, for the first time that night, his pulses really quickened.
+There in the dark he waited, and the moments that sped seemed very long
+to him, and they were very anxious. He had no good sword wherewith to
+defend himself were he attacked, no good, solid ground on which to take
+his stand. If he were discovered, he was helpless, at their mercy, to
+shoot, or take, or beat to death as best they listed. And so he waited,
+his pulses throbbing, his breath coming short and fast. The cold water
+that had invigorated him some minutes ago was numbing him now, and
+seemed to be freezing his courage as it froze the blood in his veins,
+the very marrow in his bones.
+
+Presently his ears caught a rush of feet, a sound of voices, and
+Fortunio’s raised above the others. Heavy steps rang on the bridge
+over his head, and the thud of their fall was like thunder to the man
+beneath. A crimson splash of light fell on the moat on either side of
+him. The fellow on the bridge had halted. Then the steps went on. The
+light flared this way and that, and Garnache almost trembled, expecting
+at every moment that its rays would penetrate the spot where he was
+hanging and reveal him cowering there like a frightened water-rat. But
+the man moved on, and his light flared no longer.
+
+Then others followed him. Garnache heard the sounds of their search. So
+overwrought was he that there was a moment when he thought of swimming
+to the edge and making across the country to the north while they were
+hunting the meadows to the east; but he repressed the impulse and stayed
+on. An eternity did it seem before those men returned and marched once
+more over his head. A further eternity was it until the clatter of
+hoofs on the courtyard stones and their thunder on the planks above him
+brought him the news that Tressan was riding home. He heard the hoofs
+quicken, and their loud rattle on the road that led down to the Isere,
+a half-mile away; and then, when the hoof-beats grew more distant, there
+came again the echo of voices up above.
+
+Was it not over yet? Dear God! would it never end? He felt that a few
+moments more of this immersion and he should be done for utterly; his
+numbness must rob him of the power to cross the moat.
+
+Suddenly the first welcome sound he had heard that night came to his
+ears. Chains creaked, hinges groaned, and the great black pall above
+him began gradually to rise. Faster it went, till, at last, it fell back
+into position, flat with the wall of the chateau, and such little light
+as there was from the moon was beating down upon his frozen face.
+
+He let the chain go, and, with strokes swift and silent as he could
+contrive, he crossed the water. He clambered up the bank, almost bereft
+of strength. A moment he crouched there listening. Had he moved too
+soon? Had he been incautious?
+
+Nothing stirred behind him to confirm his fears. He crept softly
+across the hard ground of the road where he had landed. Then, when the
+yielding, silent turf was under his feet, he gave not another thought
+for his numbness, but started to run as a man runs in a nightmare, so
+little did the speed of his movements match the pace of his desire to
+set a distance between himself and Condillac.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX. THROUGH THE NIGHT
+
+It wanted something over an hour to midnight when Monsieur de Garnache
+started out in his sodden clothes to run from Condillac. He bore away to
+the north, and continued running until he had covered a mile or so, when
+perforce he must slacken his pace lest presently he should have to give
+way to utter exhaustion. He trudged on bravely thereafter, at a good,
+swinging pace, realizing that in moving briskly lay his salvation from
+such ill effects as might otherwise attend his too long immersion. His
+run had set a pleasant glow upon his skin and seemed to have thawed the
+frozen condition of his joints. Yet he could not disguise from himself
+that he was sorely worn by that night’s happenings, and that, if he
+would reach his goal, he must carefully husband such strength as yet
+remained him.
+
+That goal of his was Voiron, some four leagues distant to the north,
+where, at the inn of the Beau Paon, his man, Rabecque, should be lodged,
+ready for his coming at any time. Once already, when repairing to
+Condillac, he had travelled by that road, and it was so direct that
+there seemed scant fear of his mistaking it. On he plodded through the
+night, his way lighted for him by the crescent moon, the air so still
+that, despite his wet garments, being warmed as he was by his brisk
+movements, he never felt the cold of it.
+
+He had overheard enough of what had been said by Marius to Valerie to
+understand the business that was afoot for the morrow, and he doubted
+him that he had not sufficiently injured the Dowager’s son to make him
+refrain from or adjourn his murderous ride across the border into Savoy.
+
+Garnache’s purpose now was to reach Voiron, there to snatch a brief
+rest, and then, equipped anew to set out with his man for La Rochette
+and anticipate the fell plans of Marius and Fortunio.
+
+He might have experienced elation at his almost miraculous escape and at
+the circumstance that he was still at large to carry this duel with the
+Condillacs to a fitting finish, were it not for the reflection that but
+for his besetting sin of hastiness he might now be travelling in dry
+garments toward La Rochette, with mademoiselle beside him. Once again
+that rash temper of his had marred an enterprise that was on the point
+of succeeding. And yet, even as he regretted his rashness, rage stirred
+him again at the thought of Marius crushing that slender shape against
+him and seeking to force his odious kisses upon her pure, immaculate
+lips. And then the thought of her, left behind at Condillac at the
+mercy of Marius and that she-devil the Marquise, and the fears that of
+a sudden leapt up in his mind, brought him to a standstill, as though he
+were contemplating the incomparable folly of a return. He beat his hands
+together for a moment in a frenzy of anguish; he threw back his head
+and raised his eyes to the sky above with a burst of imprecations on his
+lips. And then reflection brought him peace. No, no; they dare offer
+her no hurt. To do so must irrevocably lose them La Vauvraye; and it was
+their covetousness had made them villains. Upon that covetousness did
+their villainy rest, and he need fear from them no wanton ruthlessness
+that should endanger their chance of profit.
+
+He trudged on, reassured. He had been a fool so to give way to fear; as
+great a fool as he had been when he had laid hands on Marius to quell
+his excessive amorousness. Dieu! Was he bewitched? What ailed him? Again
+he paused there in the night to think the situation out.
+
+A dozen thoughts, all centering about Valerie, came crowding in upon
+his brain, till in the end a great burst of laughter--the laughter of a
+madman almost, eerie and terrific as it rang upon the silent night broke
+from his parted lips. That brief moment of introspection had revealed
+him to himself, and the revelation had fetched that peal of mocking
+laughter from him.
+
+He realized now, at last, that not because the Queen had ordered him to
+procure Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye’s enlargement had he submitted
+to assume a filthy travesty, to set his neck in jeopardy, to play
+the lackey and the spy. It was because something in Valerie’s eyes,
+something in her pure, lily face had moved him to it; and simultaneously
+had come the thought of the relation in which she stood to that man at
+La Rochette whose life he now sought to save for her, and it had stabbed
+him with a bitterness no misfortune, no failure yet had brought him.
+
+He trudged on, knowing himself for what he was a fool who, after close
+upon forty years of a strenuous life in which no petticoat had played a
+part, was come under the spell of a pair of innocent eyes belonging to a
+child almost young enough to have been his daughter.
+
+He despised himself a little for his weakness; he despised himself for
+his apostasy from the faith that had governed his life--the faith to
+keep himself immune from the folly to which womanhood had driven so many
+a stout man.
+
+And yet, mock himself, despise himself as he would, a great tenderness,
+a great desire grew strong in his soul that night as he trudged on
+toward distant Voiron. Mile after mile her image kept him company, and
+once, when he had left Voreppe behind him, the greater portion of his
+journey done, some devil whispered in his ear that he was weary; that
+he would be over-weary on the morrow for any ride to La Rochette. He had
+done all that mortal man could do; let him rest to-morrow whilst Marius
+and Fortunio accomplished by Florimond what the fever had begun.
+
+A cold perspiration broke on him as he wrestled with that grim
+temptation. Valerie was his; she belonged to him by the right of dangers
+shared; never had mother in her labours been nearer death for the
+offspring’s sake than had he for Valerie during the days that were sped
+and the hours that were but gone. She belonged to him by the title of
+those dangers he had been through. What had Florimond done to establish
+his claim to her? He had remained absent during long years, a-warring in
+a foreign land. With how many banal loves might not the fellow in that
+time have strewn his soldier’s path! Garnache knew well how close does
+Cupid stalk in the wake of Mars, knew well the way of these gay soldiers
+and the lightness of their loves.
+
+Was, then, this fellow to come now and claim her, when perils were past,
+when there was naught left to do but lead her to the altar? Could he be
+worthy of such a pearl of womanhood, this laggard who, because a fever
+touched him, sat him down in an inn within a few hours’ ride of her to
+rest him, as though the world held no such woman as Valerie?
+
+And she, herself, by what ties was she bound to him? By the ties of an
+old promise, given at an age when she knew not what love meant. He
+had talked of it with her, and he knew how dispassionately she awaited
+Florimond’s return. Florimond might be betrothed to her--her father and
+his had encompassed that between them--but no lover of hers was he.
+
+Thus far did his thoughts journey, and temptation gripped him ever more
+and more strongly. And then his manhood and his honour awoke with a
+shudder, as awakens a man from an ugly dream. What manner of fool was
+he? he asked himself again. Upon what presumptions did he base his silly
+musings? Did he suppose that even were there no Florimond, it would be
+left for a harsh, war-worn old greybeard such as he to awaken tenderness
+in the bosom of that child? The tenderness of friendship perhaps--she
+had confessed to that; but the tenderness of her sweet love must be won
+by a younger, comelier man.
+
+If love had indeed touched him at last, let him be worthy of it and of
+her who inspired it. Let him strain every sinew in her service, asking
+no guerdon; let him save the life of the man to whom she was affianced;
+let him save her from the clutches of the Marquise de Condillac and her
+beautiful, unscrupulous son.
+
+He put his folly from him and-went on, seeking to hold his mind to the
+planning of his to-morrow’s journey and its business. He had no means to
+know that at that very hour Valerie was on her knees by her little white
+bed, in the Northern Tower of Condillac, praying for the repose of the
+soul of Monsieur de Garnache--the bravest gentleman, the noblest friend
+she had ever known. For she accounted him dead, and she thought with
+horror of his body lying in the slime under the cold waters of the moat
+beneath the window of her antechamber. A change seemed to have come upon
+her. Her soul was numb, her courage seemed dead, and little care had she
+in that hour of what might betide her now.
+
+Florimond was coming, she remembered: coming to wed her. Ah, well! It
+mattered little, since Monsieur de Garnache was dead--as though it could
+have mattered had he been living!
+
+Three hours of his long striding brought Garnache at last to Voiron, and
+the echo of his footsteps rang through the silent streets and scared a
+stray cat or two that were preying out of doors. There was no watch
+in the little township and no lights, but by the moon’s faint glimmer
+Garnache sought the inn of the Beau Paon, and found it at the end of a
+little wandering. A gaudy peacock, with tail spread wide, was the sign
+above the door on which he thumped and kicked as if he would have beaten
+it down.
+
+It opened after some delay, and a man, half clad, candle in hand, a
+night-cap on his hoary locks, showed an angry face at the opening.
+
+At sight of the gaunt, bedraggled figure that craved admittance, the
+landlord would have shut the door again, fearing that he had to do with
+some wild bandit from the hills. But Garnache thrust his foot in the
+way.
+
+“There is a man named Rabecque, from Paris, lodging here. I must have
+instant speech with him,” said he; and his words, together with the
+crisp, commanding tones in which they were uttered, had their effect
+upon the host.
+
+Rabecque had been playing the great lord during the week he had spent
+at Voiron, and had known how to command a certain deference and regard.
+That this tatterdemalion, with the haughty voice, should demand to see
+him at that hour of the night, with such scant unconcern of how far
+he might incommode the great Monsieur Rabecque, earned for him too a
+certain measure of regard, though still alloyed with some suspicion.
+
+The landlord bade him enter. He did not know whether Monsieur Rabecque
+would forgive him for being disturbed; he could not say whether Monsieur
+Rabecque would consent to see this visitor at such an hour; very
+probably he would not. Still, monsieur might enter.
+
+Garnache cut him short before he had half done, announced his name
+and bade him convey it to Rabecque. The alacrity with which the lackey
+stirred from his bed upon hearing who it was that had arrived impressed
+the host not a little, but not half so much as it impressed him
+presently to observe the deference with which this great Monsieur
+Rabecque of Paris confronted the scarecrow below stairs when he was
+brought into its presence.
+
+“You are safe and sound, monsieur?” he cried, in deferential joy.
+
+“Aye, by a miracle, mon fils,” Garnache answered him, with a short
+laugh. “Help me to bed; then bring me a cup of spiced wine. I have swum
+a moat and done other wonders in these clothes.”
+
+The host and Rabecque bustled now to minister to his wants between them,
+and when, jaded and worn, Garnache lay at last between good-smelling
+sheets with the feeling in him that he was like to sleep until the day
+of judgment, he issued his final orders.
+
+“Awake me at daybreak, Rabecque,” said he drowsily. “We must be stirring
+then. Have horse ready and clothes for me. I shall need you to wash me
+clean and shave me and make me what I was before your tricks and dyes
+turned me into what I have been this week and more. Take away the light.
+At daybreak! Don’t let me sleep beyond that as you value your place with
+me. We shall have brisk work to-morrow. At--daybreak--Rabecque!”
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX. FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+
+It was noon of the next day when two horsemen gained the heights above
+La Rochette and paused to breathe their nags and take a survey of the
+little township in the plain at their feet. One of these was Monsieur
+de Garnache, the other was his man Rabecque. But it was no longer the
+travestied Garnache that Condillac had known as “Battista” during the
+past days, it was that gentleman as he had been when first he presented
+himself at the chateau. Rabecque had shaved him, and by means of certain
+unguents had cleansed his skin and hair of the dyes with which he had
+earlier overlaid them.
+
+That metamorphosis, of itself, was enough to set Garnache in a good
+humour; he felt himself again, and the feeling gave him confidence.
+His mustachios bristled as fiercely as of old, his skin was clear and
+healthy, and his dark brown hair showed ashen at the temples. He
+was becomingly arrayed in a suit of dark brown camlet, with rows of
+close-set gold buttons running up his hanging sleeves; a leather jerkin
+hid much of his finery, and his great boots encased his legs. He wore a
+brown hat, with a tallish crown and a red feather, and Rabecque carried
+his cloak for him, for the persistent Saint Martin’s summer rendered
+that day of November rather as one of early autumn.
+
+A flood of sunshine descended from a cloudless sky to drench the country
+at their feet, and all about them the trees preserved a green that was
+but little touched by autumnal browning.
+
+Awhile he paused there on the heights; then he gave his horse a touch
+of the spur, and they started down the winding road that led into La
+Rochette. A half-hour later they were riding under the porte cochere of
+the inn of the Black Boar. Of the ostler who hastened forward to take
+their reins Monsieur de Garnache inquired if the Marquis de Condillac
+were lodged there. He was answered in the affirmative, and he got down
+at once from his horse. Indeed, but for the formality of the thing, he
+might have spared himself the question, for lounging about the
+courtyard were a score of stalwart weather-tanned fellows, whose air and
+accoutrements proclaimed them soldiers. It required little shrewdness
+to guess in them the personal followers of the Marquis, the remainder of
+the little troop that had followed the young seigneur to the wars when,
+some three years ago, he had set out from Condillac.
+
+Garnache gave orders for the horses to be cared for, and bade Rabecque
+get himself fed in the common room. Heralded by the host, the Parisian
+then mounted the stairs to Monsieur de Condillac’s apartments.
+
+The landlord led the way to the inn’s best room, turned the handle, and,
+throwing wide the door, stood aside for Monsieur de Garnache to enter.
+
+From within the chamber came the sounds of a scuffle, a man’s soft
+laugh, and a girl’s softer intercession.
+
+“Let me go, monsieur. Of your pity, let me go. Some one is coming.”
+
+“And what care I who comes?” answered a voice that seemed oppressed by
+laughter.
+
+Garnache strode into the chamber--spacious and handsomely furnished as
+became the best room of the Auberge du Sanglier Noir--to find a meal
+spread on the table, steaming with an odour promising of good things,
+but neglected by the guest for the charms of the serving-wench, whose
+waist he had imprisoned. As Garnache’s tall figure loomed before him he
+let the girl go and turned a half-laughing, half-startled face upon the
+intruder.
+
+“Who the devil may you be?” he inquired, and a brown eye, rakish and
+roving in its glance, played briskly over the Parisian, whilst Garnache
+himself returned the compliment, and calmly surveyed this florid
+gentleman of middle height with the fair hair and regular features.
+
+The girl scurried by and darted from the room, dodging the smiting hand
+which the host raised as she flew past him. The Parisian felt his gorge
+rising. Was this the sort of fever that had kept Monsieur le Marquis at
+La Rochette, whilst mademoiselle was suffering in durance at Condillac?
+His last night’s jealous speculations touching a man he did not know had
+leastways led him into no exaggeration. He found just such a man as he
+had pictured--a lightly-loving, pleasure-taking roysterer, with never a
+thought beyond the amusement which the hour afforded him.
+
+With curling lip Garnache bowed stiffly, and in a cold, formal voice he
+announced himself.
+
+“My name is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache. I am an emissary
+dispatched from Paris by her Majesty the Queen-mother to procure the
+enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the durance in which she
+is held by madame your stepmother.”
+
+The pleasant gentleman’s eyebrows went up; a smile that was almost
+insolent broke on his face.
+
+“That being so, monsieur, why the devil are you here?”
+
+“I am here, monsieur,” answered him Garnache, throwing back his head,
+his nostrils quivering, “because you are not at Condillac.”
+
+The tone was truculent to the point of defiance, for despite the firm
+resolve he had taken last night never again to let his temper overmaster
+him, already Garnache’s self-control was slipping away.
+
+The Marquis noted the tone, and observed the man. In their way he
+liked both; in their way he disliked both. But he clearly saw that this
+peppery gentleman must be treated less cavalierly, or trouble would come
+of it. So he waved him gracefully to the table, where a brace of flagons
+stood amid the steaming viands.
+
+“You will dine with me, monsieur,” said he, the utmost politeness
+marking his utterance now. “I take it that since you have come here in
+quest of me you have something to tell me. Shall we talk as we eat? I
+detest a lonely meal.”
+
+The florid gentleman’s tone and manner were mollifying in the extreme.
+Garnache had risen early and ridden far; the smell of the viands had
+quickened an appetite already very keen; moreover, since he and this
+gentleman were to be allies, it was as well they should not begin by
+quarrelling.
+
+He bowed less stiffly, expressed his willingness and his thanks, laid
+hat and whip and cloak aside, unbuckled and set down his sword, and,
+that done, took at table the place which his host himself prepared him.
+
+Garnache took more careful stock of the Marquis now. He found much to
+like in his countenance. It was frank and jovial; obviously that of
+a sensualist, but, leastways, an honest sensualist. He was dressed
+in black, as became a man who mourned his father, yet with a striking
+richness of material, whilst his broad collar of fine point and the lace
+cuffs of his doublet were worth a fortune.
+
+What time they ate Monsieur de Garnache told of his journey from Paris
+and of his dealings with Tressan and his subsequent adventures at
+Condillac. He dwelt passingly upon the manner in which they had treated
+him, and found it difficult to choose words to express the reason for
+his returning in disguise to play the knight-errant to Valerie. He
+passed on to speak of last night’s happenings and of his escape.
+Throughout, the Marquis heard him with a grave countenance and a sober,
+attentive glance, yet, when he had finished a smile crept round the
+sensual lips.
+
+“The letter that I had at Milan prepared me for some such trouble as
+this,” said he, and Garnache was amazed at the lightness of his tone,
+just as he had been amazed to see the fellow keep his countenance at
+the narrative of mademoiselle’s position. “I guessed that my beautiful
+stepmother intended me some such scurviness from the circumstance of her
+having kept me in ignorance of my father’s death. But frankly, sir, your
+tale by far outstrips my wildest imaginings. You have behaved very--very
+bravely in this affair. You seem, in fact, to have taken a greater
+interest in Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye’s enlargement than the Queen
+could have a right to expect of you.” And he smiled, a world of
+suggestion in his eyes. Garnache sat back in his chair and stared at the
+man.
+
+“This levity, monsieur, on such a subject, leaves me thunderstruck,” he
+said at last.
+
+“Diable!” laughed the other. “You are too prone, after your trials; to
+view its tragic rather than its comic side. Forgive me if I am smitten
+only with the humour of the thing.”
+
+“The humour of the thing!” gurgled Garnache, his eyes starting from his
+head. Then out leapt that temper of his like an eager hound that has
+been suddenly unleashed. He brought down his clenched hand upon the
+table, caught in passing a flagon, and sent it crashing to the floor. If
+there was a table near at hand when his temper went, he never failed to
+treat it so.
+
+“Par la mort Dieu! monsieur, you see but the humour of it, do you? And
+what of that poor child who is lying there, suffering this incarceration
+because of her fidelity to a promise given you?”
+
+The statement was hardly fully accurate. But it served its purpose. The
+other’s face became instantly, grave.
+
+“Calm yourself, I beg, monsieur,” he cried, raising a soothing hand. “I
+have offended you somewhere; that is plain. There is something here that
+I do not altogether understand. You say that Valerie has suffered on
+account of a promise given me? To what are you referring?”
+
+“They hold her a prisoner, monsieur, because they wish to wed her to
+Marius,” answered Garnache, striving hard to cool his anger.
+
+“Parfaitement! That much I understood.”
+
+“Well, then, monsieur, is the rest not plain? Because she is betrothed
+to you--” He paused. He saw, at last, that he was stating something not
+altogether accurate. But the other took his meaning there and then, lay
+back in his chair, and burst out laughing.
+
+The blood hummed through Garnache’s head as he tightened his lips and
+watched this gentleman indulge his inexplicable mirth. Surely Monsieur
+de Condillac was possessed of the keenest sense of humour in all France.
+He laughed with a will, and Garnache sent up a devout prayer that the
+laugh might choke him. The noise of it filled the hostelry.
+
+“Sir,” said Garnache, with an ever-increasing tartness, “there is a
+by-word has it ‘Much laughter, little wit.’ In confidence won, is that
+your case, monsieur?”
+
+The other looked at him soberly a moment, then went off again.
+
+“Monsieur, monsieur!” he gasped, “you’ll be the death of me. For the
+love of Heaven look less fierce. Is it my fault that I must laugh? The
+folly of it all is so colossal. Three years from home, yet there is
+a woman keeps faithful and holds to a promise given for her. Come,
+monsieur, you who have seen the world, you must agree that there is in
+this something that is passing singular, extravagantly amusing. My poor
+little Valerie!” he spluttered through his half-checked mirth, “does she
+wait for me still? does she count me still betrothed to her? And because
+of that, says ‘No’ to brother Marius! Death of my life! I shall die of
+it.”
+
+“I have a notion that you may, monsieur,” rasped Garnache’s voice, and
+with it rasped Garnache’s chair upon the boards. He had risen, and he
+was confronting his merry host very fiercely, white to the lips, his
+eyes aflame. There was no mistaking his attitude, no mistaking his
+words.
+
+“Eh?” gasped the other, recovering himself at last to envisage what
+appeared to develop into a serious situation.
+
+“Monsieur,” said Garnache, his voice very cold, “do I understand that
+you no longer intend to carry out your engagement and wed Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye?”
+
+A dull flush spread upon the Marquis’s face. He rose too, and across the
+table he confronted his guest, his mien haughty, his eyes imperious.
+
+“I thought, monsieur,” said he, with a great dignity, “I thought when
+I invited you to sit at my table that your business was to serve me,
+however little I might be conscious of having merited the honour. It
+seems instead that you are come hither to affront me. You are my guest,
+monsieur. Let me beg that you will depart before I resent a question on
+a matter which concerns myself alone.”
+
+The man was right, and Garnache was wrong. He had no title to take up
+the affairs of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But he was past reason now,
+and he was not the man to brook haughtiness, however courteously it
+might be cloaked. He eyed the Marquis’s flushed ace across the board,
+and his lip curled.
+
+“Monsieur,” said he, “I take your meaning very fully. Half a word with
+me is as good as a whole sentence with another. You have dubbed me
+in polite phrases an impertinent. That I am not; and I resent the
+imputation.”
+
+“Oh, that!” said the Marquis, with a half-laugh and a shrug. “If you
+resent it--” His smile and his gesture made the rest plain.
+
+“Exactly, monsieur,” was Garnache’s answer. “But I do not fight sick
+men.”
+
+Florimond’s brows grew wrinkled, his eyes puzzled.
+
+“Sick men!” he echoed. “Awhile ago, monsieur, you appeared to cast a
+doubt upon my sanity. Is it a case of the drunkard who thinks all the
+world drunk but himself?”
+
+Garnache gazed at him. That doubt he had entertained grew now into
+something like assurance.
+
+“I know not whether it is the fever makes your tongue run so--” he
+began, when the other broke in, a sudden light of understanding in his
+eyes.
+
+“You are at fault,” he cried. “I have no fever.”
+
+“But then your letter to Condillac?” demanded Garnache, lost now in
+utter amazement.
+
+“What of it? I’ll swear I never said I had a fever.”
+
+“I’ll swear you did.”
+
+“You give me the lie, then?”
+
+But Garnache waved his hands as if he implored the other, to have
+done with giving and taking offence. There was some misunderstanding
+somewhere, he realized, and sheer astonishment had cooled his anger. His
+only aim now was to have this obscure thing made clear.
+
+“No, no,” he cried. “I am seeking enlightenment.”
+
+Florimond smiled.
+
+“I may have said that we were detained by a fever; but I never said the
+patient was myself.”
+
+“Who then? Who else?” cried Garnache.
+
+“Why, now I understand, monsieur. But it is my wife who has the fever.”
+
+“Your--!” Garnache dared not trust himself to utter the word.
+
+“My wife, monsieur,” the Marquis repeated. “The journey proved too much
+for her, travelling at the rate she did.”
+
+A silence fell. Garnache’s long chin sank on to his breast, and he stood
+there, his eyes upon the tablecloth, his thoughts with the poor innocent
+child who waited at Condillac, so full of trust and faith and loyalty to
+this betrothed of hers who had come home with a wife out of Italy.
+
+And then, while he stood so and Florimond was regarding him curiously,
+the door opened, and the host appeared.
+
+“Monsieur le Marquis,” said he, “there are two gentlemen below asking to
+see you. One of them is Monsieur Marius de Condillac.”
+
+“Marius?” cried the Marquis, and he started round with a frown.
+
+“Marius?” breathed Garnache, and then, realizing that the assassins
+had followed so close upon his heels, he put all thoughts from his mind
+other than that of the immediate business. He had, himself, a score
+to settle with them. The time was now. He swung round on his heel, and
+before he knew what he had said the words were out:
+
+“Bring them up, Monsieur l’Hote.”
+
+Florimond looked at him in surprise.
+
+“Oh, by all means, if monsieur wishes it,” said he, with a fine irony.
+
+Garnache looked at him, then back at the hesitating host.
+
+“You have heard,” said he coolly. “Bring them up.”
+
+“Bien, monsieur,” replied the host, withdrawing and closing the door
+after him.
+
+“Your interference in my affairs grows really droll, monsieur,” said the
+Marquis tartly.
+
+“When you shall have learned to what purpose I am interfering, you’ll
+find it, possibly, not quite so droll,” was the answer, no less tart.
+“We have but a moment, monsieur. Listen while I tell you the nature of
+their errand.”
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+
+Garnache had but a few minutes in which to unfold his story, and he
+needed, in addition, a second or two in which to ponder the situation as
+he now found it.
+
+His first reflection was that Florimond, since he was now married, might
+perhaps, instead of proving Valerie’s saviour from Marius, join forces
+with his brother in coercing her into this alliance with him. But
+from what Valerie herself had told him he was inclined to think more
+favourably of Florimond and to suppress such doubts as these. Still
+he could incur no risks; his business was to serve Valerie and Valerie
+only; to procure at all costs her permanent liberation from the power
+of the Condillacs. To make sure of this he must play upon Florimond’s
+anger, letting him know that Marius had journeyed to La Rochette for the
+purpose of murdering his half-brother. That he but sought to murder
+him to the end that he might be removed from his path to Valerie, was
+a circumstance that need not too prominently be presented. Still,
+presented it must be, for Florimond would require to know by what
+motive his brother was impelled ere he could credit him capable of such
+villainy.
+
+Succinctly, but tellingly, Garnache brought out the story of the plot
+that had been laid for Florimond’s assassination, and it joyed him to
+see the anger rising in the Marquis’s face and flashing from his eyes.
+
+“What reason have they for so damnable a deed?” he cried, between
+incredulity and indignation.
+
+“Their overweening ambition. Marius covets Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye’s
+estates.”
+
+“And to gain his ends he would not stop at murdering me? Is it, indeed,
+the truth you tell me?”
+
+“I pledge my honour for the truth of it,” answered Garnache, watching
+him closely. Florimond looked at him a moment. The steady glance of
+those blue eyes and the steady tone of that crisp voice scattered his
+last doubt.
+
+“The villains!” cried the Marquis. “The fools!” he added. “For me,
+Marius had been welcome to Valerie. He might have found in me an ally
+to aid him in the urging of his suit. But now--” He raised his clenched
+hand and shook it in the air, as if in promise of the battle he would
+deliver.
+
+“Good,” said Garnache, reassured. “I hear their steps upon the stairs.
+They must not find me with you.”
+
+A moment later the door opened, and Marius, very bravely arrayed,
+entered the room, followed closely by Fortunio. Neither showed much ill
+effects of last night’s happenings, save for a long dark-brown scar that
+ran athwart the captain’s cheek, where Garnache’s sword had ploughed it.
+
+They found Florimond seated quietly at table, and as they entered he
+rose and came forward with a friendly smile to greet his brother. His
+sense of humour was being excited; he was something of an actor, and the
+role he had adopted in the comedy to be played gave him a certain grim
+satisfaction. He would test for himself the truth of what Monsieur
+de Garnache had told him concerning his brother’s intentions. Marius
+received his advances very coolly. He took his brother’s hand, submitted
+to his brother’s kiss; but neither kiss nor hand-pressure did he return.
+Florimond affected not to notice this.
+
+“You are well, my dear Marius, I hope,” said he, and thrusting him
+out at arms’ length, he held him by the shoulders and regarded him
+critically. “Ma foi, but you are changed into a comely well-grown man.
+And your mother--she is well, too, I trust.”
+
+“I thank you, Florimond, she is well,” said Marius stiffly.
+
+The Marquis took his hands from his brother’s shoulders; his florid,
+good-natured face smiling ever, as if this were the happiest moment of
+his life.
+
+“It is good to see France again, my dear Marius,” he told his brother.
+“I was a fool to have remained away so long. I am pining to be at
+Condillac once more.”
+
+Marius eyeing him, looked in vain for signs of the fever. He had
+expected to find a debilitated, emaciated man; instead, he saw a very
+lusty, healthy, hearty fellow, full of good humour, and seemingly
+full of strength. He began to like his purpose less, despite such
+encouragement as he gathered from the support of Fortunio. Still, it
+must be gone through with.
+
+“You wrote us that you had the fever,” he said, half inquiringly.
+
+“Pooh! That is naught.” And Florimond snapped a strong finger against
+a stronger thumb. “But whom have you with you?” he asked, and his eyes
+took the measure of Fortunio, standing a pace or two behind his master.
+
+Marius presented his bravo.
+
+“This is Captain Fortunio, the commander of our garrison of Condillac.”
+
+The Marquis nodded good-humouredly towards the captain.
+
+“Captain Fortunio? He is well named for a soldier of fortune. My
+brother, no doubt, will have family matters to tell me of. If you will
+step below, Monsieur le Capitaine, and drink a health or so while you
+wait, I shall be honoured.”
+
+The captain, nonplussed, looked at Marius, and Florimond surprised the
+look. But Marius’s manner became still chillier.
+
+“Fortunio here,” said he, and he half turned and let his hand fall on
+the captain’s shoulder, “is my very good friend. I have no secrets from
+him.”
+
+The instant lift of Florimond’s eyebrows was full of insolent,
+supercilious disdain. Yet Marius did not fasten his quarrel upon that.
+He had come to La Rochette resolved that any pretext would serve his
+turn. But the sight of his brother so inflamed his jealousy that he had
+now determined that the quarrel should be picked on the actual ground in
+which it had its roots.
+
+“Oh, as you will,” said the Marquis coolly. “Perhaps your friend will
+be seated, and you, too, my dear Marius.” And he played the host to them
+with a brisk charm. Setting chairs, he forced them to sit, and pressed
+wine upon them.
+
+Marius cast his hat and cloak on the chair where Garnache’s had been
+left. The Parisian’s hat and cloak, he naturally assumed to belong to
+his brother. The smashed flagon and the mess of wine upon the floor
+he scarce observed, setting it down to some clumsiness, either his
+brother’s or a servant’s. They both drank, Marius in silence, the
+captain with a toast.
+
+“Your good return, Monsieur le Marquis,” said he, and Florimond thanked
+him by an inclination of the head. Then, turning to Marius:
+
+“And so,” he said, “you have a garrison at Condillac. What the devil
+has been taking place there? I have had some odd news of you. It would
+almost seem as if you were setting up as rebels in our quiet little
+corner of Dauphiny.”
+
+Marius shrugged his shoulders; his face suggested that he was
+ill-humoured.
+
+“Madame the Queen-Regent has seen fit to interfere in our concerns. We
+Condillacs do not lightly brook interference.”
+
+Florimond showed his teeth in a pleasant smile.
+
+“That is true, that is very true, Pardieu! But what warranted this
+action of Her Majesty’s?”
+
+Marius felt that the time for deeds was come. This fatuous conversation
+was but a futile waste of time. He set down his glass, and sitting back
+in his chair he fixed his sullen black eyes full upon his half-brother’s
+smiling brown ones.
+
+“I think we have exchanged compliments enough,” said he, and Fortunio
+wagged his head approvingly. There were too many men in the courtyard
+for his liking, and the more time they waited, the more likely were they
+to suffer interruption. Their aim must be to get the thing done quickly,
+and then quickly to depart before an alarm could be raised. “Our trouble
+at Condillac concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.”
+
+Florimond started forward, with a ready assumption of lover-like
+solicitude.
+
+“No harm has come to her?” he cried. “Tell me that no harm has come to
+her.”
+
+“Reassure yourself,” answered Marius, with a sneer, a greyness that
+was of jealous rage overspreading his face. “No harm has come to her
+whatever. The trouble was that I sought to wed her, and she, because
+she is betrothed to you, would have none of me. So we brought her to
+Condillac, hoping always to persuade her. You will remember that she was
+under my mother’s tutelage. The girl, however, could not be constrained.
+She suborned one of our men to bear a letter to Paris for her, and
+in answer to it the Queen sent a hot-headed, rash blunderer down to
+Dauphiny to procure her liberation. He lies now at the bottom of the
+moat of Condillac.”
+
+Florimond’s face had assumed a look of horror and indignation.
+
+“Do you dare tell me this?” he cried.
+
+“Dare?” answered Marius, with an ugly laugh. “Men enough have died over
+this affair already. That fellow Garnache left some bodies on our hands
+last night before he set out for another world himself. You little dream
+how far my daring goes in this matter. I’ll add as many more as need
+be to the death roll that we have already, before you set foot in
+Condillac.”
+
+“Ah!” said Florimond, as one upon whose mind a light breaks suddenly.
+“So, that is the business on which you come to me. I doubted your
+brotherliness, I must confess, my dear Marius. But tell me, brother
+mine, what of our father’s wishes in this matter? Have you no respect
+for those?”
+
+“What respect had you?” flashed back Marius, his voice now raised in
+anger. “Was it like a lover to remain away for three years--to let all
+that time go by without ever a word from you to your betrothed? What
+have you done to make good your claim to her?”
+
+“Nothing, I confess; yet--”
+
+“Well, you shall do something now,” exclaimed Marius, rising. “I am here
+to afford you the opportunity. If you would still win Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye, you shall win her from me--at point of sword. Fortunio, see to
+the door.”
+
+“Wait, Marius!” cried Florimond, and he looked genuinely aghast. “Do not
+forget that we are brothers, men of the same blood; that my father was
+your father.”
+
+“I choose to remember rather that we are rivals,” answered Marius, and
+he drew his rapier. Fortunio turned the key in the lock. Florimond gave
+his brother a long searching look, then with a sigh he picked up his
+sword where it lay ready to his hand and thoughtfully unsheathed it.
+Holding the hilt in one hand and the blade in the other he stood,
+bending the weapon like a whip, whilst again he searchingly regarded his
+brother.
+
+“Hear me a moment,” said he. “If you will force this unnatural quarrel
+upon me, at least let the thing be decently done. Not here, not in these
+cramped quarters, but out in the open let our meeting take place. If the
+captain, there, will act for you, I’ll find a friend to do me the like
+service.”
+
+“We settle this matter here and now,” Marius answered him, in a tone of
+calm finality.
+
+“But if I were to kill you--” Florimond began.
+
+“Reassure yourself,” said Marius with an ugly smile.
+
+“Very well, then; either alternative will suit the case I wish to put.
+If you were to kill me--it may be ranked as murder. The irregularity of
+it could not be overlooked.”
+
+“The captain, here, will act for both of us.”
+
+“I am entirely at your service, gentlemen,” replied Fortunio pleasantly,
+bowing to each in turn.
+
+Florimond considered him. “I do not like his looks,” he objected. “He
+may be the friend of your bosom, Marius; you may have no secrets from
+him; but for my part, frankly, I should prefer the presence of some
+friend of my own to keep his blade engaged.”
+
+The Marquis’s manner was affable in the extreme. Now that it was settled
+that they must fight, he appeared to have cast aside all scruples based
+upon their consanguinity, and he discussed the affair with the greatest
+bonhomie, as though he were disposing of a matter of how they should sit
+down to table.
+
+It gave them pause. The change was too abrupt. They did not like it.
+It was as the calm that screens some surprise. Yet it was impossible he
+should have been forewarned; impossible he could have had word of how
+they proposed to deal with him.
+
+Marius shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“There is reason in what you say,” he acknowledged; “but I am in haste.
+I cannot wait while you go in search of a friend.”
+
+“Why then,” he answered, with a careless laugh, “I must raise one from
+the dead.”
+
+Both stared at him. Was he mad? Had the fever touched his brain?
+Was that healthy colour but the brand of a malady that rendered him
+delirious?
+
+“Dieu! How you stare!” he continued, laughing in their faces. “You shall
+see something to compensate you for your journey, messieurs. I have
+learnt some odd tricks in Italy; they are a curious people beyond the
+Alps. What did you say was the name of the man the Queen had sent from
+Paris?--he who lies at the bottom of the moat of Condillac?”
+
+“Let there be an end to this jesting,” growled Marius. “On guard,
+Monsieur le Marquis!”
+
+“Patience! patience!” Florimond implored him. “You shall have your way
+with me, I promise you. But of your charity, messieurs, tell me first
+the name of that man.”
+
+“It was Garnache,” said Fortunio, “and if the information will serve
+you, it was I who slew him.”
+
+“You?” cried Florimond. “Tell me of it, I beg you.”
+
+“Do you fool us?” questioned Marius in a rage that overmastered his
+astonishment, his growing suspicion that here all was not quite as it
+seemed.
+
+“Fool you? But no. I do but wish to show you something that I learned in
+Italy. Tell me how you slew him, Monsieur le Capitaine.”
+
+“I think we are wasting time,” said the captain, angry too. He felt that
+this smiling gentleman was deriding the pair of them; it crossed his
+mind that for some purpose of his own the Marquis was seeking to gain
+time. He drew his sword.
+
+Florimond saw the act, watched it, and his eyes twinkled. Suddenly
+Marius’s sword shot out at him. He leapt back beyond the table, and
+threw himself on guard, his lips still wreathed in their mysterious
+smile.
+
+“The time has come, messieurs,” said he. “I should have preferred to
+know more of how you slew that Monsieur de Garnache; but since you deny
+me the information, I shall do my best without it. I’ll try to conjure
+up his ghost, to keep you entertained, Monsieur le Capitaine.” And then,
+raising his voice, his sword, engaging now his brother’s:
+
+“Ola, Monsieur de Garnache!” he cried. “To me!”
+
+And then it seemed to those assassins that the Marquis had been neither
+mad nor boastful when he had spoken of strange things he had
+learned beyond the Alps, or else it was they themselves were turned
+light-headed, for the doors of a cupboard at the far end of the room
+flew open suddenly, and from between them stepped the stalwart figure of
+Martin de Garnache, a grim smile lifting the corners of his mustachios,
+a naked sword in his hand flashing back the sunlight that flooded
+through the window.
+
+They paused, aghast, and they turned ashen; and then in the mind of each
+arose the same explanation of this phenomenon. This Garnache wore the
+appearance of the man who had announced himself by that name when he
+came to Condillac a fortnight ago. Then, the sallow, black-haired knave
+who had last night proclaimed himself as Garnache in disguise was some
+impostor. That was the conclusion they promptly arrived at, and however
+greatly they might be dismayed by the appearance of this ally of
+Florimond’s, yet the conclusion heartened them anew. But scarce had they
+arrived at it when Monsieur de Garnache’s crisp voice came swiftly to
+dispel it.
+
+“Monsieur le Capitaine,” it said, and Fortunio shivered at the sound,
+for it was the voice he had heard but a few hours ago, “I welcome the
+opportunity of resuming our last night’s interrupted sword-play.” And he
+advanced deliberately.
+
+Marius’s sword had fallen away from his brother’s, and the two
+combatants stood pausing. Fortunio without more ado made for the door.
+But Garnache crossed the intervening space in a bound.
+
+“Turn!” he cried. “Turn, or I’ll put my sword through your back. The
+door shall serve you presently, but it is odds that it will need a
+couple of men to bear you through it. Look to your dirty skin!”
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+
+A couple of hours after the engagement in the Marquis de Condillac’s
+apartments at the Sanglier Noir at La Rochette, Monsieur de Garnache,
+attended only by Rabecque, rode briskly into France once more and made
+for the little town of Cheylas, which is on the road that leads down to
+the valley of the Isere and to Condillac. But not as far as the township
+did he journey. On a hill, the slopes all cultivated into an opulent
+vineyard, some two miles east of Cheylas, stood the low, square grey
+building of the Convent of Saint Francis. Thither did Monsieur de
+Garnache bend his horse’s steps. Up the long white road that crept
+zigzag through the Franciscans’ vineyards rode the Parisian and his
+servant under the welcome sunshine of that November afternoon.
+
+Garnache’s face was gloomy and his eyes sad, for his thoughts were all
+of Valerie, and he was prey to a hundred anxieties regarding her.
+
+They gained the heights at last, and Rabecque got down to beat with his
+whip upon the convent gates.
+
+A lay-brother came to open, and in reply to Garnache’s request that he
+might have a word with the Father Abbot, invited him to enter.
+
+Through the cloisters about the great quadrangle, where a couple of
+monks, their habits girt high as their knees, were busy at gardeners’
+work, Garnache followed his conductor, and up the steps to the Abbot’s
+chamber.
+
+The master of the Convent of Saint Francis of Cheylas a tall, lean
+man with an ascetic face, prominent cheekbones, and a nose not unlike
+Garnache’s own--the nose of a man of action rather than of prayer--bowed
+gravely to this stalwart stranger, and in courteous accents begged to be
+informed in what he might serve him.
+
+Hat in hand, Garnache took a step forward in that bare, scantily
+furnished little room, permeated by the faint, waxlike odour that is
+peculiar to the abode of conventuals. Without hesitation he stated the
+reason of his visit.
+
+“Father,” said he, “a son of the house of Condillac met his end this
+morning at La Rochette.”
+
+The monk’s eyes seemed to quicken, as though his interest in the outer
+world had suddenly revived.
+
+“It is the Hand of God,” he cried. “Their evil ways have provoked at
+last the anger of Heaven. How did this unfortunate meet his death?”
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“De mortuis nil nisi bonum,” said he. His air was grave, his blue eyes
+solemn, and the Abbot had little cause to suspect the closeness with
+which that pair of eyes was watching him. He coloured faintly at
+the implied rebuke, but he inclined his head as if submissive to the
+correction, and waited for the other to proceed.
+
+“There is the need, Father, to give his body burial,” said Garnache
+gently.
+
+But at that the monk raised his head, and a deeper flush the flush of
+anger--spread now upon his sallow cheeks. Garnache observed it, and was
+glad.
+
+“Why do you come to me?” he asked.
+
+“Why?” echoed Garnache, and there was hesitancy now in his voice. “Is
+not the burial of the dead enjoined by Mother Church? Is it not a part
+of your sacred office?”
+
+“You ask me this as you would challenge my reply,” said the monk,
+shaking his head. “It is as you say, but it is not within our office to
+bury the impious dead, nor those who in life were excommunicate and died
+without repentance.”
+
+“How can you assume he died without repentance?”
+
+“I do not; but I assume he died without absolution, for there is no
+priest who, knowing his name, would dare to shrive him, and if one
+should do it in ignorance of his name and excommunication, why then it
+is not done at all. Bid others bury this son of the house of Condillac;
+it matters no more by what hands or in what ground he be buried than if
+he were the horse he rode or the hound that followed him.”
+
+“The Church is very harsh, Father,” said Garnache sternly.
+
+“The Church is very just,” the priest answered him, more sternly still,
+a holy wrath kindling his sombre eyes.
+
+“He was in life a powerful noble,” said Garnache thoughtfully. “It is
+but fitting that, being dead, honour and reverence should be shown his
+body.”
+
+“Then let those who have themselves been honoured by the Condillacs
+honour this dead Condillac now. The Church is not of that number,
+monsieur. Since the late Marquis’s death the house of Condillac has been
+in rebellion against us; our priests have been maltreated, our authority
+flouted; they paid no tithes, approached no sacraments. Weary of their
+ungodliness the Church placed its ban upon them; under this ban it seems
+they die. My heart grieves for them; but--”
+
+He spread his hands, long and almost transparent in their leanness, and
+on his face a cloud of sorrow rested.
+
+“Nevertheless, Father,” said Garnache, “twenty brothers of Saint Francis
+shall bear the body home to Condillac, and you yourself shall head this
+grim procession.”
+
+“I?” The monk shrank back before him, and his figure seemed to grow
+taller. “Who are you, sir, that say to me what I shall do, the Church’s
+law despite?”
+
+Garnache took the Abbot by the sleeve of his rough habit and drew him
+gently towards the window. There was a persuasive smile on his lips and
+in his keen eyes which the monk, almost unconsciously, obeyed.
+
+“I will tell you,” said Garnache, “and at the same time I shall seek to
+turn you from your harsh purpose.”
+
+At the hour at which Monsieur de Garnache was seeking to persuade the
+Abbot of Saint Francis of Cheylas to adopt a point of view more kindly
+towards a dead man, Madame de Condillac was at dinner, and with her
+was Valerie de La Vauvraye. Neither woman ate appreciably. The one was
+oppressed by sorrow, the other by anxiety, and the circumstance that
+they were both afflicted served perhaps to render the Dowager gentler in
+her manner towards the girl.
+
+She watched the pale face and troubled eyes of Valerie; she observed the
+almost lifeless manner in which she came and went as she was bidden, as
+though a part of her had ceased to exist, and that part the part that
+matters most. It did cross her mind that in this condition mademoiselle
+might the more readily be bent to their will, but she dwelt not overlong
+upon that reflection. Rather was her mood charitable, no doubt because
+she felt herself the need of charity, the want of sympathy.
+
+She was tormented by fears altogether disproportionate to their cause.
+A hundred times she told herself that no ill could befall Marius.
+Florimond was a sick man, and were he otherwise, there was still
+Fortunio to stand by and see to it that the right sword pierced the
+right heart, else would his pistoles be lost to him.
+
+Nevertheless she was fretted by anxiety, and she waited impatiently for
+news, fuming at the delay, yet knowing full well that news could not yet
+reach her.
+
+Once she reproved Valerie for her lack of appetite, and there was in
+her voice a kindness Valerie had not heard for months--not since the old
+Marquis died, nor did she hear it now, or, hearing it, she did not heed
+it.
+
+“You are not eating, child,” the Dowager said, and her eyes were gentle.
+
+Valerie looked up like one suddenly awakened; and in that moment her
+eyes filled with tears. It was as if the Dowager’s voice had opened the
+floodgates of her sorrow and let out the tears that hitherto had been
+repressed. The Marquise rose and waved the page and an attendant lackey
+from the room. She crossed to Valerie’s side and put her arm about the
+girl’s shoulder.
+
+“What ails you, child?” she asked. For a moment the girl suffered the
+caress; almost she seemed to nestle closer to the Dowager’s shoulder.
+Then, as if understanding had come to her suddenly, she drew back and
+quietly disengaged herself from the other’s arms. Her tears ceased; the
+quiver passed from her lip.
+
+“You are very good, madame,” she said, with a coldness that rendered the
+courteous words almost insulting, “but nothing ails me save a wish to be
+alone.”
+
+“You have been alone too much of late,” the Dowager answered, persisting
+in her wish to show kindness to Valerie; for all that, had she looked
+into her own heart, she might have been puzzled to find a reason for her
+mood--unless the reason lay in her own affliction of anxiety for Marius.
+
+“Perhaps I have,” said the girl, in the same cold, almost strained
+voice. “It was not by my own contriving.”
+
+“Ah, but it was, child; indeed it was. Had you been reasonable you had
+found us kinder. We had never treated you as we have done, never made a
+prisoner of you.”
+
+Valerie looked up into the beautiful ivory-white face, with its black
+eyes and singularly scarlet lips, and a wan smile raised the corners of
+her gentle mouth.
+
+“You had no right--none ever gave it you--to set constraint and
+restraint upon me.”
+
+“I had--indeed, indeed I had,” the Marquise answered her, in a tone of
+sad protest. “Your father gave me such a right when he gave me charge of
+you.”
+
+“Was it a part of your charge to seek to turn me from my loyalty to
+Florimond, and endeavour to compel me by means gentle or ungentle into
+marriage with Marius?”
+
+“We thought Florimond dead; or, if not dead, then certainly unworthy of
+you to leave you without news of him for years together. And if he was
+not dead then, it is odds he will be dead by now.” The words slipped
+out almost unconsciously, and the Marquise bit her lip and straightened
+herself, fearing an explosion. But none came. The girl looked across
+the table at the fire that smouldered on the hearth in need of being
+replenished.
+
+“What do you mean, madame?” she asked; but her tone was listless,
+apathetic, as of one who though uttering a question is incurious as to
+what the answer may be.
+
+“We had news some days ago that he was journeying homewards, but that he
+was detained by fever at La Rochette. We have since heard that his fever
+has grown so serious that there is little hope of his recovery.”
+
+“And it was to solace his last moments that Monsieur Marius left
+Condillac this morning?”
+
+The Dowager looked sharply at the girl; but Valerie’s face continued
+averted, her gaze resting on the fire. Her tone suggested nothing beyond
+a natural curiosity.
+
+“Yes,” said the Dowager.
+
+“And lest his own efforts to help his brother out of this world should
+prove insufficient he took Captain Fortunio with him?” said Valerie, in
+the same indifferent voice.
+
+“What do you mean?” the Marquise almost hissed into the girl’s ear.
+
+Valerie turned to her, a faint colour stirring in her white face.
+
+“Just what I have said, madame. Would you know what I have prayed?
+All night was I upon my knees from the moment that I recovered
+consciousness, and my prayers were that Heaven might see fit to let
+Florimond destroy your son. Not that I desire Florimond’s return, for
+I care not if I never set eyes on him again. There is a curse upon this
+house, madame,” the girl continued, rising from her chair and speaking
+now with a greater animation, whilst the Marquise recoiled a step, her
+face strangely altered and suddenly gone grey, “and I have prayed
+that that curse might be worked out upon that assassin, Marius. A fine
+husband, madame, you would thrust upon the daughter of Gaston de La
+Vauvraye.”
+
+And turning, without waiting for an answer, she moved slowly down
+the room, and took her way to her own desolate apartments, so full of
+memories of him she mourned--of him, it seemed to her, she must always
+mourn; of him who lay dead in the black waters of the moat beneath her
+window.
+
+Stricken with a sudden, inexplicable terror, the Dowager, who for
+all her spirit was not without a certain superstition, felt her knees
+loosen, and she sank limply into a chair. She was amazed at the extent
+of Valerie’s knowledge, and puzzled by it; she was amazed, too, at the
+seeming apathy of Valerie for the danger in which Florimond stood, and
+at her avowal that she did not care if she never again beheld him. But
+such amazement as came to her was whelmed fathoms-deep in her sudden
+fears for Marius. If he should die! She grew cold at the thought, and
+she sat there, her hands folded in her lap, her face grey. That mention
+of the curse the Church had put upon them had frozen her quick blood and
+turned her stout spirit to mere water.
+
+At last she rose and went out into the open to inquire if no messenger
+had yet arrived, for all that she knew there was not yet time for any
+messenger to have reached the chateau. She mounted the winding staircase
+of stone that led to the ramparts, and there alone, in the November
+sunshine, she paced to and fro for hours, waiting for news, straining
+her eyes to gaze up the valley of the Isere, watching for the horseman
+that must come that way. Then, as time sped on and the sun approached
+its setting and still no one came, she bethought her that if harm had
+befallen Marius, none would ride that night to Condillac. This very
+delay seemed pregnant with news of disaster. And then she shook off her
+fears and tried to comfort herself. There was not yet time. Besides,
+what had she to fear for Marius? He was strong and quick, and Fortunio
+was by his side. A man was surely dead by now at La Rochette; but that
+man could not be Marius.
+
+At last, in the distance, she espied a moving object, and down on the
+silent air of eventide came the far-off rattle of a horse’s hoofs. Some
+one was riding, galloping that way. He was returned at last. She leaned
+on the battlements, her breath coming in quick, short gasps, and watched
+the horseman growing larger with every stride of his horse.
+
+A mist was rising from the river, and it dimmed the figure; and she
+cursed the mist for heightening her anxiety, for straining further
+her impatience. Then a new fear was begotten in her mind. Why came one
+horseman only where two should have ridden? Who was it that returned,
+and what had befallen his companion? God send, at least, it might be
+Marius who rode thus, at such a breakneck pace.
+
+At last she could make him out. He was close to the chateau now, and she
+noticed that his right arm was bandaged and hanging in a sling. And then
+a scream broke from her, and she bit her lip hard to keep another in
+check, for she had seen the horseman’s face, and it was Fortunio’s.
+Fortunio--and wounded! Then, assuredly, Marius was dead!
+
+She swayed where she stood. She set her hand on her bosom, above her
+heart, as if she would have repressed the beating of the one, the
+heaving of the other; her soul sickened, and her mind seemed to turn
+numb, as she waited there for the news that should confirm her fears.
+
+The hoofs of his horse thundered over the planks of the drawbridge,
+and came clatteringly to halt as he harshly drew rein in the courtyard
+below. There was a sound of running feet and men sprang to his
+assistance. Madame would have gone below to meet him; but her limbs
+seemed to refuse their office. She leaned against one of the merlons of
+the embattled parapet, her eyes on the spot where he should emerge from
+the stairs, and thus she waited, her eyes haggard, her face drawn.
+
+He came at last, lurching in his walk, being overstiff from his long
+ride. She took a step forward to meet him. Her lips parted.
+
+“Well?” she asked him, and her voice sounded harsh and strained. “How
+has the venture sped?”
+
+“The only way it could,” he answered. “As you would wish it.”
+
+At that she thought that she must faint. Her lungs seemed to writhe for
+air, and she opened her lips and took long draughts of the rising mist,
+never speaking for a moment or two until she had sufficiently recovered
+from this tremendous revulsion from her fears.
+
+“Then, where is Marius?” she asked at last.
+
+“He has remained behind to accompany the body home. They are bringing it
+here.”
+
+“They?” she echoed. “Who are they?”
+
+“The monks of Saint Francis of Cheylas,” he answered.
+
+A something in his tone, a something in his shifty eyes, a cloud upon
+his fair and usually so ingenuous looking countenance aroused her
+suspicions and gave her resurrected courage pause.
+
+She caught him viciously by the arms, and forced his glance to meet her
+own in the fading daylight.
+
+“It is the truth you are telling me, Fortunio?” she snapped, and her
+voice was half-angry, half-fearful.
+
+He faced her now, his eyes bold. He raised a hand to lend emphasis to
+his words.
+
+“I swear, madame, by my salvation, that Monsieur Marius is sound and
+well.”
+
+She was satisfied. She released his arm.
+
+“Does he come to-night?” she asked.
+
+“They will be here to-morrow, madame. I rode on to tell you so.”
+
+“An odd fancy, this of his. But”--and a sudden smile overspread her
+face--“we may find a more useful purpose for one of these monks.”
+
+An hour ago she would willingly have set mademoiselle at liberty in
+exchange for the assurance that Marius had been successful in the
+business that had taken him over the border into Savoy. She would have
+done it gladly, content that Marius should be heir to Condillac. But
+now that Condillac was assured her son, she must have more for him; her
+insatiable greed for his advancement and prosperity was again upon
+her. Now, more than ever--now that Florimond was dead--must she have La
+Vauvraye for Marius, and she thought that mademoiselle would no longer
+be difficult to bend. The child had fallen in love with that mad
+Garnache, and when a woman is crossed in love, while her grief lasts
+it matters little to her where she weds. Did she not know it out of the
+fund of her own bitter experience? Was it not that--the compulsion her
+own father had employed to make her find a mate in a man so much older
+than herself as Condillac--that had warped her own nature, and done much
+to make her what she was?
+
+A lover she had had, and whilst he lived she had resisted them, and
+stood out against this odious marriage that for convenience’ sake they
+forced upon her. He was killed in Paris in a duel, and when the news of
+it came to her, she had folded her hands and let them wed her to whom
+they listed.
+
+Of just such a dejection of spirit had she observed the signs in
+Valerie; let them profit by it while it lasted. They had been long
+enough without Church ceremonies at Condillac. There should be two
+to-morrow to make up for the empty time--a wedding and a burial.
+
+She was going down the stairs, Fortunio a step behind her, when her mind
+reverted to the happening at La Rochette.
+
+“Was it well done?” she asked.
+
+“It made some stir,” said he. “The Marquis had men with him, and had the
+affair taken place in France ill might have come of it.”
+
+“You shall give me a full account of it,” said she, rightly thinking
+that there was still something to be explained. Then she laughed
+softly. “Yes, it was a lucky chance for us, his staying at La Rochette.
+Florimond was born under an unlucky star, I think, and you under a lucky
+one, Fortunio.”
+
+“I think so, too, as regards myself,” he answered grimly, and he thought
+of the sword that had ploughed his cheek last night and pierced his
+sword-arm that morning, and he thanked such gods as in his godlessness
+he owned for the luck that had kept that sword from finding out his
+heart.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+
+On the morrow, which was a Friday and the tenth of November--a date to
+be hereafter graven on the memory of all concerned in the affairs of
+Condillac--the Dowager rose betimes, and, for decency’s sake, having in
+mind the business of the day, she gowned herself in black.
+
+Betimes, too, the Lord Seneschal rode out of Grenoble, attended by
+a couple of grooms, and headed for Condillac, in doing which--little
+though he suspected it--he was serving nobody’s interests more
+thoroughly than Monsieur de Garnache’s.
+
+Madame received him courteously. She was in a blithe and happy mood that
+morning--the reaction from her yesterday’s distress of mind. The world
+was full of promise, and all things had prospered with her and Marius.
+Her boy was lord of Condillac; Florimond, whom she had hated and who had
+stood in the way of her boy’s advancement, was dead and on his way to
+burial; Garnache, the man from Paris who might have made trouble for
+them had he ridden home again with the tale of their resistance, was
+silenced for all time, and the carp in the moat would be feasting by
+now upon what was left of him; Valerie de La Vauvraye was in a dejected
+frame of mind that augured well for the success of the Dowager’s
+plans concerning her, and by noon at latest there would be priests at
+Condillac, and, if Marius still wished to marry the obstinate baggage,
+there would be no difficulty as to that.
+
+It was a glorious morning, mild and sunny as an April day, as though
+Nature took a hand in the Dowager’s triumph and wished to make the best
+of its wintry garb in honour of it.
+
+The presence of this gross suitor of hers afforded her another source
+of satisfaction. There would no longer be the necessity she once had
+dreaded of listening to his suit for longer than it should be her
+pleasure to be amused by him. But when Tressan spoke, he struck the
+first note of discord in the perfect harmony which the Dowager imagined
+existed.
+
+“Madame,” said he, “I am desolated that I am not a bearer of better
+tidings. But for all that we have made the most diligent search, the
+man Rabecque has not yet been apprehended. Still, we have not abandoned
+hope,” he added, by way of showing that there was a silver lining to his
+cloud of danger.
+
+For just a moment madame’s brows were knitted. She had forgotten
+Rabecque until now; but an instant’s reflection assured her that in
+forgetting him she had done him no more than such honour as he deserved.
+She laughed, as she led the way down the garden steps--the mildness of
+the day and the brightness of her mood had moved her there to receive
+the Seneschal.
+
+“From the sombreness of your tone one might fear your news to be of the
+nature of some catastrophe. What shall it signify that Rabecque eludes
+your men? He is but a lackey after all.”
+
+“True,” said the Seneschal, very soberly; “but do not forget, I beg,
+that he is the bearer of letters from one who is not a lackey.”
+
+The laughter went out of her face at that. Here was something that had
+been lost sight of in the all-absorbing joy of other things. In calling
+the forgotten Rabecque to mind she had but imagined that it was no more
+than a matter of the tale he might tell--a tale not difficult to refute,
+she thought. Her word should always weigh against a lackey’s. But that
+letter was a vastly different matter.
+
+“He must be found, Tressan,” she said sharply.
+
+Tressan smiled uneasily, and chewed at his beard.
+
+“No effort shall be spared,” he promised her. “Of that you may be very
+sure. The affairs of the province are at a standstill,” he added, that
+vanity of his for appearing a man of infinite business rising even in
+an hour of such anxiety, for to himself, no less than to her, was
+there danger should Rabecque ever reach his destination with the papers
+Garnache had said he carried.
+
+“The affairs of the province are at a standstill,” he repeated, “while
+all my energies are bent upon this quest. Should we fail to have news of
+his capture in Dauphiny, we need not, nevertheless, despond. I have
+sent men after him along the three roads that lead to Paris. They are to
+spare neither money nor horses in picking up his trail and effecting his
+capture. After all, I think we shall have him.”
+
+“He is our only danger now,” the Marquise answered, “for Florimond is
+dead--of the fever,” she added, with a sneering smile which gave Tressan
+sensations as of cold water on his spine. “It were an irony of fate if
+that miserable lackey were to reach Paris now and spoil the triumph for
+which we have worked so hard.”
+
+“It were, indeed,” Tressan agreed with her, “and we must see that he
+does not.”
+
+“But if he does,” she returned, “then we must stand together.” And with
+that she set her mind at ease once more, her mood that morning being
+very optimistic.
+
+“Always, I hope, Clotilde,” he answered, and his little eyes leered up
+out of the dimples of fat in which they were embedded. “I have stood by
+you like a true friend in this affair; is it not so?”
+
+“Indeed; do I deny it?” she answered half scornfully.
+
+“As I shall stand by you always when the need arises. You are a little
+in my debt concerning Monsieur de Garnache.”
+
+“I--I realize it,” said she, and she felt again as if the sunshine were
+gone from the day, the blitheness from her heart. She was moved to
+bid him cease leering at her and to take himself and his wooing to the
+devil. But she bethought her that the need for him might not yet
+utterly be passed. Not only in the affair of Garnache--in which he stood
+implicated as deeply as herself--might she require his loyalty, but also
+in the matter of what had befallen yesterday at La Rochette; for despite
+Fortunio’s assurances that things had gone smoothly, his tale hung none
+too convincingly together; and whilst she did not entertain any serious
+fear of subsequent trouble, yet it might be well not utterly to banish
+the consideration of such a possibility, and to keep the Seneschal her
+ally against it. So she told him now, with as much graciousness as she
+could command, that she fully realized her debt, and when, encouraged,
+he spoke of his reward, she smiled upon him as might a girl smile upon
+too impetuous a wooer whose impetuosity she deprecates yet cannot wholly
+withstand.
+
+“I am a widow of six months,” she reminded him, as she had reminded him
+once before. Her widowhood was proving a most convenient refuge. “It is
+not for me to listen to a suitor, however my foolish heart may incline.
+Come to me in another six months’ time.”
+
+“And you will wed me then?” he bleated.
+
+By an effort her eyes smiled down upon him, although her face was a
+trifle drawn.
+
+“Have I not said that I will listen to no suitor? and what is that but a
+suitor’s question?”
+
+He caught her hand; he would have fallen on his knees there and then, at
+her feet, on the grass still wet with the night’s mist, but that he in
+time bethought him of how sadly his fine apparel would be the sufferer.
+
+“Yet I shall not sleep, I shall know no rest, no peace until you have
+given me an answer. Just an answer is all I ask. I will set a curb upon
+my impatience afterwards, and go through my period of ah--probation
+without murmuring. Say that you, will marry me in six months’ time--at
+Easter, say.”
+
+She saw that an answer she must give, and so she gave him the answer
+that he craved. And he--poor fool!--never caught the ring of her voice,
+as false as the ring of a base coin; never guessed that in promising she
+told herself it would be safe to break that promise six months hence,
+when the need of him and his loyalty would be passed.
+
+A man approached them briskly from the chateau. He brought news that a
+numerous company of monks was descending the valley of the Isere towards
+Condillac. A faint excitement stirred her, and accompanied by Tressan
+she retraced her steps and made for the battlements, whence she might
+overlook their arrival.
+
+As they went Tressan asked for an explanation of this cortege, and she
+answered him with Fortunio’s story of how things had sped yesterday at
+La Rochette.
+
+Up the steps leading to the battlements she went ahead of him, with
+a youthful, eager haste that took no thought for the corpulence and
+short-windedness of the following Seneschal. From the heights she looked
+eastwards, shading her eyes from the light of the morning sun, and
+surveyed the procession which with slow dignity paced down the valley
+towards Condillac.
+
+At its head walked the tall, lean figure of the Abbot of Saint Francis
+of Cheylas, bearing on high a silvered crucifix that flashed and
+scintillated in the sunlight. His cowl was thrown back, revealing his
+pale, ascetic countenance and shaven head. Behind him came a coffin
+covered by a black pall, and borne on the shoulders of six black-robed,
+black cowled monks, and behind these again walked, two by two, some
+fourteen cowled brothers of the order of Saint Francis, their heads
+bowed, their arms folded, and their hands tucked away in their capacious
+sleeves.
+
+It was a numerous cortege, and as she watched its approach the Marquise
+was moved to wonder by what arguments had the proud Abbot been induced
+to do so much honour to a dead Condillac and bear his body home to this
+excommunicated roof.
+
+Behind the monks a closed carriage lumbered down the uneven mountain
+way, and behind this rode four mounted grooms in the livery of
+Condillac. Of Marius she saw nowhere any sign, and she inferred him to
+be travelling in that vehicle, the attendant servants being those of the
+dead Marquis.
+
+In silence, with the Seneschal at her elbow, she watched the procession
+advance until it was at the foot of the drawbridge. Then, while the
+solemn rhythm of their feet sounded across the planks that spanned the
+moat, she turned, and, signing to the Seneschal to follow her, she went
+below to meet them. But when she reached the courtyard she was surprised
+to find they had not paused, as surely would have been seemly. Unbidden,
+the Abbot had gone forward through the great doorway and down the
+gallery that led to the hall of Condillac. Already, when she arrived
+below, the coffin and its bearers had disappeared, and the last of the
+monks was passing from sight in its wake. Leaning against the doorway
+through which they were vanishing stood Fortunio, idly watching that
+procession and thoughtfully stroking his mustachios. About the yard
+lounged a dozen or so men-at-arms, practically all the garrison that was
+left them since the fight with Garnache two nights ago.
+
+After the last monk had disappeared, she still remained there,
+expectantly; and when she saw that neither the carriage nor the grooms
+made their appearance, she stepped up to Fortunio to inquire into the
+reason of it.
+
+“Surely Monsieur de Condillac rides in that coach,” said she.
+
+“Surely,” Fortunio answered, himself looking puzzled. “I will go seek
+the reason, madame. Meanwhile will you receive the Abbot? The monks will
+have deposited their burden.”
+
+She composed her features into a fitting solemnity, and passed briskly
+through to the hall, Tressan ever at her heels. Here she found
+the coffin deposited on the table, its great black pall of velvet,
+silver-edged, sweeping down to the floor. No fire had been lighted that
+morning nor had the sun yet reached the windows, so that the place wore
+a chill and gloomy air that was perhaps well attuned to the purpose that
+it was being made to serve.
+
+With a rare dignity, her head held high, she swept down the length of
+that noble chamber towards the Abbot, who stood erect as a pikestaff: at
+the tablehead, awaiting her. And well was it for him that he was a man
+of austere habit of mind, else might her majestic, incomparable beauty
+have softened his heart and melted the harshness of his purpose.
+
+He raised his hand when she was within a sword’s length of him, and
+with startling words, delivered in ringing tones, he broke the ponderous
+silence.
+
+“Wretched woman,” he denounced her, “your sins have found you out.
+Justice is to be done, and your neck shall be bent despite your stubborn
+pride. Derider of priests, despoiler of purity, mocker of Holy Church,
+your impious reign is at an end.”
+
+Tressan fell back aghast, his face blenching to the lips; for if justice
+was at hand for her, as the Abbot said, then was justice at hand for
+him as well. Where had their plans miscarried? What flaw was there that
+hitherto she had not perceived? Thus he questioned himself in his sudden
+panic.
+
+But the Marquise was no sharer in his tremors. Her eyes opened a trifle
+wider; a faint colour crept into her cheeks; but her only emotions were
+of amazement and indignation. Was he mad, this shaveling monk? That was
+the question that leapt into her mind, the very question with which she
+coldly answered his outburst.
+
+“For madness only,” she thought fit to add, “could excuse such rash
+temerity as yours.”
+
+“Not madness, madame,” he answered, with chill haughtiness--“not
+madness, but righteous indignation. You have defied the power of Holy
+Church as you have defied the power of our sovereign lady, and justice
+is upon you. We are here to present the reckoning, and see its payment
+made in full.”
+
+She fancied he alluded to the body in the coffin--the body of her
+stepson--and she could have laughed at his foolish conclusions that
+she must account Florimond’s death an act of justice upon her for her
+impiety. But her rising anger left her no room for laughter.
+
+“I thought, sir priest, you were come to bury the dead. But it rather
+seems you are come to talk.”
+
+He looked at her long and sternly. Then he shook his head, and the
+faintest shadow of a smile haunted his ascetic face.
+
+“Not to talk, madame; oh, not to talk,” he answered slowly. “But to act,
+I have come, madame, to liberate from this shambles the gentle lamb you
+hold here prisoned.”
+
+At that some of the colour left her cheeks; her eyes grew startled: at
+last she began to realize that all was not as she had thought--as she
+had been given to understand.--Still, she sought to hector it, from very
+instinct.
+
+“_Vertudieu_!” she thundered at him. “What mean you?”
+
+Behind her Tressan’s great plump knees were knocking one against the
+other. Fool that he had been to come to Condillac that day, and to be
+trapped thus in her company, a partner in her guilt. This proud Abbot
+who stood there uttering denunciations had some power behind him,
+else had he never dared to raise his voice in Condillac within call of
+desperate men who would give little thought to the sacredness, of his
+office.
+
+“What mean you?” she repeated--adding with a sinister smile, “in your
+zeal, Sir Abbot, you are forgetting that my men are within call.”
+
+“So, madame, are mine,” was his astounding answer, and he waved a hand
+towards the array of monks, all standing with bowed heads and folded
+arms.
+
+At that her laughter rang shrill through the chamber. “These poor
+shavelings?” she questioned.
+
+“Just these poor shavelings, madame,” he answered, and he raised his
+hand again and made a sign. And then an odd thing happened, and it
+struck a real terror into the heart of the Marquise and heightened that
+which was already afflicting her fat lover, Tressan.
+
+The monks drew themselves erect. It was as if a sudden gust of wind had
+swept through their ranks and set them all in motion. Cowls fell back
+and habits were swept aside, and where twenty monks had stood, there
+were standing now a score of nimble, stalwart men in the livery of
+Condillac, all fully armed, all grinning in enjoyment of her and
+Tressan’s dismay.
+
+One of them turned aside and locked the door of the chamber. But his
+movement went unheeded by the Dowager, whose beautiful eyes, starting
+with horror, were now back upon the grim figure of the Abbot, marvelling
+almost to see no transformation wrought in him.
+
+“Treachery!” she breathed, in an awful voice, that was no louder than
+a whisper, and again her eyes travelled round the company, and suddenly
+they fastened upon Fortunio, standing six paces from her to the right,
+pulling thoughtfully at his mustachios, and manifesting no surprise at
+what had taken place.
+
+In a sudden, blind choler, she swept round, plucked the dagger from
+Tressan’s belt and flung herself upon the treacherous captain. He had
+betrayed her in some way; he had delivered up Condillac--into whose
+power she had yet had no time to think. She caught him by the throat
+with a hand of such nervous strength as one would little have suspected
+from its white and delicate contour. Her dagger was poised in the air,
+and the captain, taken thus suddenly, was palsied with amazement and
+could raise no hand to defend himself from the blow impending.
+
+But the Abbot stepped suddenly to her side and caught her wrist in his
+thin, transparent hand.
+
+“Forbear,” he bade her. “The man is but a tool.”
+
+She fell back--dragged back almost by the Abbot--panting with rage and
+grief; and then she noticed that during the moment that her back had
+been turned the pall had been swept from the coffin. The sight of the
+bare deal box arrested her attention, and for the moment turned aside
+her anger. What fresh surprise did they prepare her?
+
+No sooner had she asked herself the question than herself she answered
+it, and an icy hand seemed to close about her heart. It was Marius who
+was dead. They had lied to her. Marius’s was the body they had borne to
+Condillac--those men in the livery of her stepson.
+
+With a sudden sob in her throat she took a step towards the coffin. She
+must see for herself. One way or the other she must at once dispel this
+torturing doubt. But ere she had taken three paces, she stood arrested
+again, her hands jerked suddenly to the height of her breast, her lips
+parting to let out a scream of terror. For the coffin-lid had slowly
+raised and clattered over. And as if to pile terror for her, a figure
+rose from the box, and, sitting up, looked round with a grim smile; and
+the figure was the figure of a man whom she knew to be dead, a man
+who had died by her contriving--it was the figure of Garnache. It
+was Garnache as he had been on the occasion of his first coming to
+Condillac, as he had been on the day they had sought his life in this
+very room. How well she knew that great hooked nose and the bright,
+steely blue eyes, the dark brown hair, ash-coloured at the temples where
+age had paled it, and the fierce, reddish mustachios, bristling above
+the firm mouth and long, square chin.
+
+She stared and stared, her beautiful face livid and distorted, till
+there was no beauty to be seen in it, what time the Abbot regarded her
+coldly and Tressan, behind her, turned almost sick with terror. But not
+the terror of ghosts was it afflicted him. He saw in Garnache a man who
+was still of the quick--a man who by some miracle had escaped the fate
+to which they supposed him to have succumbed; and his terror was the
+terror of the reckoning which that man would ask.
+
+After a moment’s pause, as if relishing the sensation he had created,
+Garnache rose to his feet and leapt briskly to the ground. There was
+nothing ghostly about the thud with which he alighted on his feet before
+her. A part of her terror left her; yet not quite all. She saw that she
+had but a man to deal with, yet she began to realize that this man was
+very terrible.
+
+“Garnache again!” she gasped.
+
+He bowed serenely, his lips smiling.
+
+“Aye, madame,” he told her pleasantly, “always Garnache. Tenacious as
+a leech, madame; and like a leech come hither to do a little work of
+purification.”
+
+Her eyes, now kindling again as she recovered from her recent fears,
+sought Fortunio’s shifty glance. Garnache followed it and read what was
+in her mind.
+
+“What Fortunio has done,” said he, “he has done by your son’s authority
+and sanction.”
+
+“Marius?” she inquired, and she was almost fearful lest she should hear
+that by her son he meant her stepson, and that Marius was dead.
+
+“Yes, Marius,” he answered her. “I bent him to my will. I threatened him
+that he and this fellow of his, this comrade in arms so worthy of his
+master, should be broken on the wheel together unless I were implicitly
+obeyed. If they would save their lives, this was their chance. They were
+wise, and they took it, and thus afforded me the means of penetrating
+into Condillac and rescuing Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.”
+
+“Then Marius--?” She left her question unfinished, her hand clutching
+nervously at the bosom of her gown.
+
+“Is sound and well, as Fortunio truthfully will have told you. But he is
+not yet out of my grasp, nor will be until the affairs of Condillac are
+settled. For if I meet with further opposition here, broken on the wheel
+he shall be yet, I promise you.”
+
+Still she made a last attempt at hectoring it. The long habit of
+mastership dies hard. She threw back her head; her courage revived now
+that she knew Marius to be alive and sound.
+
+“Fine words,” she sneered. “But who are you that you can threaten so and
+promise so?”
+
+“I am the Queen-Regent’s humble mouthpiece, madame. What I threaten, I
+threaten in her name. Ruffle it no longer, I beseech you. It will prove
+little worth your while. You are deposed, madame, and you had best take
+your deposition with dignity and calm--in all friendliness do I advise
+it.”
+
+“I am not yet come so low that I need your advice,” she answered sourly.
+
+“You may before the sun sets,” he answered, with his quiet smile. “The
+Marquis de Condillac and his wife are still at La Rochette, waiting
+until my business here is done that they may come home.”
+
+“His wife?” she cried.
+
+“His wife, madame. He has brought home a wife from Italy.”
+
+“Then--then--Marius?” She said no more than that. Maybe she had no
+intention of muttering even so much of her thoughts aloud. But Garnache
+caught the trend of her mind, and he marvelled to see how strong a habit
+of thought can be. At once upon hearing of the Marquis’s marriage her
+mind had flown back to its wonted pondering of the possibilities of
+Marius’s wedding Valerie.
+
+But Garnache dispelled such speculations.
+
+“No, madame,” said he. “Marius looks elsewhere for a wife--unless
+mademoiselle of her own free will should elect to wed him--a thing
+unlikely.” Then, with a sudden change to sternness--“Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye is well, madame?” he asked.
+
+She nodded her head, but made no answer in words. He turned to Fortunio.
+
+“Go fetch her,” he bade the captain, and one of the men unlocked the
+door to let Fortunio out upon that errand.
+
+The Parisian took a turn in the apartment, and came close to Tressan.
+He nodded to the Seneschal with a friendliness that turned him sick with
+fright.
+
+“Well met, my dear Lord Seneschal. I am rejoiced to find you here. Had
+it been otherwise I must have sent for you. There is a little matter
+to be settled between us. You may depend upon me to settle it to your
+present satisfaction, if to your future grief.” And, with a smile, he
+passed on, leaving the Seneschal too palsied to answer him, too stricken
+to disclaim his share in what had taken place at Condillac.
+
+“You have terms to make with me?” the Marquise questioned proudly.
+
+“Certainly,” he answered, with his grim courtesy. “Upon your acceptance
+of those terms shall depend Marius’s life and your own future liberty.”
+
+“What are they?”
+
+“That within the hour all your people--to the last scullion--shall have
+laid down their arms and vacated Condillac.”
+
+It was beyond her power to refuse.
+
+“The Marquis will not drive me forth?” she half affirmed, half asked.
+
+“The Marquis, madame, has no power in this matter. It is for the Queen
+to deal with your insubordination--for me as the Queen’s emissary.”
+
+“If I consent, monsieur, what then?”
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and smiled quietly.
+
+“There is no ‘if,’ madame. Consent you must, willingly or unwillingly.
+To make sure of that have I come back thus and with force. But should
+you deliver battle, you will be worsted--and it will be very ill for
+you. Bid your men depart, as I have told you, and you also shall have
+liberty to go hence.”
+
+“Aye, but whither?” she cried, in a sudden frenzy of anger.
+
+“I realize, madame, from what I know of your circumstances that you will
+be well-nigh homeless. You should have thought of how one day you might
+come to be dependent upon the Marquis de Condillac’s generosity before
+you set yourself to conspire against him, before you sought to encompass
+his death. You can hardly look for generosity at his hands now, and so
+you will be all but homeless, unless--” He paused, and his eyes strayed
+to Tressan and were laden with a sardonic look.
+
+“You take a very daring tone with me,” she told him. “You speak to me as
+no man has ever dared to speak.”
+
+“When the power was yours, madame, you dealt with me as none has ever
+dared to deal. The advantage now is mine. Behold how I use it in your
+own interests; observe how generously I shall deal with you who deal in
+murder. Monsieur de Tressan,” he called briskly. The Seneschal started
+forward as if some one had prodded him suddenly.
+
+“Mu--monsieur?” said he.
+
+“With you, too, will I return good for evil. Come hither.”
+
+The Seneschal approached, wondering what was about to take place. The
+Marquise watched his coming, a cold glitter in her eye, for--keener of
+mental vision than Tressan--she already knew the hideous purpose that
+was in Garnache’s mind.
+
+The soldiers grinned; the Abbot looked on with an impassive face.
+
+“The Marquise de Condillac is likely to be homeless henceforth,” said
+the Parisian, addressing the Seneschal. “Will you not be gallant enough
+to offer her a home, Monsieur de Tressan?”
+
+“Will I?” gasped Tressan, scarce daring to believe his own ears, his
+eyes staring with a look that was almost one of vacancy. “Madame well
+knows how readily.”
+
+“Oho?” crowed Garnache, who had been observing madame’s face. “She
+knows? Then do so, monsieur; and on that condition I will forget your
+indiscretions here. I pledge you my word that you shall not be called to
+further account for the lives that have been lost through your treachery
+and want of loyalty, provided that of your own free will you lay down
+your Seneschalship of Dauphiny--an office which I cannot consent to see
+you filling hereafter.”
+
+Tressan stared from the Dowager to Garnache and back to the Dowager. She
+stood there as if Garnache’s words had turned her into marble, bereft of
+speech through very rage. And then the door opened, and Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye entered, followed closely by Fortunio.
+
+At sight of Garnache she stood still, set her hand on her heart, and
+uttered a low cry. Was it indeed Garnache she saw--Garnache, her brave
+knight-errant? He looked no longer as he had looked during those days
+when he had been her gaoler; but he looked as she liked to think of him
+since she had accounted him dead. He advanced to meet her, a smile in
+his eyes that had something wistful in it. He held out both hands to
+her, and she took them, and there, under the eyes of all, before he
+could snatch them away, she had stooped and kissed them, whilst a murmur
+of “Thank God! Thank God!” escaped from her lips to heaven.
+
+“Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!” he remonstrated, when it was too late to
+stay her. “You must not; it is not seemly in me to allow it.”
+
+He saw in the act no more than an expression of the gratitude for what
+he had done to serve her, and for the risk in which his life had been
+so willingly placed in that service. Under the suasion of his words she
+grew calm again; then, suddenly, a fear stirred her once more in that
+place where she had known naught but fears.
+
+“Why are you here, monsieur? You have come into danger again?”
+
+“No, no,” he laughed. “These are my own men, at least for the time
+being. I am come in power this time, to administer justice. What shall
+be done with this lady, mademoiselle?” he asked; and knowing well the
+merciful sweetness of the girl’s soul, he added, “Speak, now. Her fate
+shall rest in your hands.”
+
+Valerie looked at her enemy, and then her eyes strayed round the room
+and took stock of the men standing there in silence, of the Abbot who
+still remained at the table-head, a pale, scarce-interested spectator of
+this odd scene.
+
+The change had come so abruptly. A few minutes ago she had been still a
+prisoner, suffering tortures at having heard that Marius was to return
+that day, and that, willy-nilly, she must wed him now. And now she was
+free it seemed: her champion was returned in power, and he stood bidding
+her decide the fate of her late oppressors.
+
+Madame’s face was ashen. She judged the girl by her own self; she had no
+knowledge of any such infinite sweetness as that of this child’s nature,
+a sweetness that could do no hurt to any. Death was what the Marquise
+expected, since she knew that death would she herself have pronounced
+had the positions been reversed. But--
+
+“Let her go in peace, monsieur,” she heard mademoiselle say, and she
+could not believe but that she was being mocked. And as if mockery were
+at issue, Garnache laughed.
+
+“We will let her go, mademoiselle--yet not quite her own way. You must
+not longer remain unrestrained, madame,” he told the Marquise. “Natures
+such as yours need a man’s guidance. I think you will be sufficiently
+punished if you wed this rash Monsieur de Tressan, just as he will be
+sufficiently punished later when disillusionment follows his present
+youthful ardour. Make each other happy, then,” and he waved his arms
+from one to the other. “Our good Father, here, will tie the knot at
+once, and then, my Lord Seneschal, you may bear home your bride. Her son
+shall follow you.”
+
+But the Marquise blazed out now. She stamped her foot, and her eyes
+seemed to have taken fire.
+
+“Never, sir! Never in life!” she cried. “I will not be so constrained. I
+am the Marquise de Condillac, monsieur. Do not forget it!”
+
+“I am hardly in danger of doing that. It is because I remember it that
+I urge you to change your estate with all dispatch; and cease to be the
+Marquise de Condillac. That same Marquise has a heavy score against
+her. Let her evade payment by this metamorphosis. I have opened for you,
+madame, a door through which you may escape.”
+
+“You are insolent,” she told him. “By God, sir! I am no baggage to be
+disposed of by the will of any man.”
+
+At that Garnache himself took fire. Her anger proved as the steel
+smiting the flint of his own nature, and one of his fierce bursts of
+blazing passion whirled about her head.
+
+“And what of this child, here?” he thundered. “What of her, madame? Was
+she a baggage to be disposed of by the will of any man or woman? Yet you
+sought to dispose of her against her heart, against her nature, against
+her plighted word. Enough said!” he barked, and so terrific was his mien
+and voice that the stout-spirited Dowager was cowed, and recoiled as he
+advanced a step in her direction. “Get you married. Take you this man
+to husband, you who with such calmness sought to drive others into
+unwilling wedlock. Do it, madame, and do it now, or by the Heaven above
+us, you shall come to Paris with me, and you’ll not find them nice
+there. It will avail you little to storm and shout at them that you are
+Marquise de Condillac. As a murderess and a rebel shall you be tried,
+and as both or either it is odds you will be broken on the wheel--and
+your son with you. So make your choice, madame.”
+
+He ceased. Valerie had caught him by the arm. At once his fury fell from
+him. He turned to her.
+
+“What is it, child?”
+
+“Do not compel her, if she will not wed him,” said she. “I
+know--and--she did not--how terrible a thing it is.”
+
+“Nay, patience, child,” he soothed her, smiling now, his smile as the
+sunshine that succeeds a thunderstorm.
+
+“It is none so bad with her. She is but coy. They had plighted their
+troth already, so it seems. Besides, I do not compel her. She shall
+marry him of her own free will--or else go to Paris and stand her trial
+and the consequences.”
+
+“They had plighted their troth, do you say?”
+
+“Well--had you not, Monsieur le Seneschal?”
+
+“We had, monsieur,” said Tressan, with conscious pride; “and for myself
+I am ready for these immediate nuptials.”
+
+“Then, in God’s name, let Madame give us her answer now. We have not the
+day to waste.”
+
+She stood looking at him, her toe tapping the ground, her eyes sullenly
+angry. And in the end, half-fainting in her great disdain, she consented
+to do his will. Paris and the wheel formed too horrible an alternative;
+besides, even if that were spared her, there was but a hovel in Touraine
+for her, and Tressan, for all his fat ugliness, was wealthy.
+
+So the Abbot, who had lent himself to the mummery of coming there to
+read a burial service, made ready now, by order of the Queen’s emissary,
+to solemnize a wedding.
+
+It was soon done. Fortunio stood sponsor for Tressan, and Garnache
+himself insisted upon handing the Lord Seneschal his bride, a stroke
+of irony which hurt the proud lady of Condillac more than all her
+sufferings of the past half-hour.
+
+When it was over and the Dowager Marquise de Condillac had been
+converted into the Comtesse de Tressan, Garnache bade them depart in
+peace and at once.
+
+“As I have promised, you shall be spared all prosecution, Monsieur de
+Tressan,” he assured the Seneschal at parting. “But you must resign at
+once the King’s Seneschalship of Dauphiny, else will you put me to the
+necessity of having you deprived of your office--and that might entail
+unpleasant consequences.”
+
+They went, madame with bowed head, her stubborn pride broken at last as
+the Abbot of Saint Francis had so confidently promised her. After them
+went the Abbot and the lackeys of Florimond, and Fortunio went with
+these to carry out Garnache’s orders that the men of the Dowager’s
+garrison be sent packing at once, leaving with the Parisian, in the
+great hall, just Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. SAINT MARTIN’S EVE
+
+Uneasy in his mind, seeking some way to tell the thing and acquit
+himself of the painful task before him, Garnache took a turn in the
+apartment.
+
+Mademoiselle leaned against the table, which was still burdened by the
+empty coffin, and observed him. His ponderings were vain; he could find
+no way to tell, his story. She had said that she did not exactly love
+this Florimond, that her loyalty to him was no more than her loyalty to
+her father’s wishes. Nevertheless, he thought, what manner of hurt must
+not her pride receive when she learned that Florimond had brought him
+home a wife? Garnache was full of pity for her and for the loneliness
+that must be hers hereafter, mistress of a vast estate in Dauphiny,
+alone and friendless. And he was a little sorry for himself and the
+loneliness which, he felt, would be his hereafter; but that was by the
+way.
+
+At last it was she herself who broke the silence.
+
+“Monsieur,” she asked him, and her voice was strained and husky, “were
+you in time to save Florimond?”
+
+“Yes, mademoiselle,” he answered readily, glad that by that question she
+should have introduced the subject. “I was in time.”
+
+“And Marius?” she inquired. “From what I heard you say, I take it that
+he has suffered no harm.”
+
+“He has suffered none. I have spared him that he might participate in
+the joy of his mother at her union with Monsieur de Tressan.”
+
+“I am glad it was so, monsieur. Tell me of it.” Her voice sounded formal
+and constrained.
+
+But either he did not hear or did not heed the question.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” he said slowly. “Florimond is coming--”
+
+“Florimond?” she broke in, and her voice went shrill, as if with a
+sudden fear, her cheeks turned white as chalk. The thing that for months
+she had hoped and prayed for was come at last, and it struck her almost
+dead with terror.
+
+He remarked the change, and set it down to a natural excitement. He
+paused a moment. Then:
+
+“He is still at La Rochette. But he does no more than wait until he
+shall have learned that his stepmother has departed from Condillac.”
+
+“But--why--why--? Was he then in no haste to come to me?” she inquired,
+her voice faltering.
+
+“He is--” He stopped and tugged at his mustachios, his eyes regarding
+her sombrely. He was close beside her now, where he had halted, and he
+set his hand gently upon her shoulder, looked down into that winsome
+little oval face she raised to his.
+
+“Mademoiselle,” he inquired, “would it afflict you very sorely if you
+were not destined, after all, to wed the Lord of Condillac?”
+
+“Afflict me?” she echoed. The very question set her gasping with hope.
+“No--no, monsieur; it would not afflict me.”
+
+“That is true? That is really, really true?” he cried, and his tone
+seemed less despondent.
+
+“Don’t you know how true it is?” she said, in such accents and with such
+a shy upward look that something seemed suddenly to take Garnache by the
+throat. The blood flew to his cheeks. He fancied an odd meaning in those
+words of hers--a meaning that set his pulses throbbing faster than joy
+or peril had ever set them yet. Then he checked himself, and deep down
+in his soul he seemed to hear a peal of mocking laughter--just such a
+burst of sardonic mirth as had broken from his lips two nights ago when
+on his way to Voiron. Then he went back to the business he had in hand.
+
+“I am glad it is so with you,” he said quietly. “Because Florimond has
+brought him home a wife.”
+
+The words were out, and he stood back as stands a man who, having cast
+an insult, prepares to ward the blow he expects in answer. He had looked
+for a storm, a wild, frantic outburst; the lightning of flashing, angry
+eyes; the thunder of outraged pride. Instead, here was a gentle calm, a
+wan smile overspreading her sweet, pale face, and then she hid that
+face in her hands, buried face and hands upon his shoulder and fell to
+weeping very quietly.
+
+This, he thought, was almost worse than the tempest he had looked for.
+How was he to know that these tears were the overflow of a heart that
+was on the point of bursting from sheer joy? He patted her shoulder; he
+soothed her.
+
+“Little child,” he whispered in her ear. “What does it matter? You did
+not really love him. He was all unworthy of you. Do not grieve, child.
+So, so, that is better.”
+
+She was looking up at him, smiling through the tears that suffused er
+eyes.
+
+“I am weeping for joy, monsieur,” said she.
+
+“For joy?” quoth he. “_Vertudieu_! There is no end to the things a woman
+weeps for!”
+
+Unconsciously, instinctively almost, she nestled closer to him, and
+again his pulses throbbed, again that flush came to overspread his lean
+countenance. Very softly he whispered in her ear:
+
+“Will you go to Paris with me, mademoiselle?”
+
+He meant by that question no more than to ask whether, now that here in
+Dauphiny she would be friendless and alone, it were not better for her
+to place herself under the care of the Queen-Regent. But what blame to
+her if she misunderstood the question, if she read in it the very words
+her heart was longing to hear from him? The very gentleness of his tone
+implied his meaning to be the one she desired. She raised her hazel eyes
+again to his, she nestled closer to him, and then, with a shy fluttering
+of her lids, a delicious red suffusing her virgin cheek, she answered
+very softly:
+
+“I will go anywhere with you, monsieur--anywhere.”
+
+With a cry he broke from her. There was no fancying now; no possibility
+of misunderstanding. He saw how she had misread his question, how she
+had delivered herself up to him in answer. His almost roughness startled
+her, and she stared at him as he stamped down the apartment and back
+to where she stood, seeking in vain to master the turbulence of his
+feelings. He stood still again. He took her by the shoulders and held
+her at arms’ length, before him, thus surveying her, and there was
+trouble in his keen eyes.
+
+“Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!” he cried. “Valerie, my child, what are you
+saying to me?”
+
+“What would you have me say?” she asked, her eyes upon the floor. “Was I
+too forward? It seemed to me there could not be question of such a thing
+between us now. I belong to you. What man has ever served a woman as
+you have served me? What better friend, what nobler lover did ever woman
+have? Why then need I take shame at confessing my devotion?”
+
+He swallowed hard, and there was a mist before his eyes--eyes that had
+looked unmoved on many a scene of carnage.
+
+“You know not what you do,” he cried out, and his voice was as the voice
+of one in pain. “I am old.”
+
+“Old?” she echoed in deep surprise, and she looked up at him, as if she
+sought evidence of what he stated.
+
+“Aye, old,” he assured her bitterly. “Look at the grey in my hair, the
+wrinkles in my face. I am no likely lover for you, child. You’ll need a
+lusty, comely young gallant.”
+
+She looked at him, and a faint smile flickered at the corners of her
+lips. She observed his straight, handsome figure; his fine air of
+dignity and of strength. Every inch a man was he; never lived there one
+who was more a man; and what more than such a man could any maid desire?
+
+“You are all that I would have you,” she answered him, and in his mind
+he almost cursed her stubbornness, her want of reason.
+
+“I am peevish and cross-grained,” he informed her, “and I have grown old
+in ignorance of woman’s ways. Love has never come to me until now. What
+manner of lover, think you, can I make?”
+
+Her eyes were on the windows at his back. The sunshine striking through
+them seemed to give her the reply she sought.
+
+“To-morrow will be Saint Martin’s Day,” she told him; “yet see with a
+warmth the sun is shining.”
+
+“A poor, make-believe Saint Martin’s Summer,” said he. “I am fitly
+answered by your allegory.”
+
+“Oh, not make-believe, not make-believe,” she exclaimed. “There is no
+make-believe in the sun’s brightness and its warmth. We see it and we
+feel it, and we are none the less glad of it because the time of year
+should be November; rather do we take the greater joy in it. And it is
+not yet November in your life, not yet by many months.”
+
+“What you say is apt, perhaps,” said he, “and may seem more apt than
+it is since my name is Martin, though I am no saint.” Then he shook off
+this mood that he accounted selfish; this mood that would take her--as
+the wolf takes the lamb--with no thought but for his own hunger.
+
+“No, no!” he cried out. “It were unworthy in me!”
+
+“When I love you, Martin?” she asked him gently.
+
+A moment he stared at her, as if through those clear eyes he would
+penetrate to the very depths of her maiden soul. Then he sank on to his
+knees before her as any stripling lover might have done, and kissed her
+hands in token of the fact that he was conquered.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Martin’s Summer, by Rafael
+Sabatini
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. MARTIN’S SUMMER ***
+
+***** This file should be named 2640-0.htm or 2640-0.zip ***** This
+and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+http://www.gutenberg.org/2/6/4/2640/
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Project Gutenberg Volunteer, and David Widger
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be
+renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one
+owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and
+you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission
+and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in
+the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and
+distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the
+PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a
+registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks,
+unless you receive specific permission. If you do not charge anything
+for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You
+may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative
+works, reports, performances and research. They may be modified and
+printed and given away--you may do practically ANYTHING with public
+domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license,
+especially commercial redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU
+DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
+Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
+Project Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree
+to and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all the
+terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy all
+copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be used
+on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who agree
+to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few things that
+you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works even without
+complying with the full terms of this agreement. See paragraph 1.C
+below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement and help
+preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works.
+See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the Foundation”
+ or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in
+the collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you
+are located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent
+you from copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating
+derivative works based on the work as long as all references to Project
+Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the
+Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic
+works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with
+the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name
+associated with the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this
+agreement by keeping this work in the same format with its attached
+full Project Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with
+others.
+
+1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing
+or creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase “Project
+Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost
+no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use
+it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
+eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work with
+the phrase “Project Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work,
+you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through
+1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute
+this electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other
+than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
+version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site
+(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
+to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
+of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
+Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the full
+Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing access
+to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method you
+already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed to the
+owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has agreed to donate
+royalties under this paragraph to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid within 60 days following each
+date on which you prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your
+periodic tax returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such
+and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+address specified in Section 4, “Information about donations to the
+Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.”
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies you
+in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he does not
+agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm License. You
+must require such a user to return or destroy all copies of the works
+possessed in a physical medium and discontinue all use of and all access
+to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
+any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
+receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth
+in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from both the
+Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael Hart, the
+owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the Foundation as
+set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm collection.
+Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, and the
+medium on which they may be stored, may contain “Defects,” such as, but
+not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription
+errors, a copyright or other intellectual property infringement, a
+defective or damaged disk or other medium, a computer virus, or computer
+codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
+
+1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
+of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal fees.
+YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY,
+BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE PROVIDED IN
+PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE TRADEMARK OWNER, AND
+ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR
+ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES
+EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a defect
+in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can receive
+a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a written
+explanation to the person you received the work from. If you received
+the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with your
+written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with the
+defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’ WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation,
+the trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm’s
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will remain
+freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure and
+permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. To
+learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and
+how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 and the
+Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the state
+of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal Revenue
+Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification number
+is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.
+
+The Foundation’s principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887,
+email business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation’s web site and official page
+at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information: Dr. Gregory B. Newby Chief Executive
+and Director gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide spread
+public support and donations to carry out its mission of increasing
+the number of public domain and licensed works that can be freely
+distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest array
+of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations ($1 to
+$5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt status with
+the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
+DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
+visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make any
+statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from outside
+the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other ways
+including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To donate,
+please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. unless
+a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily keep eBooks
+in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, including
+how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to subscribe to
+our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+
+
diff --git a/2640-0.zip b/2640-0.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e9e7221
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2640-0.zip
diff --git a/2640-h.zip b/2640-h.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..19712d8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2640-h.zip
diff --git a/2640-h/2640-h.htm b/2640-h/2640-h.htm
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bf5ce75
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2640-h/2640-h.htm
@@ -0,0 +1,12660 @@
+<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
+
+<!DOCTYPE html
+   PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
+   "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" >
+
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
+  <head>
+    <title>
+      St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve">
+
+    body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify}
+    P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; }
+    H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; }
+    hr  { width: 50%; text-align: center;}
+    .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; }
+    blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+    .mynote    {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;}
+    .toc       { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;}
+    .toc2      { margin-left: 20%;}
+    div.fig    { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; }
+    div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; }
+    .figleft   {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;}
+    .figright  {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;}
+    .pagenum   {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal;
+               margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%;
+               text-align: right;}
+    pre        { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;}
+
+</style>
+  </head>
+  <body>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: St. Martin's Summer
+
+Author: Rafael Sabatini
+
+Release Date: January 2, 2009 [EBook #2640]
+Last Updated: October 13, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. MARTIN'S SUMMER ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Project Gutenberg Volunteer, and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      ST. MARTIN&rsquo;S SUMMER
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <br />
+    </p>
+    <h2>
+      By Rafael Sabatini
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h3>
+      Originally published in 1921
+    </h3>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <blockquote>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big>
+      </p>
+      <p>
+        <br /> <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE SENESCHAL
+        OF DAUPHINY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;MONSIEUR
+        DE GARNACHE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE
+        DOWAGER&rsquo;S COMPLIANCE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV.
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+        LOSES HIS TEMPER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;MONSIEUR
+        DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER
+        VII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE OPENING OF THE TRAP <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE CLOSING OF THE
+        TRAP <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE
+        SENESCHAL&rsquo;S ADVICE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE
+        RECRUIT <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;VALERIE&rsquo;S
+        GAOLER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A
+        MATTER OF CONSCIENCE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII.
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE COURIER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER
+        XIV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;FLORIMOND&rsquo;S LETTER <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE CONFERENCE <br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE UNEXPECTED
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;HOW
+        MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0018">
+        CHAPTER XVIII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;IN THE MOAT <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THROUGH THE NIGHT
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;FLORIMOND
+        DE CONDILLAC <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE
+        GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII.
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII. &nbsp;&nbsp;</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE
+        JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV.
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;SAINT MARTIN&rsquo;S EVE <br /><br />
+      </p>
+    </blockquote>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      SAINT MARTIN&rsquo;S SUMMER
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER I. THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      My Lord of Tressan, His Majesty&rsquo;s Seneschal of Dauphiny, sat at his ease,
+      his purple doublet all undone, to yield greater freedom to his vast bulk,
+      a yellow silken undergarment visible through the gap, as is visible the
+      flesh of some fruit that, swollen with over-ripeness, has burst its skin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His wig&mdash;imposed upon him by necessity, not fashion&mdash;lay on the table
+      amid a confusion of dusty papers, and on his little fat nose, round and
+      red as a cherry at its end, rested the bridge of his horn-rimmed
+      spectacles. His bald head&mdash;so bald and shining that it conveyed an
+      unpleasant sense of nakedness, suggesting that its uncovering had been an
+      act of indelicacy on the owner&rsquo;s part&mdash;rested on the back of his
+      great chair, and hid from sight the gaudy escutcheon wrought upon the
+      crimson leather. His eyes were closed, his mouth open, and whether from
+      that mouth or from his nose&mdash;or, perhaps, conflicting for issue
+      between both&mdash;there came a snorting, rumbling sound to proclaim that
+      my Lord the Seneschal was hard at work upon the King&rsquo;s business.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yonder, at a meaner table, in an angle between two windows, a pale-faced
+      thread-bare secretary was performing for a yearly pittance the duties for
+      which my Lord the Seneschal was rewarded by emoluments disproportionately
+      large.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The air of that vast apartment was disturbed by the sounds of Monsieur de
+      Tressan&rsquo;s slumbers, the scratch and splutter of the secretary&rsquo;s pen, and
+      the occasional hiss and crackle of the logs that burned in the great,
+      cavern-like fireplace. Suddenly to these another sound was added. With a
+      rasp and rattle the heavy curtains of blue velvet flecked with silver
+      fleurs-de-lys were swept from the doorway, and the master of Monsieur de
+      Tressan&rsquo;s household, in a well filled suit of black relieved by his heavy
+      chain of office, stepped pompously forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The secretary dropped his pen, and shot a frightened glance at his
+      slumbering master; then raised his hands above his head, and shook them
+      wildly at the head lackey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sh!&rdquo; he whispered tragically. &ldquo;Doucement, Monsieur Anselme.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Anselme paused. He appreciated the gravity of the situation. His bearing
+      lost some of its dignity; his face underwent a change. Then with a
+      recovery of some part of his erstwhile resolution:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nevertheless, he must be awakened,&rdquo; he announced, but in an undertone, as
+      if afraid to do the thing he said must needs be done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The horror in the secretary&rsquo;s eyes increased, but Anselme&rsquo;s reflected none
+      of it. It was a grave thing, he knew by former experience, to arouse His
+      Majesty&rsquo;s Seneschal of Dauphiny from his after-dinner nap; but it was an
+      almost graver thing to fail in obedience to that black-eyed woman below
+      who was demanding an audience.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Anselme realized that he was between the sword and the wall. He was,
+      however, a man of a deliberate habit that was begotten of inherent
+      indolence and nurtured among the good things that fell to his share as
+      master of the Tressan household. Thoughtfully he caressed his tuft of red
+      beard, puffed out his cheeks, and raised his eyes to the ceiling in appeal
+      or denunciation to the heaven which he believed was somewhere beyond it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nevertheless, he must be awakened,&rdquo; he repeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And then Fate came to his assistance. Somewhere in the house a door banged
+      like a cannon-shot. Perspiration broke upon the secretary&rsquo;s brow. He sank
+      limply back in his chair, giving himself up for lost. Anselme started and
+      bit the knuckle of his forefinger in a manner suggesting an inarticulate
+      imprecation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      My Lord the Seneschal moved. The noise of his slumbers culminated in a
+      sudden, choking grunt, and abruptly ceased. His eyelids rolled slowly
+      back, like an owl&rsquo;s, revealing pale blue eyes, which fixed themselves
+      first upon the ceiling, then upon Anselme. Instantly he sat up, puffing
+      and scowling, his hands shuffling his papers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A thousand devils! Anselme, why am I interrupted?&rdquo; he grumbled
+      querulously, still half-asleep. &ldquo;What the plague do you want? Have you no
+      thought for the King&rsquo;s affairs? Babylas&rdquo;&mdash;this to his secretary&mdash;&ldquo;did
+      I not tell you that I had much to do; that I must not be disturbed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the great vanity of the life of this man, who did nothing, to
+      appear the busiest fellow in all France, and no audience&mdash;not even
+      that of his own lackeys&mdash;was too mean for him to take the stage to in
+      that predilect role.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Comte,&rdquo; said Anselme, in tones of abject self-effacement, &ldquo;I
+      had never dared intrude had the matter been of less urgency. But Madame
+      the Dowager of Condillac is below. She begs to see Your Excellency
+      instantly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At once there was a change. Tressan became wide-awake upon the instant.
+      His first act was to pass one hand over the wax-like surface of his bald
+      head, whilst his other snatched at his wig. Then he heaved himself
+      ponderously out of his great chair. He donned his wig, awry in his haste,
+      and lurched forward towards Anselme, his fat fingers straining at his open
+      doublet and drawing it together.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame la Douairiere here?&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Make fast these buttons, rascal!
+      Quick! Am I to receive a lady thus? Am I&mdash;? Babylas,&rdquo; he snapped,
+      interrupting himself and turning aside even as Anselme put forth hands to
+      do his bidding. &ldquo;A mirror, from my closet! Dispatch!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The secretary was gone in a flash, and in a flash returned, even as
+      Anselme completed his master&rsquo;s toilet. But clearly Monsieur de Tressan had
+      awakened in a peevish humour, for no sooner were the buttons of his
+      doublet secured than with his own fingers he tore them loose again,
+      cursing his majordomo the while with vigour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You dog, Anselme, have you no sense of fitness, no discrimination? Am I
+      to appear in this garment of the mode of a half-century ago before Madame
+      la Marquise? Take it off; take it off, man! Get me the coat that came last
+      month from Paris&mdash;the yellow one with the hanging sleeves and the
+      gold buttons, and a sash&mdash;the crimson sash I had from Taillemant. Can
+      you move no quicker, animal? Are you still here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Anselme, thus enjoined, lent an unwonted alacrity to his movements,
+      waddling grotesquely like a hastening waterfowl. Between him and the
+      secretary they dressed my Lord the Seneschal, and decked him out till he
+      was fit to compare with a bird of paradise for gorgeousness of colouring
+      if not for harmony of hues and elegance of outline.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Babylas held the mirror, and Anselme adjusted the Seneschal&rsquo;s wig, whilst
+      Tressan himself twisted his black mustachios&mdash;how they kept their
+      colour was a mystery to his acquaintance&mdash;and combed the tuft of
+      beard that sprouted from one of his several chins.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He took a last look at his reflection, rehearsed a smile, and bade Anselme
+      introduce his visitor. He desired his secretary to go to the devil, but,
+      thinking better of it, he recalled him as he reached the door. His
+      cherished vanity craved expression.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wait!&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;There is a letter must be written. The King&rsquo;s business
+      may not suffer postponement&mdash;not for all the dowagers in France. Sit
+      down.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Babylas obeyed him. Tressan stood with his back to the open door. His
+      ears, strained to listen, had caught the swish of a woman&rsquo;s gown. He
+      cleared his throat, and began to dictate:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To Her Majesty the Queen-Regent&mdash;&rdquo; He paused, and stood with knitted
+      brows, deep in thought. Then he ponderously repeated&mdash;&ldquo;To Her Majesty
+      the Queen Regent&mdash;Have you got that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Monsieur le Comte. &lsquo;To Her Majesty the Queen Regent.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a step, and a throat-clearing cough behind him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; said a woman&rsquo;s voice, a rich, melodious voice, if
+      haughty and arrogant of intonation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the instant he turned, advanced a step, and bowed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your humblest servant, madame,&rdquo; said he, his hand upon his heart. &ldquo;This
+      is an honour which&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Which necessity thrusts upon you,&rdquo; she broke in imperiously. &ldquo;Dismiss
+      that fellow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The secretary, pale and shy, had risen. His eyes dilated at the woman&rsquo;s
+      speech. He looked for a catastrophe as the natural result of her taking
+      such a tone with this man who was the terror of his household and of all
+      Grenoble. Instead, the Lord Seneschal&rsquo;s meekness left him breathless with
+      surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is my secretary, madame. We were at work as you came. I was on the
+      point of inditing a letter to Her Majesty. The office of Seneschal in a
+      province such as Dauphiny is helas!&mdash;no sinecure.&rdquo; He sighed like one
+      whose brain is weary. &ldquo;It leaves a man little time even to eat or sleep.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will be needing a holiday, then,&rdquo; said she, with cool insolence.
+      &ldquo;Take one for once, and let the King&rsquo;s business give place for half an
+      hour to mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The secretary&rsquo;s horror grew by leaps and bounds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Surely the storm would burst at last about this audacious woman&rsquo;s head.
+      But the Lord Seneschal&mdash;usually so fiery and tempestuous&mdash;did no
+      more than make her another of his absurd bows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You anticipate, madame, the very words I was about to utter. Babylas,
+      vanish!&rdquo; And he waved the scribbler doorwards with a contemptuous hand.
+      &ldquo;Take your papers with you&mdash;into my closet there. We will resume that
+      letter to Her Majesty when madame shall have left me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The secretary gathered up his papers, his quills, and his inkhorn, and
+      went his way, accounting the end of the world at hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When the door had closed upon him, the Seneschal, with another bow and a
+      simper, placed a chair at his visitor&rsquo;s disposal. She looked at the chair,
+      then looked at the man much as she had looked at the chair, and turning
+      her back contemptuously on both, she sauntered towards the fireplace. She
+      stood before the blaze, with her whip tucked under her arm, drawing off
+      her stout riding-gloves. She was a tall, splendidly proportioned woman, of
+      a superb beauty of countenance, for all that she was well past the spring
+      of life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the waning light of that October afternoon none would have guessed her
+      age to be so much as thirty, though in the sunlight you might have set it
+      at a little more. But in no light at all would you have guessed the truth,
+      that her next would be her forty-second birthday. Her face was pale, of an
+      ivory pallor that gleamed in sharp contrast with the ebony of her lustrous
+      hair. Under the long lashes of low lids a pair of eyes black and insolent
+      set off the haughty lines of her scarlet lips. Her nose was thin and
+      straight, her neck an ivory pillar splendidly upright upon her handsome
+      shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was dressed for riding, in a gown of sapphire velvet, handsomely laced
+      in gold across the stomacher, and surmounted at the neck, where it was cut
+      low and square, by the starched band of fine linen which in France was
+      already replacing the more elaborate ruff. On her head, over a linen coif,
+      she wore a tall-crowned grey beaver, swathed with a scarf of blue and
+      gold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Standing by the hearth, one foot on the stone kerb, one elbow leaning
+      lightly on the overmantel, she proceeded leisurely to remove her gloves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal observed her with eyes that held an odd mixture of
+      furtiveness and admiration, his fingers&mdash;plump, indolent-looking
+      stumps&mdash;plucking at his beard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you but know, Marquise, with what joy, with what a&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will imagine it, whatever it may be,&rdquo; she broke in, with that brusque
+      arrogance that marked her bearing. &ldquo;The time for flowers of rhetoric is
+      not now. There is trouble coming, man; trouble, dire trouble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Up went the Seneschal&rsquo;s brows; his eyes grew wider.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Trouble?&rdquo; quoth he. And, having opened his mouth to give exit to that
+      single word, open he left it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed lazily, her lip curling, her face twisting oddly, and
+      mechanically she began to draw on again the glove she had drawn off.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By your face I see how well you understand me,&rdquo; she sneered. &ldquo;The trouble
+      concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From Paris&mdash;does it come from Court?&rdquo; His voice was sunk.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded. &ldquo;You are a miracle of intuition today, Tressan.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He thrust his tiny tuft of beard between his teeth&mdash;a trick he had
+      when perplexed or thoughtful. &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; he exclaimed at last, and it sounded
+      like an indrawn breath of apprehension. &ldquo;Tell me more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What more is there to tell? You have the epitome of the story.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what is the nature of the trouble? What form does it take, and by
+      whom are you advised of it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A friend in Paris sent me word, and his messenger did his work well, else
+      had Monsieur de Garnache been here before him, and I had not so much as
+      had the mercy of this forewarning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Garnache?&rdquo; quoth the Count. &ldquo;Who is Garnache?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The emissary of the Queen-Regent. He has been dispatched hither by her to
+      see that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye has justice and enlargement.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan fell suddenly to groaning and wringing his hands a pathetic figure
+      had it been less absurd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I warned you, madame! I warned you how it would end,&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;I told
+      you&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I remember the things you told me,&rdquo; she cut in, scorn in her voice.
+      &ldquo;You may spare yourself their repetition. What is done is done, and I&rsquo;ll
+      not&mdash;I would not&mdash;have it undone. Queen-Regent or no
+      Queen-Regent, I am mistress at Condillac; my word is the only law we know,
+      and I intend that so it shall continue.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan looked at her in surprise. This unreasoning, feminine obstinacy so
+      wrought upon him that he permitted himself a smile and a lapse into irony
+      and banter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Parfaitement,&rdquo; said he, spreading his hands, and bowing. &ldquo;Why speak of
+      trouble, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She beat her whip impatiently against her gown, her eyes staring into the
+      fire. &ldquo;Because, my attitude being such as it is, trouble will there be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and moved a step towards her. He was
+      cast down to think that he might have spared himself the trouble of
+      donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris. She had eyes for no
+      finery that afternoon. He was cast down, too, to think how things might go
+      with him when this trouble came. It entered his thoughts that he had lain
+      long on a bed of roses in this pleasant corner of Dauphiny, and he was
+      smitten now with fear lest of the roses he should find nothing remaining
+      but the thorns.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How came the Queen-Regent to hear of&mdash;of mademoiselle&rsquo;s&mdash;ah&mdash;situation?&rdquo;
+       he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise swung round upon him in a passion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The girl found a dog of a traitor to bear a letter for her. That is
+      enough. If ever chance or fate should bring him my way, by God! he shall
+      hang without shrift.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she put her anger from her; put from her, too, the insolence and
+      scorn with which so lavishly she had addressed him hitherto. Instead she
+      assumed a suppliant air, her beautiful eyes meltingly set upon his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tressan,&rdquo; said she in her altered voice, &ldquo;I am beset by enemies. But you
+      will not forsake me? You will stand by me to the end&mdash;will you not,
+      my friend? I can count upon you, at least?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In all things, madame,&rdquo; he answered, under the spell of her gaze. &ldquo;What
+      force does this man Garnache bring with him? Have you ascertained?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He brings none,&rdquo; she answered, triumph in her glance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None?&rdquo; he echoed, horror in his. &ldquo;None? Then&mdash;then&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He tossed his arms to heaven, and stood a limp and shaken thing. She
+      leaned forward, and regarded him stricken in surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Diable! What ails you?&rdquo; she snapped. &ldquo;Could I have given you better
+      news?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you could have given me worse, I cannot think what it might have
+      been,&rdquo; he groaned. Then, as if smitten by a sudden notion that flashed a
+      gleam of hope into this terrifying darkness that was settling down upon
+      him, he suddenly looked up. &ldquo;You mean to resist him?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She stared at him a second, then laughed, a thought unpleasantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pish! But you are mad,&rdquo; she scorned him. &ldquo;Do you need ask if I intend to
+      resist&mdash;I, with the strongest castle in Dauphiny? By God! sir, if you
+      need to hear me say it, hear me then say that I shall resist him and as
+      many as the Queen may send after him, for as long as one stone of
+      Condillac shall stand upon another.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal blew out his lips, and fell once more to the chewing of his
+      beard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did you mean when you said I could have given you no worse news than
+      that of his coming alone?&rdquo; she questioned suddenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;if this man comes without force, and you resist the
+      orders of which he is the bearer, what think you will betide?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He will appeal to you for the men he needs that he may batter down my
+      walls,&rdquo; she answered calmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her incredulously. &ldquo;You realize it?&rdquo; he ejaculated. &ldquo;You
+      realize it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is there in it that should puzzle a babe?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her callousness was like a gust of wind upon the living embers of his
+      fears. It blew them into a blaze of wrath, sudden and terrific as that of
+      such a man at bay could be. He advanced upon her with the rolling gait of
+      the obese, his cheeks purple, his arms waving wildly, his dyed mustachios
+      bristling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what of me, madame?&rdquo; he spluttered. &ldquo;What of me? Am I to be ruined,
+      gaoled, and hanged, maybe, for refusing him men?&mdash;for that is what is
+      in your mind. Am I to make myself an outlaw? Am I, who have been Lord
+      Seneschal of Dauphiny these fifteen years, to end my days in degradation
+      in the cause of a woman&rsquo;s matrimonial projects for a simpering
+      school-girl? Seigneur du Ciel!&rdquo; he roared, &ldquo;I think you are gone mad&mdash;mad,
+      mad! over this affair. You would not think it too much to set the whole
+      province in flames so that you could have your way with this wretched
+      child. But, Ventregris! to ruin me&mdash;to&mdash;to&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He fell silent for very want of words; just gaped and gasped, and then,
+      with hands folded upon his paunch, he set himself to pace the chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame de Condillac stood watching him, her face composed, her glance
+      cold. She was like some stalwart oak, weathering with unshaken front a
+      hurricane. When he had done, she moved away from the fireplace, and,
+      beating her side gently with her whip, she stepped to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Au revoir, Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; said she, mighty cool, her back towards
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that he halted in his feverish stride, stood still and threw up his
+      head. His anger went out, as a candle is extinguished by a puff of wind.
+      And in its place a new fear crept into his heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame, madame!&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Wait! Hear me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She paused, half-turned, and looked at him over her shoulder, scorn in her
+      glance, a sneer on her scarlet mouth, insolence in every line of her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think, monsieur, that I have heard a little more than enough,&rdquo; said
+      she. &ldquo;I am assured, at least, that in you I have but a fair-weather
+      friend, a poor lipserver.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, not that, madame,&rdquo; he cried, and his voice was stricken. &ldquo;Say not
+      that. I would serve you as would none other in all this world&mdash;you
+      know it, Marquise; you know it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She faced about, and confronted him, her smile a trifle broader, as if
+      amusement were now blending with her scorn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is easy to protest. Easy to say, &lsquo;I will die for you,&rsquo; so long as the
+      need for such a sacrifice be remote. But let me do no more than ask a
+      favour, and it is, &lsquo;What of my good name, madame? What of my
+      seneschalship? Am I to be gaoled or hanged to pleasure you?&rsquo; Faugh!&rdquo; she
+      ended, with a toss of her splendid head. &ldquo;The world is peopled with your
+      kind, and I&mdash;alas! for a woman&rsquo;s intuitions&mdash;had held you
+      different from the rest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her words were to his soul as a sword of fire might have been to his
+      flesh. They scorched and shrivelled it. He saw himself as she would have
+      him see himself&mdash;a mean, contemptible craven; a coward who made big
+      talk in times of peace, but faced about and vanished into hiding at the
+      first sign of danger. He felt himself the meanest, vilest thing a-crawl
+      upon this sinful earth, and she&mdash;dear God!&mdash;had thought him
+      different from the ruck. She had held him in high esteem, and behold, how
+      short had he not fallen of all her expectations! Shame and vanity combined
+      to work a sudden, sharp revulsion in his feelings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marquise,&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;you say no more than what is just. But punish me no
+      further. I meant not what I said. I was beside myself. Let me atone&mdash;let
+      my future actions make amends for that odious departure from my true
+      self.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was no scorn now in her smile; only an ineffable tenderness,
+      beholding which he felt it in his heart to hang if need be that he might
+      continue high in her regard. He sprang forward, and took the hand she
+      extended to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I knew, Tressan,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;that you were not yourself, and that when
+      you bethought you of what you had said, my valiant, faithful friend would
+      not desert me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He stooped over her hand, and slobbered kisses upon her unresponsive
+      glove.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you may count upon me. This fellow out of Paris shall
+      have no men from me, depend upon it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She caught him by the shoulders, and held him so, before her. Her face was
+      radiant, alluring; and her eyes dwelt on his with a kindness he had never
+      seen there save in some wild daydream of his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not refuse a service you offer me so gallantly,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;It
+      were an ill thing to wound you by so refusing it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marquise,&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;it is as nothing to what I would do did the
+      occasion serve. But when this thing &lsquo;tis done; when you have had your way
+      with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and the nuptials shall have been
+      celebrated, then&mdash;dare I hope&mdash;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He said no more in words, but his little blue eyes had an eloquence that
+      left nothing to mere speech.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Their glances met, she holding him always at arm&rsquo;s length by that grip
+      upon his shoulders, a grip that was firm and nervous.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the Seneschal of Dauphiny, as she now gazed upon him, she beheld a very
+      toad of a man, and the soul of her shuddered at the sight of him combining
+      with the thing that he suggested. But her glance was steady and her lips
+      maintained their smile, just as if that ugliness of his had been invested
+      with some abstract beauty existing only to her gaze; a little colour crept
+      into her cheeks, and red being the colour of love&rsquo;s livery, Tressan
+      misread its meaning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded to him across the little distance of her outstretched arms,
+      then smothered a laugh that drove him crazed with hope, and breaking from
+      him she sped swiftly, shyly it almost seemed to him, to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There she paused a moment looking back at him with a coyness that might
+      have become a girl of half her years, yet which her splendid beauty saved
+      from being unbecoming even in her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One adorable smile she gave him, and before he could advance to hold the
+      door for her, she had opened it and passed out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER II. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      To promise rashly, particularly where a woman is the suppliant, and
+      afterwards, if not positively to repent the promise, at least to regret
+      that one did not hedge it with a few conditions, is a proceeding not
+      uncommon to youth. In a man of advanced age, such as Monsieur de Tressan,
+      it never should have place; and, indeed, it seldom has, unless that man
+      has come again under the sway of the influences by which youth, for good
+      or ill, is governed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Whilst the flush of his adoration was upon him, hot from the contact of
+      her presence, he knew no repentance, found room in his mind for no
+      regrets. He crossed to the window, and pressed his huge round face to the
+      pane, in a futile effort to watch her mount and ride out of the courtyard
+      with her little troop of attendants. Finding that he might not&mdash;the
+      window being placed too high&mdash;gratify his wishes in that connection,
+      he dropped into his chair, and sat in the fast-deepening gloom, reviewing,
+      fondly here, hurriedly there, the interview that had but ended.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus night fell, and darkness settled down about him, relieved only by the
+      red glow of the logs smouldering on the hearth. In the gloom inspiration
+      visited him. He called for lights and Babylas. Both came, and he
+      dispatched the lackey that lighted the tapers to summon Monsieur d&rsquo;Aubran,
+      the commander of the garrison of Grenoble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the interval before the soldier&rsquo;s coming he conferred with Babylas
+      concerning what he had in mind, but he found his secretary singularly dull
+      and unimaginative. So that, perforce, he must fall back upon himself. He
+      sat glum and thoughtful, his mind in unproductive travail, until the
+      captain was announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Still without any definite plan, he blundered headlong, nevertheless, into
+      the necessary first step towards the fulfilment of his purpose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Captain,&rdquo; said he, looking mighty grave, &ldquo;I have cause to believe that
+      all is not as it should be in the hills in the district of Montelimar.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is there trouble, monsieur?&rdquo; inquired the captain, startled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Maybe there is, maybe there is not,&rdquo; returned the Seneschal mysteriously.
+      &ldquo;You shall have your full orders in the morning. Meanwhile, make ready to
+      repair to the neighbourhood of Montelimar to-morrow with a couple of
+      hundred men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A couple of hundred, monsieur!&rdquo; exclaimed d&rsquo;Aubran. &ldquo;But that will be to
+      empty Grenoble of soldiers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What of it? We are not likely to require them here. Let your orders for
+      preparation go round tonight, so that your knaves may be ready to set out
+      betimes to-morrow. If you will be so good as to wait upon me early you
+      shall have your instructions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mystified, Monsieur d&rsquo;Aubran departed on his errand, and my Lord Seneschal
+      went down to supper well pleased with the cunning device by which he was
+      to leave Grenoble without a garrison. It was an astute way of escape from
+      the awkward situation into which his attachment to the interests of the
+      dowager of Condillac was likely to place him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But when the morning came he was less pleased with the idea, chiefly
+      because he had been unable to invent any details that should lend it the
+      necessary colour, and d&rsquo;Aubran&mdash;worse luck&mdash;was an intelligent
+      officer who might evince a pardonable but embarrassing curiosity. A leader
+      of soldiers has a right to know something at least of the enterprise upon
+      which he leads them. By morning, too, Tressan found that the intervening
+      space of the night, since he had seen Madame de Condillac, had cooled his
+      ardour very considerably.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had reached the incipient stages of regret of his rash promise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Captain d&rsquo;Aubran was announced to him, he bade them ask him to come
+      again in an hour&rsquo;s time. From mere regrets he was passing now, through
+      dismay, into utter repentance of his promise. He sat in his study, at his
+      littered writing-table, his head in his hands, a confusion of thoughts, a
+      wild, frenzied striving after invention in his brain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus Anselme found him when he thrust aside the portiere to announce that
+      a Monsieur de Garnache, from Paris, was below, demanding to see the Lord
+      Seneschal at once upon an affair of State.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan&rsquo;s flesh trembled and his heart fainted. Then, suddenly,
+      desperately, he took his courage in both hands. He remembered who he was
+      and what he was the King&rsquo;s Lord Seneschal of the Province of Dauphiny.
+      Throughout that province, from the Rhone to the Alps, his word was law,
+      his name a terror to evildoers&mdash;and to some others besides. Was he to
+      blench and tremble at the mention of the name of a Court lackey out of
+      Paris, who brought him a message from the Queen-Regent? Body of God! not
+      he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He heaved himself to his feet, warmed and heartened by the thought; his
+      eye sparkled, and there was a deeper flush than usual upon his cheek.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Admit this Monsieur de Garnache,&rdquo; said he with a fine loftiness, and in
+      his heart he pondered what he would say and how he should say it; how he
+      should stand, how move, and how look. His roving eye caught sight of his
+      secretary. He remembered something&mdash;the cherished pose of being a man
+      plunged fathoms-deep in business. Sharply he uttered his secretary&rsquo;s name.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Babylas raised his pale face; he knew what was coming; it had come so many
+      times before. But there was no vestige of a smile on his drooping lips, no
+      gleam of amusement in his patient eye. He thrust aside the papers on which
+      he was at work, and drew towards him a fresh sheet on which to pen the
+      letter which, he knew by experience, Tressan was about to indite to the
+      Queen-mother. For these purposes Her Majesty was Tressan&rsquo;s only
+      correspondent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the door opened, the portiere was swept aside, and Anselme announced
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Garnache.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan turned as the newcomer stepped briskly into the room, and bowed,
+      hat in hand, its long crimson feather sweeping the ground, then
+      straightened himself and permitted the Seneschal to take his measure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan beheld a man of a good height, broad to the waist and spare thence
+      to the ground, who at first glance appeared to be mainly clad in leather.
+      A buff jerkin fitted his body; below it there was a glimpse of
+      wine-coloured trunks, and hose of a slightly deeper hue, which vanished
+      immediately into a pair of huge thighboots of untanned leather. A leather
+      swordbelt, gold-embroidered at the edges, carried a long steel-halted
+      rapier in a leather scabbard chaped with steel. The sleeves of his doublet
+      which protruded from his leather casing were of the same colour and
+      material as his trunks. In one hand he carried his broad black hat with
+      its crimson feather, in the other a little roll of parchment; and when he
+      moved the creak of leather and jingle of his spurs made pleasant music for
+      a martial spirit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Above all, this man&rsquo;s head, well set upon his shoulders, claimed some
+      attention. His nose was hooked and rather large, his eyes were blue,
+      bright as steel, and set a trifle wide. Above a thin-lapped, delicate
+      mouth his reddish mustachios, slightly streaked with grey, stood out,
+      bristling like a cat&rsquo;s. His hair was darker&mdash;almost brown save at the
+      temples, where age had faded it to an ashen colour. In general his aspect
+      was one of rugged strength.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal, measuring him with an adversary&rsquo;s eye, misliked his looks.
+      But he bowed urbanely, washing his hands in the air, and murmuring:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your servant, Monsieur de&mdash;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Garnache,&rdquo; came the other&rsquo;s crisp, metallic voice, and the name had a
+      sound as of an oath on his lips. &ldquo;Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache. I
+      come to you on an errand of Her Majesty&rsquo;s, as this my warrant will apprise
+      you.&rdquo; And he proffered the paper he held, which Tressan accepted from his
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A change was visible in the wily Seneschal&rsquo;s fat countenance. Its round
+      expanse had expressed interrogation until now; but at the Parisian&rsquo;s
+      announcement that he was an emissary of the Queen&rsquo;s, Tressan insinuated
+      into it just that look of surprise and of increased deference which would
+      have been natural had he not already been forewarned of Monsieur de
+      Garnache&rsquo;s mission and identity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He placed a chair at his visitor&rsquo;s disposal, himself resuming his seat at
+      his writing-table, and unfolding the paper Garnache had given him. The
+      newcomer seated himself, hitched his sword-belt round so that he could
+      lean both hands upon the hilt, and sat, stiff and immovable, awaiting the
+      Lord Seneschal&rsquo;s pleasure. From his desk across the room the secretary,
+      idly chewing the feathered end of his goose-quill, took silent stock of
+      the man from Paris, and wondered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan folded the paper carefully, and returned it to its owner. It was
+      no more than a formal credential, setting forth that Garnache was
+      travelling into Dauphiny on a State affair, and commanding Monsieur de
+      Tressan to give him every assistance he might require in the performance
+      of his errand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Parfaitement,&rdquo; purred the Lord Seneschal. &ldquo;And now, monsieur, if you will
+      communicate to me the nature of your affair, you shall find me entirely at
+      your service.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It goes without saying that you are acquainted with the Chateau de
+      Condillac?&rdquo; began Garnache, plunging straight into business.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perfectly.&rdquo; The Seneschal leaned back, and was concerned to feel his
+      pulses throbbing a shade too quickly. But he controlled his features, and
+      maintained a placid, bland expression.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are perhaps acquainted with its inhabitants?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Intimate with them?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal pursed his lips, arched his brows, and slowly waved his
+      podgy hands, a combination of grimace and gesture that said much or
+      nothing. But reflecting that Monsieur de Tressan had a tongue, Garnache
+      apparently did not opine it worth his while to set a strain upon his own
+      imagination, for&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Intimate with them?&rdquo; he repeated, and this time there was a sharper note
+      in his voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan leaned forward and brought his finger-tips together. His voice was
+      as urbane as it lay within its power to be.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understood that monsieur was proposing to state his business, not to
+      question mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache sat back in his chair, and his eyes narrowed. He scented
+      opposition, and the greatest stumbling-block in Garnache&rsquo;s career had been
+      that he could never learn to brook opposition from any man. That
+      characteristic, evinced early in life, had all but been the ruin of him.
+      He was a man of high intellectual gifts, of military skill and great
+      resource; out of consideration for which had he been chosen by Marie de
+      Medicis to come upon this errand. But he marred it all by a temper so
+      ungovernable that in Paris there was current a byword, &ldquo;Explosive as
+      Garnache.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Little did Tressan dream to what a cask of gunpowder he was applying the
+      match of his smug pertness. Nor did Garnache let him dream it just yet. He
+      controlled himself betimes, bethinking him that, after all, there might be
+      some reason in what this fat fellow said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You misapprehend my purpose, sir,&rdquo; said he, his lean brown hand stroking
+      his long chin. &ldquo;I but sought to learn how far already you may be informed
+      of what is taking place up there, to the end that I may spare myself the
+      pains of citing facts with which already you are acquainted. Still,
+      monsieur, I am willing to proceed upon the lines which would appear to be
+      more agreeable to yourself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This, then, is the sum of the affair that brings me: The late Marquis de
+      Condillac left two sons. The elder, Florimond&mdash;who is the present
+      marquis, and who has been and still continues absent, warring in Italy,
+      since before his father&rsquo;s death&mdash;is the stepson of the present
+      Dowager, she being the mother of the younger son, Marius de Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Should you observe me to be anywhere at error, I beg, monsieur, that you
+      will have the complaisance to correct me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal bowed gravely, and Monsieur de Garnache continued:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now this younger son&mdash;I believe that he is in his twenty-first year
+      at present&mdash;has been something of a scapegrace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A scapegrace? Bon Dieu, no. That is a harsh name to give him. A little
+      indiscreet at times, a little rash, as is the way of youth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He would have said more, but the man from Paris was of no mind to waste
+      time on quibbles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he snapped, cutting in. &ldquo;We will say, a little indiscreet. My
+      errand is not concerned with Monsieur Marius&rsquo;s morals or with his lack of
+      them. These indiscretions which you belittle appear to have been enough to
+      have estranged him from his father, a circumstance which but served the
+      more to endear him to his mother. I am told that she is a very handsome
+      woman, and that the boy favours her surprisingly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; sighed the Seneschal in a rapture. &ldquo;A beautiful woman&mdash;a noble,
+      splendid woman.&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hum!&rdquo; Garnache observed the ecstatic simper with a grim eye. Then he
+      proceeded with his story.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The late marquis possessed in his neighbour, the also deceased Monsieur
+      de La Vauvraye, a very dear and valued friend. Monsieur de La Vauvraye had
+      an only child, a daughter, to inherit his very considerable estates
+      probably the wealthiest in all Dauphiny, so I am informed. It was the
+      dearest wish of his heart to transform what had been a lifelong friendship
+      in his own generation into a closer relationship in the next&mdash;a wish
+      that found a very ready echo in the heart of Monsieur de Condillac.
+      Florimond de Condillac was sixteen years of age at the time, and Valerie
+      de La Vauvraye fourteen. For all their tender years, they were betrothed,
+      and they grew up to love each other and to look forward to the
+      consummation of the plans their fathers had laid for them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, monsieur,&rdquo; the Seneschal protested, &ldquo;how can you possibly infer
+      so much? How can you say that they loved each other? What authority can
+      you have for pretending to know what was in their inmost hearts?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The authority of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye,&rdquo; was the unanswerable
+      rejoinder. &ldquo;I am telling you, more or less, what she herself wrote to the
+      Queen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! Well, well&mdash;proceed, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This marriage should render Florimond de Condillac the wealthiest and
+      most powerful gentleman in Dauphiny&mdash;one of the wealthiest in France;
+      and the idea of it pleased the old marquis, inasmuch as the disparity
+      there would be between the worldly possessions of his two sons would serve
+      to mark his disapproval of the younger. But before settling down,
+      Florimond signified a desire to see the world, as was fit and proper and
+      becoming in a young man who was later to assume such wide
+      responsibilities. His father, realizing the wisdom of such a step, made
+      but slight objection, and at the age of twenty Florimond set out for the
+      Italian wars. Two years afterwards, a little over six months ago, his
+      father died, and was followed to the grave some weeks later by Monsieur de
+      La Vauvraye. The latter, with a want of foresight which has given rise to
+      the present trouble, misjudging the character of the Dowager of Condillac,
+      entrusted to her care his daughter Valerie pending Florimond&rsquo;s return,
+      when the nuptials would naturally be immediately celebrated. I am probably
+      telling you no more than you already know. But you owe the infliction to
+      your own unwillingness to answer my questions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no, monsieur; I assure you that in what you say there is much that is
+      entirely new to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I rejoice to hear it, Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; said Garnache very seriously,
+      &ldquo;for had you been in possession of all these facts, Her Majesty might have
+      a right to learn how it chanced that you had nowise interfered in what is
+      toward at Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But to proceed: Madame de Condillac and her precious Benjamin&mdash;this
+      Marius&mdash;finding themselves, in Florimond&rsquo;s absence, masters of the
+      situation, have set about turning it to their own best advantage.
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, whilst being nominally under their
+      guardianship, finds herself practically gaoled by them, and odious plans
+      are set before her to marry Marius. Could the Dowager but accomplish this,
+      it would seem that she would not only be assuring a future of ease and
+      dignity for her son, but also be giving vent to all her pent-up hatred of
+      her stepson.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle, however, withstands them, and in this she is aided by a
+      fortuitous circumstance which has arisen out of the overbearing arrogance
+      that appears to be madame&rsquo;s chief characteristic. Condillac after the
+      marquis&rsquo;s death had refused to pay tithes to Mother Church and has flouted
+      and insulted the Bishop. This prelate, after finding remonstrance vain,
+      has retorted by placing Condillac under an Interdict, depriving all within
+      it of the benefit of clergy. Thus, they have been unable to find a priest
+      to venture thither, so that even had they willed to marry mademoiselle by
+      force to Marius, they lacked the actual means of doing so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Florimond continues absent. We have every reason to believe that he has
+      been left in ignorance of his father&rsquo;s death. Letters coming from him from
+      time to time prove that he was alive and well at least until three months
+      ago. A messenger has been dispatched to find him and urge him to return
+      home at once. But pending his arrival the Queen has determined to take the
+      necessary steps to ensure that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye shall be
+      released from her captivity, that she shall suffer no further molestation
+      at the hands of Madame de Condillac and her son&mdash;enfin, that she
+      shall run no further risks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My errand, monsieur, is to acquaint you with these facts, and to request
+      you to proceed to Condillac and deliver thence Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye, whom I am subsequently to escort to Paris and place under Her
+      Majesty&rsquo;s protection until such time as the new marquis shall return to
+      claim her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Having concluded, Monsieur de Garnache sat back in his chair, and threw
+      one leg over the other, fixing his eyes upon the Seneschal&rsquo;s face and
+      awaiting his reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On that gross countenance before him he saw fall the shadow of perplexity.
+      Tressan was monstrous ill-at-ease, and his face lost a good deal of its
+      habitual plethora of colour. He sought to temporize.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does it not occur to you, monsieur, that perhaps too much importance may
+      have been attached to the word of this child&mdash;this Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does it occur to you that such has been the case, that she has overstated
+      it?&rdquo; counter-questioned Monsieur de Garnache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no. I do not say that. But&mdash;but&mdash;would it not be better&mdash;more&mdash;ah&mdash;satisfactory
+      to all concerned, if you yourself were to go to Condillac, and deliver
+      your message in person, demanding mademoiselle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man from Paris looked at him a moment, then stood up suddenly, and
+      shifted the carriages of his sword back to their normal position. His
+      brows came together in a frown, from which the Seneschal argued that his
+      suggestion was not well received.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said the Parisian very coldly, like a man who contains a
+      rising anger, &ldquo;let me tell you that this is the first time in my life that
+      I have been concerned in anything that had to do with women and I am close
+      upon forty years of age. The task, I can assure you, was little to my
+      taste. I embarked upon it because, being a soldier and having received my
+      orders, I was in the unfortunate position of being unable to help myself.
+      But I intend, monsieur, to adhere rigidly to the letter of these commands.
+      Already I have endured more than enough in the interests of this damsel. I
+      have ridden from Paris, and that means close upon a week in the saddle&mdash;no
+      little thing to a man who has acquired certain habits of life and
+      developed a taste for certain minor comforts which he is very reluctant to
+      forgo. I have fed and slept at inns, living on the worst of fares and
+      sleeping on the hardest, and hardly the cleanest, of beds. Ventregris!
+      Figure to yourself that last night we lay at Luzan, in the only inn the
+      place contained&mdash;a hovel, Monsieur le Seneschal, a hovel in which I
+      would not kennel a dog I loved.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His face flushed, and his voice rose as he dwelt upon the things he had
+      undergone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My servant and I slept in a dormitory&rsquo;&mdash;a thousand devils! monsieur,
+      in a dormitory! Do you realize it? We had for company a drunken vintner, a
+      pedlar, a pilgrim on his way to Rome, and two peasant women; and they sent
+      us to bed without candles, for modesty&rsquo;s sake. I ask you to conceive my
+      feelings in such a case as that. I could tell you more; but that as a
+      sample of what I have undergone could scarcely be surpassed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Truly-truly outrageous,&rdquo; sympathized the Seneschal; yet he grinned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I ask you&mdash;have I not suffered inconvenience enough already in the
+      service of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye that you can blame me if I refuse
+      to go a single step further than my orders bid me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal stared at him now in increasing dismay. Had his own
+      interests been less at issue he could have indulged his mirth at the
+      other&rsquo;s fiery indignation at the inconveniences he recited. As it was, he
+      had nothing to say; no thought or feeling other than what concerned
+      finding a way of escape from the net that seemed to be closing in about
+      him&mdash;how to seem to serve the Queen without turning against the
+      Dowager of Condillac; how to seem to serve the Dowager without opposing
+      the wishes of the Queen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A plague on the girl!&rdquo; he growled, unconsciously uttering his thoughts
+      aloud. &ldquo;The devil take her!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache smiled grimly. &ldquo;That is a bond of sympathy between us,&rdquo; said he.
+      &ldquo;I have said those very words a hundred times&mdash;a thousand times,
+      indeed&mdash;between Paris and Grenoble. Yet I scarcely see that you can
+      damn her with as much justice as can I.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But there, monsieur; all this is unprofitable. You have my message. I
+      shall spend the day at Grenoble, and take a well-earned rest. By this time
+      to-morrow I shall be ready to start upon my return journey. I shall have
+      then the honour to wait upon you again, to the end that I may receive from
+      you the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. I shall count upon your
+      having her here, in readiness to set out with me, by noon to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed, with a flourish of his plumed hat, and would with that have
+      taken his departure but that the Seneschal stayed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, monsieur,&rdquo; he cried, in piteous affright, &ldquo;you do not know the
+      Dowager of Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, no. What of it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What of it? Did you know her, you would understand that she is not the
+      woman to be driven. I may order her in the Queen&rsquo;s name to deliver up
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But she will withstand me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Withstand you?&rdquo; echoed Garnache, frowning into the face of this fat man,
+      who had risen also, brought to his feet by excitement. &ldquo;Withstand you&mdash;you,
+      the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny? You are amusing yourself at my expense.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I tell you that she will,&rdquo; the other insisted in a passion. &ldquo;You may
+      look for the girl in vain tomorrow unless you go to Condillac yourself and
+      take her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache drew himself up and delivered his answer in a tone that was
+      final.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are the governor of the province, monsieur, and in this matter you
+      have in addition the Queen&rsquo;s particular authority&mdash;nay, her commands
+      are imposed upon you. Those commands, as interpreted by me, you will
+      execute in the manner I have indicated.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and chewed a second at his beard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is an easy thing for you to tell me what to do. Tell me, rather, how
+      to do it, how to overcome her opposition.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very sure of opposition&mdash;strangely sure, monsieur,&rdquo; said
+      Garnache, looking him between the eyes. &ldquo;In any case, you have soldiers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And so has she, and the strongest castle in southern France&mdash;to say
+      nothing of the most cursed obstinacy in the world. What she says, she
+      does.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what the Queen says her loyal servants do,&rdquo; was Garnache&rsquo;s rejoinder,
+      in a withering tone. &ldquo;I think there is nothing more to be said, monsieur,&rdquo;
+       he added. &ldquo;By this time to-morrow I shall expect to receive from you,
+      here, the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. A demain, donc, Monsieur
+      le Seneschal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And with another bow the man from Paris drew himself erect, turned on his
+      heel, and went jingling and creaking from the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Lord Seneschal sank back in his chair, and wondered to himself whether
+      to die might not prove an easy way out of the horrid situation into which
+      chance and his ill-starred tenderness for the Dowager of Condillac had
+      thrust him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At his desk sat his secretary, who had been a witness of the interview,
+      lost in wonder almost as great as the Seneschal&rsquo;s own.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For an hour Tressan remained where he was, deep in thought and gnawing at
+      his beard. Then with a sudden burst of passion, expressed in a round oath
+      or two, he rose, and called for his horse that he might ride to Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER III. THE DOWAGER&rsquo;S COMPLIANCE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Promptly at noon on the morrow Monsieur de Garnache presented himself once
+      more at the Seneschal&rsquo;s palace, and with him went Rabecque, his
+      body-servant, a lean, swarthy, sharp-faced man, a trifle younger than his
+      master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Anselme, the obese master of the household, received them with profound
+      respect, and at once conducted Garnache to Monsieur de Tressan&rsquo;s presence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the stairs they met Captain d&rsquo;Aubran, who was descending. The captain
+      was not in the best of humours. For four-and-twenty hours he had kept two
+      hundred of his men under arms, ready to march as soon as he should receive
+      his orders from the Lord Seneschal, yet those instructions were not
+      forthcoming. He had been to seek them again that morning, only to be again
+      put off.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Monsieur de Garnache had considerable doubt, born of his yesterday&rsquo;s
+      interview with the Seneschal, that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye would be
+      delivered into his charge as he had stipulated. His relief was, therefore,
+      considerable, upon being ushered into Tressan&rsquo;s presence, to find a lady
+      in cloak and hat, dressed as for a journey, seated in a chair by the great
+      fireplace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan advanced to meet him, a smile of cordial welcome on his lips, and
+      they bowed to each other in formal greeting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see, monsieur,&rdquo; said the Seneschal, waving a plump hand in the
+      direction of the lady, &ldquo;that you have been obeyed. Here is your charge.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then to the lady: &ldquo;This is Monsieur de Garnache,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;of whom I
+      have already told you, who is to conduct you to Paris by order of Her
+      Majesty.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now, my good friends, however great the pleasure I derive from your
+      company, I care not how soon you set out, for I have some prodigious
+      arrears of work upon my hands.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache bowed to the lady, who returned his greeting by an inclination of
+      the head, and his keen eyes played briskly over her. She was a
+      plump-faced, insipid child, with fair hair and pale blue eyes, stolid and
+      bovine in their expressionlessness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite ready, monsieur,&rdquo; said she, rising as she spoke, and gathering
+      her cloak about her; and Garnache remarked that her voice had the southern
+      drawl, her words the faintest suggestion of a patois. It was amazing how a
+      lady born and bred could degenerate in the rusticity of Dauphiny. Pigs and
+      cows, he made no doubt, had been her chief objectives. Yet, even so, he
+      thought he might have expected that she would have had more to say to him
+      than just those five words expressing her readiness to depart. He had
+      looked for some acknowledgment of satisfaction at his presence, some
+      utterances of gratitude either to himself or to the Queen-Regent for the
+      promptness with which she had been succoured. He was disappointed, but he
+      showed nothing of it, as with a simple inclination of the head&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good!&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Since you are ready and Monsieur le Seneschal is anxious
+      to be rid of us, let us by all means be moving. You have a long and
+      tedious journey before you, mademoiselle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&mdash;I am prepared for that,&rdquo; she faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stood aside, and bending from the waist he made a sweeping gesture
+      towards the door with the hand that held his hat. To the invitation to
+      precede him she readily responded, and, with a bow to the Seneschal, she
+      began to walk across the apartment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache&rsquo;s eyes, narrowing slightly, followed her, like points of steel.
+      Suddenly he shot a disturbing glance at Tressan&rsquo;s face, and the corner of
+      his wild-cat mustachios twitched. He stood erect, and called her very
+      sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stopped, and turned to face him, an incredible shyness seeming to
+      cause her to avoid his gaze.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have, no doubt, Monsieur le Seneschal&rsquo;s word for my identity. But I
+      think it is as well that you should satisfy yourself. Before placing
+      yourself entirely in my care, as you are about to do, you would be well
+      advised to assure yourself, that I am indeed Her Majesty&rsquo;s emissary. Will
+      you be good enough to glance at this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He drew forth as he spoke the letter in the queen&rsquo;s own hand, turned it
+      upside down, and so presented it to her. The Seneschal looked on stolidly,
+      a few paces distant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But certainly, mademoiselle, assure yourself that this gentleman is no
+      other than I have told you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus enjoined, she took the letter; for a second her eyes met Garnache&rsquo;s
+      glittering gaze, and she shivered. Then she bent her glance to the
+      writing, and studied it a moment, what time the man from Paris watched her
+      closely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently she handed it back to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you, monsieur,&rdquo; was all she said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are satisfied that it is in order, mademoiselle?&rdquo; he inquired, and a
+      note of mockery too subtle for her or the Seneschal ran through his
+      question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite satisfied.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache turned to Tressan. His eyes were smiling, but unpleasantly, and
+      in his voice when he spoke there was something akin to the distant rumble
+      that heralds an approaching storm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;has received an eccentric education.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Eh?&rdquo; quoth Tressan, perplexed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have heard tell, monsieur, of a people somewhere in the East who read
+      and write from right to left; but never yet have I heard tell of any&mdash;particularly
+      in France&mdash;so oddly schooled as to do their reading upside down.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan caught the drift of the other&rsquo;s meaning. He paled a little, and
+      sucked his lip, his eyes wandering to the girl, who stood in stolid
+      inapprehension of what was being said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did she do that?&rdquo; said he, and he scarcely knew what he was saying; all
+      that he realized was that it urged him to explain this thing.
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle&rsquo;s education has been neglected&mdash;a by no means uncommon
+      happening in these parts. She is sensitive of it; she seeks to hide the
+      fact.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the storm broke about their heads. And it crashed and thundered
+      awfully in the next few minutes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O liar! O damned, audacious liar,&rdquo; roared Garnache uncompromisingly,
+      advancing a step upon the Seneschal, and shaking the parchment
+      threateningly in his very face, as though it were become a weapon of
+      offence. &ldquo;Was it to hide the fact that she had not been taught to write
+      that she sent the Queen a letter pages-long? Who is this woman?&rdquo; And the
+      finger he pointed at the girl quivered with the rage that filled him at
+      this trick they had thought to put upon him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan sought refuge in offended dignity. He drew himself up, threw back
+      his head, and looked the Parisian fiercely in the eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Since you take this tone with me, monsieur&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I take with you&mdash;as with any man&mdash;the tone that to me seems
+      best. You miserable fool! As sure as you&rsquo;re a rogue this affair shall cost
+      you your position. You have waxed fat and sleek in your seneschalship;
+      this easy life in Dauphiny appears to have been well suited to your
+      health. But as your paunch has grown, so, of a truth, have your brains
+      dwindled, else had you never thought to cheat me quite so easily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I some lout who has spent his days herding swine, think you, that you
+      could trick me into believing this creature to be Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye&mdash;this creature with the mien of a peasant, with a breath
+      reeking of garlic like a third-rate eating-house, and the walk of a woman
+      who has never known footgear until this moment? Tell me, sir, for what
+      manner of fool did you take me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal stood with blanched face and gaping mouth, his fire all
+      turned to ashes before the passion of this gaunt man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache paid no heed to him. He stepped to the girl, and roughly raised
+      her chin with his hand so that she was forced to look him in the face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is your name, wench?&rdquo; he asked her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Margot,&rdquo; she blubbered, bursting into tears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He dropped her chin, and turned away with a gesture of disgust.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Get you gone,&rdquo; he bade her harshly. &ldquo;Get you back to the kitchen or the
+      onion-field from which they took you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And the girl, scarce believing her good fortune, departed with a speed
+      that bordered on the ludicrous. Tressan had naught to say, no word to stay
+      her with; pretence, he realized, was vain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, my Lord Seneschal,&rdquo; quoth Garnache, arms akimbo, feet planted wide,
+      and eyes upon the wretched man&rsquo;s countenance, &ldquo;what may you have to say to
+      me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan shifted his position; he avoided the other&rsquo;s glance; he was
+      visibly trembling, and when presently he spoke it was in faltering
+      accents.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It&mdash;it&mdash;seems, monsieur, that&mdash;ah&mdash;that I have been
+      the victim of some imposture.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It had rather seemed to me that the victim chosen was myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Clearly we were both victims,&rdquo; the Seneschal rejoined. Then he proceeded
+      to explain. &ldquo;I went to Condillac yesterday as you desired me, and after a
+      stormy interview with the Marquise I obtained from her&mdash;as I believed&mdash;the
+      person of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. You see I was not myself acquainted
+      with the lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache looked at him. He did not believe him. He regretted almost that
+      he had not further questioned the girl. But, after all, perhaps it might
+      be easier and more expedient if he were to appear to accept the
+      Seneschal&rsquo;s statement. But he must provide against further fraud.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Seneschal,&rdquo; said he in calmer tones, putting his anger from
+      him, &ldquo;at the best you are a blunderer and an ass, at the worst a traitor.
+      I will inquire no further at present; I&rsquo;ll not seek to discriminate too
+      finely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, these insults&mdash;&rdquo; began the Seneschal, summoning dignity to
+      his aid. But Garnache broke in:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;La, la! I speak in the Queen&rsquo;s name. If you have thought to aid the
+      Dowager of Condillac in this resistance of Her Majesty&rsquo;s mandate, let me
+      enjoin you, as you value your seneschalship&mdash;as you value your very
+      neck&mdash;to harbour that thought no longer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems that, after all, I must deal myself with the situation. I must
+      go myself to Condillac. If they should resist me, I shall look to you for
+      the necessary means to overcome that resistance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And bear you this in mind: I have chosen to leave it an open question
+      whether you were a party to the trick it has been sought to put upon the
+      Queen, through me, her representative. But it is a question that I have it
+      in my power to resolve at any moment&mdash;to resolve as I choose. Unless,
+      monsieur, I find you hereafter&mdash;as I trust&mdash;actuated by the most
+      unswerving loyalty, I shall resolve that question by proclaiming you a
+      traitor; and as a traitor I shall arrest you and carry you to Paris.
+      Monsieur le Seneschal, I have the honour to give you good-day!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When he was gone, Monsieur de Tressan flung off his wig, and mopped the
+      perspiration from his brow. He went white as snow and red as fire by
+      turns, as he paced the apartment in a frenzy. Never in the fifteen years
+      that were sped since he had been raised to the governorship of the
+      province had any man taken such a tone with him and harangued him in such
+      terms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A liar and a traitor had he been called that morning, a knave and a fool;
+      he had been browbeaten and threatened; and he had swallowed it all, and
+      almost turned to lick the hand that administered the dose. Dame! What
+      manner of cur was he become? And the man who had done all this&mdash;a
+      vulgar upstart out of Paris, reeking of leather and the barrack-room still
+      lived!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Bloodshed was in his mind; murder beckoned him alluringly to take her as
+      his ally. But he put the thought from him, frenzied though he might be. He
+      must fight this knave with other weapons; frustrate his mission, and send
+      him back to Paris and the Queen&rsquo;s scorn, beaten and empty-handed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Babylas!&rdquo; he shouted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Immediately the secretary appeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you given thought to the matter of Captain d&rsquo;Aubran?&rdquo; he asked, his
+      voice an impatient snarl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, monsieur, I have pondered it all morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well? And what have you concluded?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Helas! monsieur, nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan smote the table before him a blow that shook some of the dust out
+      of the papers that cumbered it. &ldquo;Ventregris! How am I served? For what do
+      I pay you, and feed you, and house you, good-for-naught, if you are to
+      fail me whenever I need the things you call your brains? Have you no
+      intelligence, no thought, no imagination? Can you invent no plausible
+      business, no likely rising, no possible disturbances that shall justify my
+      sending Aubran and his men to Montelimar&mdash;to the very devil, if need
+      be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The secretary trembled in his every limb; his eyes shunned his master&rsquo;s as
+      his master&rsquo;s had shunned Garnache&rsquo;s awhile ago. The Seneschal was enjoying
+      himself. If he had been bullied and browbeaten, here, at least, was one
+      upon whom he, in his turn, might taste the joys of bullying and
+      browbeating.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You lazy, miserable calf,&rdquo; he stormed, &ldquo;I might be better served by a
+      wooden image. Go! It seems I must rely upon myself. It is always so.
+      Wait!&rdquo; he thundered; for the secretary, only too glad to obey his last
+      order, had already reached the door. &ldquo;Tell Anselme to bid the Captain
+      attend me here at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Babylas&rsquo;s bowed and went his errand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A certain amount of his ill-humour vented, Tressan made an effort to
+      regain his self-control. He passed his handkerchief for the last time over
+      face and head, and resumed his wig.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When d&rsquo;Aubran entered, the Seneschal was composed and in his wonted habit
+      of ponderous dignity. &ldquo;Ah, d&rsquo;Aubran,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;your men are ready?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They have been ready these four-and-twenty hours, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good. You are a brisk soldier, d&rsquo;Aubran. You are a man to be relied
+      upon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      D&rsquo;Aubran bowed. He was a tall, active young fellow with a pleasant face
+      and a pair of fine black eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Seneschal is very good.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With a wave of the hand the Seneschal belittled his own goodness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will march out of Grenoble within the hour, Captain, and you will
+      lead your men to Montelimar. There you will quarter them, and await my
+      further orders. Babylas will give you a letter to the authorities,
+      charging them to find you suitable quarters. While there, d&rsquo;Aubran, and
+      until my further orders reach you, you will employ your time in probing
+      the feeling in the hill district. You understand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Imperfectly,&rdquo; d&rsquo;Aubran confessed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will understand better when you have been in Montelimar a week or so.
+      It may, of course, be a false alarm. Still, we must safeguard the King&rsquo;s
+      interests and be prepared. Perhaps we may afterwards be charged with
+      starting at shadows; but it is better to be on the alert from the moment
+      the shadow is perceived than to wait until the substance itself has
+      overwhelmed us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It sounded so very much as if the Seneschal&rsquo;s words really had some hidden
+      meaning, that d&rsquo;Aubran, if not content with going upon an errand of which
+      he knew so little, was, at least, reconciled to obey the orders he
+      received. He uttered words that conveyed some such idea to Tressan&rsquo;s mind,
+      and within a half-hour he was marching out of Grenoble with beating drums,
+      on his two days&rsquo; journey to Montelimar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IV. THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      As Captain d&rsquo;Aubran and his troop were speeding westwards from Grenoble,
+      Monsieur de Garnache, ever attended by his man, rode briskly in the
+      opposite direction, towards the grey towers of Condillac, that reared
+      themselves towards the greyer sky above the valley of the Isere. It was a
+      chill, dull, autumnal day, with a raw wind blowing from the Alps; its
+      breath was damp, and foretold of the rain that was likely to come anon,
+      the rain with which the clouds hanging low about the distant hills were
+      pregnant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Monsieur de Garnache was totally insensible to his surroundings; his
+      mind was very busy with the interview from which he had come, and the
+      interview to which he was speeding. Once he permitted himself a
+      digression, that he might point a moral for the benefit of his servant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see, Rebecque, what a plague it is to have to do with women. Are you
+      sufficiently grateful to me for having quelled your matrimonial ardour of
+      two months ago? No, you are not. Grateful you may be; sufficiently
+      grateful, never; it would be impossible. No gratitude could be
+      commensurate with the benefit I conferred upon you. Yet if you had
+      married, and discovered for yourself the troubles that come from too close
+      an association with that sex which some wag of old ironically called the
+      weaker, and of which contemporary fools with no sense of irony continue so
+      to speak in good faith, you could have blamed only yourself. You would
+      have shrugged your shoulders and made the best of it, realizing that no
+      other man had put this wrong upon you. But with me&mdash;thousand devils!&mdash;it
+      is very different. I am a man who, in one particular at least, has chosen
+      his way of life with care; I have seen to it that I should walk a road
+      unencumbered by any petticoat. What happens? What comes of all my careful
+      plans?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fate sends an infernal cut-throat to murder our good king&mdash;whose
+      soul God rest eternally! And since his son is of an age too tender to
+      wield the sceptre, the boy&rsquo;s mother does it in his name. Thus, I, a
+      soldier, being subject to the head of the State, find myself, by no
+      devising of my own, subject to a woman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In itself that is bad enough. Too bad, indeed&mdash;Ventregris!&mdash;too
+      bad. Yet Fate is not content. It must occur to this woman to select me&mdash;me
+      of all men&mdash;to journey into Dauphiny, and release another woman from
+      the clutches of yet a third. And to what shifts are we not put, to what
+      discomforts not subjected? You know them, Rabecque, for you have shared
+      them with me. But it begins to break upon my mind that what we have
+      endured may be as nothing to what may lie before us. It is an ill thing to
+      have to do with women. Yet you, Rabecque, would have deserted me for one
+      of them!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque was silent. Maybe he was ashamed of himself; or maybe that, not
+      agreeing with his master, he had yet sufficient appreciation of his
+      position to be discreetly silent where his opinions might be at variance.
+      Thus Garnache was encouraged to continue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what is all this trouble about, which they have sent me to set right?
+      About a marriage. There is a girl wants to marry one man, and a woman who
+      wants to marry her to another. Ponder the possibilities of tragedy in such
+      a situation. Half this world&rsquo;s upheavals have had their source in less.
+      Yet you, Rabecque, would have married!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Necessity at last turned his discourse to other matters.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me, now,&rdquo; said he abruptly, in a different tone, &ldquo;is there
+      hereabouts a ford?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a bridge up yonder, monsieur,&rdquo; returned the servant, thankful to
+      have the conversation changed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They rode towards it in silence, Garnache&rsquo;s eyes set now upon the grey
+      pile that crowned the hillock, a half-mile away, on the opposite bank of
+      the stream. They crossed the bridge and rode up the gently rising, bare,
+      and rugged ground towards Condillac. The place wore an entirely peaceful
+      air, strong and massive though it appeared. It was encircled by a ditch,
+      but the drawbridge was down, and the rust on its chains argued that long
+      had it been so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      None coming to challenge them, the pair rode across the planks, and the
+      dull thud of their hooves started into activity some one in the gatehouse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A fellow rudely clad&mdash;a hybrid between man-at-arms and lackey&mdash;lounged
+      on a musket to confront them in the gateway. Monsieur de Garnache
+      announced his name, adding that he came to crave an audience of Madame la
+      Marquise, and the man stood aside to admit him. Thus he and Rabecque rode
+      forward into the roughly paved courtyard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From several doorways other men emerged, some of martial bearing, showing
+      that the place was garrisoned to some extent. Garnache took little heed of
+      them. He flung his reins to the man whom he had first addressed&mdash;the
+      fellow had kept pace beside him&mdash;and leapt nimbly to the ground,
+      bidding Rabecque await him there.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldier lackey resigned the reins to Rabecque, and requested Monsieur
+      de Garnache to follow him. He led the way through a door on the left, down
+      a passage and across an anteroom, and ushered the visitor finally into a
+      spacious, gloomy hall, panelled in black oak and lighted as much by the
+      piled-up fire that flared on the noble hearth as by the grey daylight that
+      filtered through the tall mullioned windows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As they entered, a liver-coloured hound that lay stretched before the fire
+      growled lazily, and showed the whites of his eyes. Paying little attention
+      to the dog, Garnache looked about him. The apartment was handsome beyond
+      praise, in a sombre, noble fashion. It was hung with pictures of departed
+      Condillacs&mdash;some of them rudely wrought enough&mdash;with trophies of
+      ancient armour, and with implements of the chase. In the centre stood an
+      oblong table of black oak, very richly carved about its massive legs, and
+      in a china bowl, on this, an armful of late roses filled the room with
+      their sweet fragrance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Garnache espied a page on the window-seat, industriously burnishing a
+      cuirass. He pursued his task, indifferent to the newcomer&rsquo;s advent, until
+      the knave who had conducted thither the Parisian called the boy and bade
+      him go tell the Marquise that a Monsieur de Garnache, with a message from
+      the Queen-Regent, begged an audience.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The boy rose, and simultaneously, out of a great chair by the hearth,
+      whose tall back had hitherto concealed him, there rose another figure.
+      This was a stripling of some twenty summers&mdash;twenty-one, in fact&mdash;of
+      a pale, beautifully featured face, black hair and fine black eyes, and
+      very sumptuously clad in a suit of shimmering silk whose colour shifted
+      from green to purple as he moved.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Monsieur de Garnache assumed that he was in the presence of Marius de
+      Condillac. He bowed a trifle stiffly, and was surprised to have his bow
+      returned with a graciousness that amounted almost to cordiality.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are from Paris, monsieur?&rdquo; said the young man, in a gentle, pleasant
+      voice. &ldquo;I fear you have had indifferent weather for your journey.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache thought of other things besides the weather that he had found
+      indifferent, and he felt warmed almost to the point of anger at the very
+      recollection. But he bowed again, and answered amiably enough.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young man offered him a seat, assuring him that his mother would not
+      keep him waiting long. The page had already gone upon his errand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache took the proffered chair, and sank down with creak and jingle to
+      warm himself at the fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From what you have said, I gather that you are Monsieur Marius de
+      Condillac,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I, as you may have heard me announced by your
+      servant, am Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache&mdash;at your service.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have heard of you, Monsieur de Garnache,&rdquo; said the youth as he crossed
+      his shapely legs of silken violet, and fingered the great pearl that
+      depended from his ear. &ldquo;But we had thought that by now you would be on
+      your way to Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No doubt&mdash;with Margot,&rdquo; was the grim rejoinder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Marius either gathered no suggestion from its grimness, or did not
+      know the name Garnache uttered, for he continued:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We understood that you were to escort Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to
+      Paris, to place her under the tutelage of the Queen-Regent. I will not
+      conceal from you that we were chagrined at the reflection cast upon
+      Condillac; nevertheless, Her Majesty&rsquo;s word is law in Dauphiny as much as
+      it is in Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quite as much, and I am relieved to hear you confess it,&rdquo; said Garnache
+      drily, and he scanned more closely the face of this young man. He found
+      cause to modify the excellent impression he had received at first.
+      Marius&rsquo;s eyebrows were finely pencilled, but they arched a shade too much,
+      and his eyes were set a trifle too closely; the mouth, which had seemed
+      beautiful at first, looked, in addition, on this closer inspection, weak,
+      sensual, and cruel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There fell upon the momentary silence the sound of an opening door, and
+      both men rose simultaneously to their feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the splendid woman that entered, Monsieur de Garnache saw a wonderful
+      likeness to the boy who stood beside him. She received the emissary very
+      graciously. Marius set a chair for her between the two they had been
+      occupying, and thus interchanging phrases of agreeable greeting the three
+      sat down about the hearth with every show of the greatest amity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A younger man might have been put out of countenance; the woman&rsquo;s
+      surpassing beauty, her charm of manner, her melodious voice, falling on
+      the ear soft and gentle as a caress, might have turned a man of less
+      firmness a little from his purpose, a little perhaps from his loyalty and
+      the duty that had brought him all the way from Paris. But Monsieur de
+      Garnache was to her thousand graces as insensible as a man of stone. And
+      he came to business briskly. He had no mind to spend the day at her
+      fireside in pleasant, meaningless talk.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;monsieur your son informs me that you have heard of me
+      and of the business that brings me into Dauphiny. I had not looked for the
+      honour of journeying quite so far as Condillac; but since Monsieur de
+      Tressan, whom I made my ambassador, appears to have failed so signally, I
+      am constrained to inflict my presence upon you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Inflict?&rdquo; quoth she, with a pretty look of make-believe dismay. &ldquo;How
+      harsh a word, monsieur!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The smoothness of the implied compliment annoyed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will use any word you think more adequate, madame, if you will suggest
+      it,&rdquo; he answered tartly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There are a dozen I might suggest that would better fit the case&mdash;and
+      with more justice to yourself,&rdquo; she answered, with a smile that revealed a
+      gleam of white teeth behind her scarlet lips. &ldquo;Marcus, bid Benoit bring
+      wine. Monsieur de Garnache will no doubt be thirsting after his ride.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache said nothing. Acknowledge the courtesy he would not; refuse it he
+      could not. So he sat, and waited for her to speak, his eyes upon the fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame had already set herself a course. Keener witted than her son, she
+      had readily understood, upon Garnache&rsquo;s being announced to her, that his
+      visit meant the failure of the imposture by which she had sought to be rid
+      of him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think, monsieur,&rdquo; she said presently, watching him from under her lids,
+      &ldquo;that we have, all of us who are concerned in Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye&rsquo;s affairs, been at cross-purposes. She is an impetuous, impulsive
+      child, and it happened that some little time ago we had words&mdash;such
+      things will happen in the most united families. Whilst the heat of her
+      foolish anger was upon her, she wrote a letter to the Queen, in which she
+      desired to be removed from my tutelage. Since then, monsieur, she has come
+      to repent her of it. You, who no doubt understand a woman&rsquo;s mind&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Set out upon no such presumption, madame,&rdquo; he interrupted. &ldquo;I know as
+      little of a woman&rsquo;s mind as any man who thinks he knows a deal&mdash;and
+      that is nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed as at an excellent jest, and Marius, overhearing Garnache&rsquo;s
+      retort as he was returning to resume his seat, joined in her laugh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Paris is a fine whetstone for a man&rsquo;s wits,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I take it, madame, that you wish me to understand that Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye, repenting of her letter, desires no longer to repair to Paris;
+      desires, in fact, to remain here at Condillac in your excellent care.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You apprehend the position exactly, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To my mind,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;it presents few features difficult of
+      apprehension.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius&rsquo;s eyes flashed his mother a look of relief; but the Marquise, who
+      had an ear more finely trained, caught the vibration of a second meaning
+      in the emissary&rsquo;s words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All being as you say, madame,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;will you tell me why,
+      instead of some message to this purport, you sent Monsieur de Tressan back
+      to me with a girl taken from some kitchen or barnyard, whom it was sought
+      to pass off upon me as Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise laughed, and her son, who had shown signs of perturbation,
+      taking his cue from her, laughed too.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a jest, monsieur&rdquo;&mdash;she told him, miserably conscious that the
+      explanation could sound no lamer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My compliments, madame, upon the humour that prevails in Dauphiny. But
+      your jest failed of its purpose. It did not amuse me, nor, so far as I
+      could discern, was Monsieur de Tressan greatly taken with it. But all this
+      is of little moment, madame,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;Since you tell me that
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye is content to remain here, I am satisfied that
+      it is so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They were the very words that she desired to hear from him; yet his manner
+      of uttering them gave her little reassurance. The smile on her lips was
+      forced; her watchful eyes smiled not at all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Still,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;you will be so good as to remember that I am not
+      my own master in this affair. Were that so, I should not fail to relieve
+      you at once of my unbidden presence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, monsieur&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, being the Queen&rsquo;s emissary, I have her orders to obey, and those
+      orders are to convey Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to Paris. They make no
+      allowance for any change that may have occurred in mademoiselle&rsquo;s
+      inclinations. If the journey is now distasteful to her, she has but her
+      own rashness to blame in having sought it herself. What imports is that
+      she is bidden by the Queen to repair to Paris; as a loyal subject she must
+      obey the Queen&rsquo;s commands; you, as a loyal subject, must see to it that
+      she obeys them. So, madame, I count upon your influence with mademoiselle
+      to see that she is ready to set out by noon to-morrow. One day already has
+      been wasted me by your&mdash;ah&mdash;jest, madame. The Queen likes her
+      ambassadors to be brisk.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager reclined in her chair, and bit her lip. This man was too keen
+      for her. She had no illusions. He had seen through her as if she had been
+      made of glass; he had penetrated her artifices and detected her
+      falsehoods. Yet feigning to believe her and them, he had first neutralized
+      her only weapons&mdash;other than offensive&mdash;then used them for her
+      own defeat. Marius it was who took up the conversation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; he cried&mdash;and there was a frown drawing together his fine
+      brows&mdash;&ldquo;what you suggest amounts to a tyranny on the Queen&rsquo;s part.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache was on his feet, his chair grating the polished floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur says?&rdquo; quoth he, his glittering eye challenging the rash boy to
+      repeat his words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the Dowager intervened with a little trill of laughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bon Dieu! Marius, what are you saying? Foolish boy! And you, Monsieur de
+      Garnache, do not heed him, I beg you. We are so far from Court in this
+      little corner of Dauphiny, and my son has been reared in so free an
+      atmosphere that he is sometimes betrayed into expressions whose
+      impropriety he does not realize.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache bowed in token of his perfect satisfaction, and at that moment
+      two servants entered bearing flagons and beakers, fruits and sweetmeats,
+      which they placed upon the table. The Dowager rose, and went to do the
+      honours of the board. The servants withdrew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will taste our wine of Condillac, monsieur?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He acquiesced, expressing thanks, and watched her fill a beaker for him,
+      one for herself, and another for her son. She brought him the cup in her
+      hands. He took it with a grave inclination of the head. Then she proffered
+      him the sweetmeats. To take one, he set down the cup on the table, by
+      which he had also come to stand. His left hand was gloved and held his
+      beaver and whip.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nibbled, herself, at one of the comfits, and he followed her example.
+      The boy, a trifle sullen since the last words, stood on the hearth with
+      his back to the fire, his hands clasped behind him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;do you think it would enable you to comply with
+      what I have signified to be not only our own wishes, but those of
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye herself, if she were to state them to you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked up sharply, his lips parting in a smile that revealed his strong
+      white teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you proposing another of your jests, madame?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed outright. A wonderful assurance was hers, thought Monsieur de
+      Garnache. &ldquo;Mon Dieu! no, monsieur,&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;If you will, you may see
+      the lady herself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took a turn in the apartment, idly, as does a man in thought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; said he, at last. &ldquo;I do not say that it will alter my
+      determination. But perhaps&mdash;yes, I should be glad of an opportunity
+      of the honour of making Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye&rsquo;s acquaintance. But no
+      impersonations, I beg, madame!&rdquo; He said it half-laughingly, taking his cue
+      from her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need have no fear of any.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She walked to the door, opened it, and called &ldquo;Gaston!&rdquo; In answer came the
+      page whom Garnache had found in the room when he was admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Desire Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to come to us here at once,&rdquo; she bade
+      the boy, and closed the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache had been all eyes for some furtive sign, some whispered word; but
+      he had surprised neither.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His pacing had brought him to the opposite end of the board, where stood
+      the cup of wine madame had poured for Marius. His own, Garnache had left
+      untouched. As if abstractedly, he now took up the beaker, pledged madame
+      with his glance, and drank. She watched him, and suddenly a suspicion
+      darted through her mind&mdash;a suspicion that he suspected them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dieu! What a man was this! He took no chances. Madame reflected that this
+      augured ill for the success of the last resource upon which, should all
+      else fail, she was counting to keep mademoiselle at Condillac. It seemed
+      incredible that one so wary and watchful should have committed the
+      rashness of venturing alone into Condillac without taking his precautions
+      to ensure his ability to retreat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In her heart she felt daunted by him. But in the matter of that wine&mdash;the
+      faintest of smiles hovered on her lips, her eyebrows went up a shade. Then
+      she took up the cup that had been poured for the Parisian, and bore it to
+      her son.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marius, you are not drinking,&rdquo; said she. And seeing a command in her
+      eyes; he took the beaker from her hand and bore it to his lips, emptying
+      the half of it, whilst with the faintest smile of scorn the Dowager swept
+      Garnache a glance of protest, as of one repudiating an unworthy challenge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the door opened, and the eyes of all three were centred upon the girl
+      that entered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER V. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You sent for me, madame,&rdquo; said the girl, seeming to hesitate upon the
+      threshold of the room, and her voice&mdash;a pleasant, boyish contralto&mdash;was
+      very cold and conveyed a suggestion of disdain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise detected that inauspicious note, and was moved by it to
+      regret her already of having embarked upon so bold a game as to confront
+      Monsieur de Garnache with Valerie. It was a step she had decided upon as a
+      last means of convincing the Parisian of the truth of her statement
+      touching the change that had taken place in mademoiselle&rsquo;s inclinations.
+      And she had provided for it as soon as she heard of Garnache&rsquo;s arrival by
+      informing mademoiselle that should she be sent for, she must tell the
+      gentleman from Paris that it was her wish to remain at Condillac.
+      Mademoiselle had incontinently refused, and madame, to win her compliance,
+      had resorted to threats.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will do as you consider best, of course,&rdquo; she had said, in a voice
+      that was ominously sweet. &ldquo;But I promise you that if you do otherwise than
+      as I tell you, you shall be married before sunset to Marius, whether you
+      be willing or not. Monsieur de Garnache comes alone, and if I so will it
+      alone he shall depart or not at all. I have men enough at Condillac to see
+      my orders carried out, no matter what they be.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may tell yourself that this fellow will return to help you. Perhaps
+      he will; but when he does, it will be too late so far as you shall be
+      concerned.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Terrified by that threat, Valerie had blenched, and had felt her spirit
+      deserting her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And if I comply, madame?&rdquo; she had asked. &ldquo;If I do as you wish, if I tell
+      this gentleman that I no longer desire to go to Paris&mdash;what then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager&rsquo;s manner had become more affectionate. She had patted the
+      shrinking girl upon the shoulder. &ldquo;In that case, Valerie, you shall suffer
+      no constraint; you shall continue here as you have done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And has there been no constraint hitherto?&rdquo; had been the girl&rsquo;s indignant
+      rejoinder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hardly, child,&rdquo; the Dowager had returned. &ldquo;We have sought to guide you to
+      a wise choice&mdash;no more than that. Nor shall we do more hereafter if
+      you do my pleasure now and give this Monsieur de Garnache the answer that
+      I bid you. But if you fail me, remember&mdash;you marry Marius before
+      nightfall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She had not waited for the girl to promise her compliance. She was too
+      clever a woman to show anxiety on that score. She left her with that
+      threat vibrating in her mind, confident that she would scare the girl into
+      obedience by the very assurance she exhibited that Valerie would not dare
+      to disobey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But now, at the sound of that chill voice, at the sight of that calm,
+      resolved countenance, madame was regretting that she had not stayed to
+      receive the girl&rsquo;s promise before she made so very sure of her pliability.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She glanced anxiously at Garnache. His eyes were upon the girl. He was
+      remarking the slender, supple figure, moderately tall and looking taller
+      in its black gown of mourning; the oval face, a trifle pale now from the
+      agitation that stirred her, with its fine level brows, its clear, hazel
+      eyes, and its crown of lustrous brown hair rolled back under the daintiest
+      of white coifs. His glance dwelt appreciatively on the slender nose, with
+      its delicate nostrils, the charming line of mouth and chin, the dazzling
+      whiteness of her skin, conspicuous not only in neck and face but in the
+      long, slender hands that were clasped before her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These signs of breeding, everywhere proclaimed, left him content that here
+      was no imposture; the girl before him was, indeed, Valerie de La Vauvraye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At madame&rsquo;s invitation she came forward. Marius hastened to close the door
+      and to set a chair for her, his manner an admirable suggestion of ardour
+      restrained by deference.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat down with an outward calm under which none would have suspected
+      the full extent of her agitation, and she bent her eyes upon the man whom
+      the Queen had sent for her deliverance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After all, Garnache&rsquo;s appearance was hardly suggestive of the role of
+      Perseus which had been thrust upon him. She saw a tall, spare man, with
+      prominent cheek-bones, a gaunt, high-bridged nose, very fierce mustachios,
+      and a pair of eyes that were as keen as sword-blades and felt to her
+      glance as penetrating. There was little about him like to take a woman&rsquo;s
+      fancy or claim more than a moderate share of her attention, even when
+      circumstances rendered her as interested in him as was now Mademoiselle de
+      La Vauvraye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There fell a silence, broken at last by Marius, who leaned, a supple,
+      graceful figure, his elbow resting upon the summit of Valerie&rsquo;s chair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Garnache does us the injustice to find a difficulty in
+      believing that you no longer wish to leave us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      That was by no means what Garnache had implied; still, since it really
+      expressed his mind, he did not trouble to correct Marius.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie said nothing, but her eyes travelled to madame&rsquo;s countenance,
+      where she found a frown. Garnache observed the silence, and drew his own
+      conclusions.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So we have sent for you, Valerie,&rdquo; said the Dowager, taking up her son&rsquo;s
+      sentence, &ldquo;that you may yourself assure Monsieur de Garnache that it is
+      so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her voice was stern; it bore to the girl&rsquo;s ears a subtle, unworded
+      repetition of the threat the Marquise had already voiced. Mademoiselle
+      caught it, and Garnache caught it too, although he failed to interpret it
+      as precisely as he would have liked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl seemed to experience a difficulty in answering. Her eyes roved to
+      Garnache&rsquo;s, and fell away in affright before their glitter. That man&rsquo;s
+      glance seemed to read her very mind, she thought; and suddenly the
+      reflection that had terrified her became her hope. If it were as she
+      deemed it, what matter what she said? He would know the truth, in spite of
+      all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, madame,&rdquo; she said at last, and her voice was wholly void of
+      expression. &ldquo;Yes, monsieur, it is as madame says. It is my wish to remain
+      at Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      From the Dowager, standing a pace or two away from Garnache, came the
+      sound of a half-sigh. Garnache missed nothing. He caught the sound, and
+      accepted it as an expression of relief. The Marquise stepped back a pace;
+      idly, one might have thought; not so thought Garnache. It had this
+      advantage: that it enabled her to stand where he might not watch her face
+      without turning his head. He was content that such was her motive. To
+      defeat her object, to show her that he had guessed it, he stepped back,
+      too, also with that same idleness of air, so that he was once more in line
+      with her. And then he spoke, addressing Valerie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle, that you should have written to the Queen in haste is
+      deplorable now that your views have undergone this change. I am a stupid
+      man, mademoiselle, just a blunt soldier with orders to obey and no
+      authority to think. My orders are to conduct you to Paris. Your will was
+      not taken into consideration. I know not how the Queen would have me act,
+      seeing your reluctance; it may be that she would elect to leave you here,
+      as you desire. But it is not for me to arrogate to determine the Queen&rsquo;s
+      mind. I can but be guided by her orders, and those orders leave me no
+      course but one&mdash;to ask you, mademoiselle, to make ready immediately
+      to go with me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The look of relief that swept into Valerie&rsquo;s face, the little flush of
+      colour that warmed her cheeks, hitherto so pale, were all the confirmation
+      that he needed of what he suspected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, monsieur,&rdquo; said Marius, &ldquo;it must be plain to you that since the
+      Queen&rsquo;s orders are but a compliance with mademoiselle&rsquo;s wishes, now that
+      mademoiselle&rsquo;s wishes have altered, so too would Her Majesty&rsquo;s commands
+      alter to comply with them once more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That may be plain to you, monsieur; for me, unfortunately, there are my
+      orders for only guide,&rdquo; Garnache persisted. &ldquo;Does not mademoiselle herself
+      agree with me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was about to speak; her glance had looked eager, her lips had parted.
+      Then, of a sudden, the little colour faded from her cheeks again, and she
+      seemed stricken with a silence. Garnache&rsquo;s eyes, directed in a sidelong
+      glance to the Marquise&rsquo;s face, surprised there a frown that had prompted
+      that sudden change.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He half-turned, his manner changing suddenly to a freezing civility.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame la Marquise,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I beg with all deference to suggest that I
+      am not allowed the interview you promised me with Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The ominous coldness with which he had begun to speak had had a disturbing
+      effect upon the Dowager; the words he uttered, when she had weighed them,
+      brought an immense relief. It seemed, then, that he but needed convincing
+      that this was Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. This argued that for the rest
+      he was satisfied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, monsieur, you are at fault,&rdquo; she cried, and she was smiling into
+      his grave eyes. &ldquo;Because once I put that jest upon you, you imagine&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; he broke in. &ldquo;You misapprehend me. I do not say that this is not
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye; I do not say that&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He paused; he was at the end of his resources. He did not know how to put
+      the thing without giving offence, and it had been his resolve&mdash;realizing
+      the necessity for it&mdash;to conduct this matter with a grave courtesy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To feel that after having carried the affair so far with a for him&mdash;commendable
+      lightness of touch, he should be at a loss for a delicate word to convey a
+      harsh accusation began to anger him. And once Garnache began to be
+      angered, the rest followed quickly. It was just that flaw in his character
+      that had been the ruin of him, that had blighted what otherwise might have
+      been a brilliant career. Astute and wily as a fox, brave as a lion, and
+      active as a panther, gifted with intelligence, insight and resource, he
+      had carried a dozen enterprises up to the very threshold of success, there
+      to have ruined them all by giving way to some sudden excess of choler.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So was it now. His pause was but momentary. Yet in that moment, from calm
+      and freezing that he had been, he became ruffled and hot. The change was
+      visible in his heightened colour, in his flashing eyes, and in his
+      twitching mustachios. For just a second he sought to smother his wrath; he
+      had a glimmer of remembrance of the need for caution and diplomacy in the
+      darkness of anger that was descending over him. Then, without further
+      warning, he exploded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His nervous, sinewy hand clenched itself and fell with a crash upon the
+      table, overturning a flagon and sending a lake of wine across the board,
+      to trickle over at a dozen points and form in puddles at the feet of
+      Valerie. Startled, they all watched him, mademoiselle the most startled of
+      the three.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; he thundered, &ldquo;I have been receiving dancing-lessons at your
+      hands for long enough. It is time, I think, we did a little ordinary
+      walking, else shall we get no farther along the road I mean to go and that
+      is the road to Paris with mademoiselle for company.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, monsieur!&rdquo; cried the startled Marquise, placing herself
+      intrepidly before him; and Marius trembled for her, for so wild did the
+      man seem that he almost feared he might strike her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have heard enough,&rdquo; he blazed. &ldquo;Not another word from any here in
+      Condillac! I&rsquo;ll take this lady with me now, at once; and if any here
+      raises a finger to resist me, as Heaven is my witness, it will be the last
+      resistance he will ever offer any man. Let a hand be laid upon me, or a
+      sword bared before my eyes, and I swear, madame, that I&rsquo;ll come back and
+      burn this dunghill of rebellion to the ground.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In the blindness of his passion all his fine keenness was cast to the
+      wind, his all-observing watchfulness was smothered in the cloud of anger
+      that oppressed his brain. He never saw the sign that madame made to her
+      son, never so much as noticed Marius&rsquo;s stealthy progress towards the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; he continued, a satirical note running now through his tempestuous
+      voice, &ldquo;it is a fine thing to cozen each other with honeyed words, with
+      smirks and with grimaces. But we have done with that, madame.&rdquo; He towered
+      grimly above her, shaking a threatening finger in her very face. &ldquo;We have
+      done with that. We shall resort to deeds, instead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, monsieur,&rdquo; she answered very coldly, sneering upon his red-hot fury,
+      &ldquo;there shall be deeds enough to satisfy even your outrageous thirst for
+      them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      That cold, sneering voice, with its note of threat, was like a hand of ice
+      upon his overheated brain. It cooled him on the instant. He stiffened, and
+      looked about him. He saw that Marius had disappeared, and that
+      mademoiselle had risen and was regarding him with singularly imploring
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bit his lip in mortified chagrin. He cursed himself inwardly for a fool
+      and a dolt&mdash;the more pitiable because he accounted himself cunning
+      above others. Had he but kept his temper, had he done no more than
+      maintain the happy pretence that he was a slave to the orders he had
+      received&mdash;a mere machine&mdash;he might have gained his ends by sheer
+      audacity. At least, his way of retreat would have remained open, and he
+      might have gone, to return another day with force at his heels.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As it was, that pretty whelp, her son, had been sent, no doubt, for men.
+      He stepped up to Valerie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you ready, mademoiselle?&rdquo; said he; for little hope though he might
+      still have of winning through, yet he must do the best to repair the
+      damage that was of his making.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She saw that the storm of passion had passed, and she was infected by the
+      sudden, desperate daring that prompted that question of his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am ready, monsieur,&rdquo; said she, and her boyish voice had an intrepid
+      ring. &ldquo;I will come with you as I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, in God&rsquo;s name, let us be going.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They moved together towards the door, with never another glance for the
+      Dowager where she stood, patting the head of the hound that had risen and
+      come to stand beside her. In silence she watched them, a sinister smile
+      upon her beautiful, ivory face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then came a sound of feet and voices in the anteroom. The door was flung
+      violently open, and a half-dozen men with naked swords came blundering
+      into the room, Marius bringing up the rear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a cry of fear Valerie shrank back against the panelled wall, her
+      little hands to her cheeks, her eyes dilating with alarm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache&rsquo;s sword rasped out, an oath rattled from his clenched teeth, and
+      he fell on guard. The men paused, and took his measure. Marius urged them
+      on, as if they had been a pack of dogs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At him!&rdquo; he snapped, his finger pointing, his handsome eyes flashing
+      angrily. &ldquo;Cut him down!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They moved; but mademoiselle moved at the same moment. She sprang before
+      them, between their swords and their prey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall not do it; you shall not do it!&rdquo; she cried, and her face looked
+      drawn, her eyes distraught. &ldquo;It is murder&mdash;murder, you curs!&rdquo; And the
+      memory of how that dainty little lady stood undaunted before so much bared
+      steel, to shield him from those assassins, was one that abode ever after
+      with Garnache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; said he, in a quiet voice, &ldquo;if you will but stand aside
+      there will be some murder done among them first.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But she did not move. Marius clenched his hands, fretted by the delay. The
+      Dowager looked on and smiled and patted her dog&rsquo;s head. To her
+      mademoiselle now turned in appeal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;you&rsquo;ll not allow it. You&rsquo;ll not let them do this
+      thing. Bid them put up their swords, madame. Bethink you that Monsieur de
+      Garnache is here in the Queen&rsquo;s name.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Too well did madame bethink her of it. Garnache need not plague himself
+      with vexation that his rash temper alone had wrought his ruin now. It had
+      but accelerated it. It was just possible, perhaps, that suavity might have
+      offered him opportunities; but, for the rest, from the moment that he
+      showed himself firm in his resolve to carry mademoiselle to Paris, his
+      doom was sealed. Madame would never willingly have allowed him to leave
+      Condillac alive, for she realized that did she do so he would stir up
+      trouble enough to have them outlawed. He must perish here, and be
+      forgotten. If questions came to be asked later, Condillac would know
+      nothing of him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Garnache promised us some fine deeds on his own account,&rdquo; she
+      mocked him. &ldquo;We but afford him the opportunity to perform them. If these
+      be not enough for his exceeding valour, there are more men without whom we
+      can summon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A feeling of pity for mademoiselle&mdash;perhaps of no more than decency&mdash;now
+      overcame Marius. He stepped forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Valerie,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;it is not fitting you should remain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, take her hence,&rdquo; the Dowager bade him, with a smile. &ldquo;Her presence
+      is unmanning our fine Parisian.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Eager to do so, over-eager, Marius came forward, past his men-at-arms,
+      until he was but some three paces from the girl and just out of reach of a
+      sudden dart of Garnache&rsquo;s sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Softly, very warily, Garnache slipped his right foot a little farther to
+      the right. Suddenly he threw his weight upon it, so that he was clear of
+      the girl. Before they understood what he was about, the thing had taken
+      place. He had leaped forward, caught the young man by the breast of his
+      shimmering doublet, leaped back to shelter beyond mademoiselle, hurled
+      Marius to the ground, and planted his foot, shod as it was in his thickly
+      mudded riding-boot, full upon the boy&rsquo;s long, shapely neck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Move so much as a finger, my pretty fellow,&rdquo; he snapped at him, &ldquo;and I&rsquo;ll
+      crush the life from you as from a toad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a sudden forward movement on the part of the men; but if
+      Garnache was vicious, he was calm. Were he again to lose his temper now,
+      there would indeed be a speedy end to him. That much he knew, and kept
+      repeating to himself, lest he should be tempted to forget it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Back!&rdquo; he bade them in a voice so imperative that they stopped, and
+      looked on with gaping mouths. &ldquo;Back, or he perishes!&rdquo; And dropping the
+      point of his sword, he lightly rested it upon the young man&rsquo;s breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In dismay they looked to the Dowager for instruction. She craned forward,
+      the smile gone from her lips, a horror in her eyes, her bosom heaving. A
+      moment ago she had smiled upon mademoiselle&rsquo;s outward signs of fear; had
+      mademoiselle been so minded, she might in her turn have smiled now at the
+      terror written large upon the Dowager&rsquo;s own face. But her attention was
+      all absorbed by the swiftly executed act by which Garnache had gained at
+      least a temporary advantage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She had turned and looked at the strange spectacle of that dauntless man,
+      erect, his foot upon Marius&rsquo;s neck, like some fantastic figure of a
+      contemporary Saint George and a contemporary dragon. She pressed her hands
+      tighter upon her bosom; her eyes sparkled with an odd approval of that
+      brisk deed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache&rsquo;s watchful eyes were upon the Dowager. He read the anxious
+      fear that marred the beauty of her face, and he took heart at the sight,
+      for he was dependent upon the extent to which he might work upon her
+      feelings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You smiled just now, madame, when it was intended to butcher a man before
+      your eyes. You smile no longer, I observe, at this the first of the fine
+      deeds I promised you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let him go,&rdquo; she said, and her voice was scarce louder than a whisper,
+      horror-laden. &ldquo;Let him go, monsieur, if you would save your own neck.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At that price, yes&mdash;though, believe me, you are paying too much for
+      so poor a life as this. Still, you value the thing, and I hold it; and so
+      you&rsquo;ll forgive me if I am extortionate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Release him, and, in God&rsquo;s name, go your ways. None shall stay you,&rdquo; she
+      promised him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll need some security for that. I do not choose to take your
+      word for it, Madame de Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What security can I give you?&rdquo; she cried, wringing her hands, her eyes on
+      the boy&rsquo;s ashen face ashen from mingling fear and rage&mdash;where it
+      showed beyond Garnache&rsquo;s heavy boot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bid one of your knaves summon my servant. I left him awaiting me in the
+      courtyard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The order was given, and one of the cut-throats departed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In a tense and anxious silence they awaited his return, though he kept
+      them but an instant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque&rsquo;s eyes took on a startled look when he had viewed the situation.
+      Garnache called to him to deprive those present of their weapons.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And let none refuse, or offer him violence,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;or your master&rsquo;s
+      life shall pay the price of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager with a ready anxiety repeated to them his commands. Rabecque,
+      understanding nothing, went from man to man, and received from each his
+      weapons. He placed the armful on the windowseat, at the far end of the
+      apartment, as Garnache bade him. At the other end of the long room,
+      Garnache ordered the disarmed men to range themselves. When that was done,
+      the Parisian removed his foot from his victim&rsquo;s neck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stand up,&rdquo; he commanded, and Marius very readily obeyed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache placed himself immediately behind the boy. &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;no
+      harm shall come to your son if he is but wise. Let him disobey me, or let
+      any man in Condillac lift a hand against us, and that shall be the signal
+      for Monsieur de Condillac&rsquo;s death. Mademoiselle, it is your wish to
+      accompany me to Paris?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, monsieur,&rdquo; she answered fearlessly, her eyes sparkling now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will be going then. Place yourself alongside of Monsieur de Condillac.
+      Rabecque, follow me. Forward, Monsieur de Condillac. You will be so good
+      as to conduct us to our horses in the courtyard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They made an odd procession as they marched out of the hall, under the
+      sullen eyes of the baulked cut-throats and their mistress. On the
+      threshold Garnache paused, and looked over his shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you content, madame? Have you seen fine deeds enough for one day?&rdquo; he
+      asked her, laughing. But, white to the lips with chagrin, she returned no
+      answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache and his party crossed the anteroom, after having taken the
+      precaution to lock the door upon the Marquise and her men, and proceeding
+      down a gloomy passage they gained the courtyard. Here Marius was consoled
+      to find some men of the garrison of Condillac a half-score, or so&mdash;all
+      more or less armed, surrounding the horses of Garnache and his lackey. At
+      sight of the odd group that now appeared those ruffians stood at gaze,
+      surprised, and with suspicions aroused by Garnache&rsquo;s naked sword, ready
+      for anything their master might demand of them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius had in that instant a gleam of hope. Thus far, Garnache had been
+      master of the situation. But surely the position would be reversed when
+      Garnache and his man came to mount their horses, particularly considering
+      how hampered they must be by Valerie. This danger Garnache, however, was
+      no less quick to perceive, and with a dismaying promptness did he take his
+      measures.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Remember,&rdquo; he threatened Monsieur de Condillac, &ldquo;if any of your men show
+      their teeth it will be the worse for you.&rdquo; They had come to a halt on the
+      threshold of the courtyard. &ldquo;You will be so good as to bid them retreat
+      through that doorway across the yard yonder.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius hesitated. &ldquo;And if I refuse?&rdquo; he demanded hardily, but keeping his
+      back to Garnache. The men stirred, and stray words of mingling wonder and
+      anger reached the Parisian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will not,&rdquo; said Garnache, with quiet confidence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think you make too sure,&rdquo; Marius replied, and dissembled his misgivings
+      in a short laugh. Garnache became impatient. His position was not being
+      improved by delay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Condillac,&rdquo; said he, speaking quickly and yet with an
+      incisiveness of tone that made his words sound deliberate, &ldquo;I am a
+      desperate man in a desperate position. Every moment that I tarry here
+      increases my danger and shortens my temper. If you think to temporize in
+      the hope of gaining an opportunity of turning the tables upon me, you must
+      be mad to dream that I shall permit it. Monsieur, you will at once order
+      those men to leave the courtyard by that doorway, or I give you my word of
+      honour that I shall run you through as you stand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That would be to destroy yourself,&rdquo; said Marius with an attempted note of
+      confidence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should be no less destroyed by delay,&rdquo; answered Garnache; and added
+      more sharply, &ldquo;Give the word, monsieur, or I will make an end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      From the movement behind him Marius guessed almost by instinct that
+      Garnache had drawn back for a lunge. At his side Valerie looked over her
+      shoulder, with eyes that were startled but unafraid. For a second Marius
+      considered whether he might not attempt to elude Garnache by a wild and
+      sudden dash towards his men. But the consequences of failure were too
+      fearful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He shrugged his shoulders, and gave the order. The men hesitated a moment,
+      then shuffled away in the direction indicated. But they went slowly, with
+      much half-whispered, sullen conferring and many a backward glance at
+      Marius and those with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bid them go faster,&rdquo; snapped Garnache. Marius obeyed him, and the men
+      obeyed Marius, and vanished into the gloom of the archway. After all,
+      thought Monsieur de Condillac, they need go no farther than that doorway;
+      they must have appreciated the situation by now; and he was confident they
+      would have the sense to hold themselves in readiness for a rush in the
+      moment of Garnache&rsquo;s mounting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache&rsquo;s next order shattered that last hope.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rebecque,&rdquo; said he, without turning his head, &ldquo;go and lock them in.&rdquo;
+       Before bidding the men go that way, he had satisfied himself that there
+      was a key on the outside of the door. &ldquo;Monsieur de Condillac,&rdquo; he resumed
+      to Marius, &ldquo;you will order your men in no way to hinder my servant. I
+      shall act upon any menace of danger to my lackey precisely as I should
+      were I, myself, in danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius&rsquo;s heart sank within him, as sinks a stone through water. He
+      realized, as his mother had realized a little while before, that in
+      Garnache they had an opponent who took no chances. In a voice thick with
+      the torturing rage of impotence he gave the order upon which the grim
+      Parisian insisted. There followed a silence broken by the fall of
+      Rabecque&rsquo;s heavily shod feet upon the stones of the yard, as he crossed it
+      to do his master&rsquo;s bidding. The door creaked on its hinges; the key grated
+      screaming in its lock, and Rabecque returned to Garnache&rsquo;s side even as
+      Garnache tapped Marius on the shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This way, Monsieur de Condillac, if you please,&rdquo; said he, and as Marius
+      turned at last to face him, he stood aside and waved his left hand towards
+      the door through which they had lately emerged. A moment stood the youth
+      facing his stern conqueror; his hands were clenched until the knuckles
+      showed white; his face was a dull crimson. Vainly he sought for words in
+      which to vent some of the malicious chagrin that filled his soul almost to
+      bursting-point. Then, despairing, with a shrug and an inarticulate mutter,
+      he flung past the Parisian, obeying him as the cur obeys, with pendant
+      tail and teeth-revealing snarl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache closed the door upon him with a bang, and smiled quietly as he
+      turned to Valerie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think we have won through, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said he, with pardonable
+      vanity. &ldquo;The rest is easy, though you may be subjected to some slight
+      discomfort between this and Grenoble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled back at him, a pale, timid smile, like a gleam of sunshine from
+      a wintry sky. &ldquo;That matters nothing,&rdquo; she assured him, and strove to make
+      her voice sound brave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was need for speed, and compliments were set aside by Garnache, who,
+      at his best, was not felicitous with them. Valerie felt herself caught by
+      the wrist, a trifle roughly she remembered afterwards, and hurried across
+      the cobbles to the tethered horses, with which Rabecque was already busy.
+      She saw Garnache raise his foot to the stirrup and hoist himself to the
+      saddle. Then he held down a hand to her, bade her set her foot on his, and
+      called with an oath to Rabecque to lend her his assistance. A moment later
+      she was perched in front of Garnache, almost on the withers of his horse.
+      The cobbles rattled under its hooves, the timbers of the drawbridge sent
+      up a booming sound, they were across&mdash;out of Condillac&mdash;and
+      speeding at a gallop down the white road that led to the river; after them
+      pounded Rabecque, bumping horribly in his saddle, and attempting wildly,
+      and with awful objurgations, to find his stirrups.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They crossed the bridge that spans the Isere and took the road to Grenoble
+      at a sharp pace, with scarce a backward glance at the grey towers of
+      Condillac. Valerie experienced an overwhelming inclination to weep and
+      laugh, to cry and sing at one and the same time; but whether this odd
+      emotion sprang from the happenings in which she had had her part, or from
+      the exhilaration of that mad ride, she could not tell. No doubt it sprang
+      from both, owing a part to each. She controlled herself, however. A shy,
+      upward glance at the stern, set face of the man whose arm encircled and
+      held her fast had a curiously sobering effect upon her. Their eyes met,
+      and he smiled a friendly, reassuring smile, such as a father might have
+      bestowed upon a daughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not think that they will charge me with blundering this time,&rdquo; he
+      said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Charge you with blundering?&rdquo; she echoed; and the inflection of the
+      pronoun might have flattered him had he not reflected that it was
+      impossible she could have understood his allusion. And now she bethought
+      her that she had not thanked him&mdash;and the debt was a heavy one. He
+      had come to her aid in an hour when hope seemed dead. He had come
+      single-handed&mdash;save for his man Rabecque; and in a manner that was
+      worthy of being made the subject of an epic, he had carried her out of
+      Condillac, away from the terrible Dowager and her cut-throats. The thought
+      of them sent a shiver through her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you feel the cold?&rdquo; he asked concernedly; and that the wind might cut
+      her less, he slackened speed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she cried, her alarm waking again at the thought of the folk of
+      Condillac. &ldquo;Make haste! Go on, go on! Mon Dieu! if they should overtake
+      us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked over his shoulder. The road ran straight for over a half-mile
+      behind them, and not a living thing showed upon it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need have no alarm,&rdquo; he smiled. &ldquo;We are not pursued. They must have
+      realized the futility of attempting to overtake us. Courage, mademoiselle.
+      We shall be in Grenoble presently, and once there, you will have nothing
+      more to fear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are sure of that?&rdquo; she asked, and there was doubt in her voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled reassuringly again. &ldquo;The Lord Seneschal shall supply us with an
+      escort,&rdquo; he promised confidently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Still,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;we shall not stay there, I hope, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No longer than may be necessary to procure a coach for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad of that,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;I shall know no peace until Grenoble is a
+      good ten leagues behind us. The Marquise and her son are too powerful
+      there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet their might shall not prevail against the Queen&rsquo;s,&rdquo; he made reply.
+      And as now they rode amain she fell to thanking him, shyly at first, then,
+      as she gathered confidence in her subject, with a greater fervour. But he
+      interrupted her ere she had gone far, &ldquo;Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye,&rdquo; said
+      he, &ldquo;you overstate the matter.&rdquo; His tone was chilling almost; and she felt
+      as she had been rebuked. &ldquo;I am no more than the emissary of Her Majesty&mdash;it
+      is to her that your thanks are due.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, but, monsieur,&rdquo; she returned to the assault, &ldquo;I owe some thanks to
+      you as well. What other in your place would have done what you have done?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know not that, nor do I greatly care,&rdquo; said he, and laughed, but with a
+      laugh that jarred on her. &ldquo;That which I did I must have done, no matter
+      whom it was a question of saving. I am but an instrument in this matter,
+      mademoiselle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His thought was to do no more than belittle the service he had rendered
+      her, to stem her flow of gratitude, since, indeed, he felt, as he said,
+      that it was to the Queen-Regent her thanks were due. All unwitting was it&mdash;out
+      of his ignorance of the ways of thought of a sex with which he held the
+      view that it is an ill thing to meddle&mdash;that he wounded her by his
+      disclaimer, in which her sensitive maiden fancy imagined a something that
+      was almost contemptuous.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They rode in silence for a little spell, broken at last by Garnache in
+      expression of the thoughts that had come to him as a consequence of what
+      she had said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On this same subject of thanks,&rdquo; said he&mdash;and as she raised her eyes
+      again she found him smiling almost tenderly&mdash;&ldquo;if any are due between
+      us they are surely due from me to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From you to me?&rdquo; she asked in wonder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Assuredly,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Had you not come between me and the Dowager&rsquo;s
+      assassins there had been an end to me in the hall of Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hazel eyes were very round for a moment, then they narrowed, and
+      little humorous lines formed at the corners of her lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Garnache,&rdquo; said she, with a mock coldness that was a faint
+      echo of his own recent manner, &ldquo;you overstate the case. That which I did I
+      must have done, no matter whom it was a question of saving. I was but an
+      instrument in this matter, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His brows went up. He stared at her a moment, gathering instruction from
+      the shy mockery of her glance. Then he laughed with genuine amusement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;An instrument you were; but an instrument of Heaven,
+      whereas in me you but behold the instrument of an earthly power. We are
+      not quite quits, you see.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But she felt, at least, that she was quits with him in the matter of his
+      repudiation of her own thanks, and the feeling bridged the unfriendly gap
+      that she had felt was opening out between them; and for no reason in the
+      world that she could think of, she was glad that this was so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VI. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Night had fallen and it had begun to rain when Garnache and Valerie
+      reached Grenoble. They entered the town afoot, the Parisian not desiring
+      to attract attention by being seen in the streets with a lady on the
+      withers of his horse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With thought for her comfort, Monsieur de Garnache had divested himself of
+      his heavy horseman&rsquo;s cloak and insisted upon her assuming it, so setting
+      it about her that her head was covered as by a wimple. Thus was she
+      protected not only from the rain, but from the gaze of the inquisitive.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They made their way in the drizzle, through the greasy, slippery streets
+      ashine with the lights that fell from door and window, Rabecque following
+      closely with the horses. Garnache made straight for his inn&mdash;the
+      Auberge du Veau qui Tete&mdash;which enjoyed the advantage of facing the
+      Palais Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ostler took charge of the nags, and the landlord conducted them to a
+      room above-stairs, which he placed at mademoiselle&rsquo;s disposal. That done,
+      Garnache left Rabecque on guard, and proceeded to make the necessary
+      arrangements for the journey that lay before them. He began by what he
+      conceived to be the more urgent measure, and stepping across to the Palais
+      Seneschal, he demanded to see Monsieur de Tressan at once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ushered into the Lord Seneschal&rsquo;s presence, he startled that obese
+      gentleman by the announcement that he had returned from Condillac with
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and that he would require an escort to
+      accompany them to Paris.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For I am by no means minded to be exposed to such measures as the tigress
+      of Condillac and her cub may take to recover their victim,&rdquo; he explained
+      with a grim smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal combed his beard and screwed up his pale eyes until they
+      vanished in the cushions of his cheeks. He was lost in amazement. He could
+      only imagine that the Queen&rsquo;s emissary had been duped more successfully
+      this time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am to gather, then,&rdquo; said he, dissembling what was passing through his
+      mind, &ldquo;that you delivered the lady by force or strategy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By both, monsieur,&rdquo; was the short answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan continued to comb his beard, and pondered the situation. If things
+      were so, indeed, they could not have fallen out more to his taste. He had
+      had no hand in it, one way or the other. He had run with the hare and
+      hunted with the hounds, and neither party could charge him with any lack
+      of loyalty. His admiration and respect for Monsieur de Garnache grew
+      enormously. When the rash Parisian had left him that afternoon for the
+      purpose of carrying his message himself to Condillac, Tressan had
+      entertained little hope of ever again seeing him alive. Yet there he
+      stood, as calm and composed as ever, announcing that singlehanded he had
+      carried out what another might well have hesitated to attempt with a
+      regiment at his heels.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan&rsquo;s curiosity urged him to beg for the details of this marvel, and
+      Garnache entertained him with a brief recital of what had taken place,
+      whereat, realizing that Garnache had indeed outwitted them, the
+      Seneschal&rsquo;s wonder increased.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But we are not out of the quagmire yet,&rdquo; cried Garnache; &ldquo;and that is why
+      I want an escort.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan became uneasy. &ldquo;How many men shall you require?&rdquo; he asked,
+      thinking that the Parisian would demand at least the half of a company.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A half-dozen and a sergeant to command them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan&rsquo;s uneasiness was dissipated, and he found himself despising
+      Garnache more for his rashness in being content with so small a number
+      than he respected him for the boldness and courage he had so lately
+      displayed. It was not for him to suggest that the force might prove
+      insufficient; rather was it for him to be thankful that Garnache had not
+      asked for more. An escort Tressan dared not refuse him, and yet refuse it
+      him he must have done&mdash;or broken with the Condillacs&mdash;had he
+      asked for a greater number. But six men! Pooh! they would be of little
+      account. So he very readily consented, inquiring how soon Garnache would
+      require them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At once,&rdquo; was the Parisian&rsquo;s answer. &ldquo;I leave Grenoble to-night. I hope
+      to set out in an hour&rsquo;s time. Meanwhile I&rsquo;ll have the troopers form a
+      guard of honour. I am lodged over the way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan, but too glad to be quit of him, rose there and then to give the
+      necessary orders, and within ten minutes Garnache was back at the Sucking
+      Calf with six troopers and a sergeant, who had left their horses in the
+      Seneschal&rsquo;s stables until the time for setting out. Meanwhile Garnache
+      placed them on duty in the common-room of the inn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He called for refreshment for them, and bade them remain there at the
+      orders of his man Rabecque. His reason for this step was that it became
+      necessary that he should absent himself for a while to find a carriage
+      suitable for the journey; for as the Sucking Calf was not a post-house he
+      must seek one elsewhere&mdash;at the Auberge de France, in fact, which was
+      situate on the eastern side of the town by the Porte de Savoie&mdash;and
+      he was not minded to leave the person of Valerie unguarded during his
+      absence. The half-dozen troopers he considered ample, as indeed they were.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On this errand he departed, wrapped tightly in his cloak, walking briskly
+      through the now heavier rain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But at the Auberge de France a disappointment awaited him. The host had no
+      horses and no carriage, nor would he have until the following morning. He
+      was sorrow-stricken that the circumstance should discompose Monsieur de
+      Garnache; he was elaborate in his explanations of how it happened that he
+      could place no vehicle at Monsieur de Garnache&rsquo;s disposal&mdash;so
+      elaborate that it is surprising Monsieur de Garnache&rsquo;s suspicions should
+      not have been aroused. For the truth of the matter was that the folk of
+      Condillac had been at the Auberge de France before him&mdash;as they had
+      been elsewhere in the town wherever a conveyance might be procurable&mdash;and
+      by promises of reward for obedience and threats of punishment for
+      disobedience, they had contrived that Garnache should hear this same story
+      on every hand. His mistake had lain in his eagerness to obtain a guard
+      from the Seneschal. Had he begun by making sure of a conveyance,
+      anticipating, as he should have done, this move on the part of the
+      Condillacs&mdash;a move which he did not even now suspect&mdash;it is
+      possible that he might have been spared much of the trouble that was to
+      follow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An hour or so later, after having vainly ransacked the town for the thing
+      he needed, he returned wet and annoyed to the Veau qui Tote. In a corner
+      of the spacious common-room&mdash;a corner by the door leading to the
+      interior of the inn&mdash;he saw the six troopers at table, waxing a
+      trifle noisy over cards. Their sergeant sat a little apart, in
+      conversation with the landlord&rsquo;s wife, eyes upturned adoringly, oblivious
+      of the increasing scowl that gathered about her watchful husband&rsquo;s brow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At another table sat four gentlemen&mdash;seemingly travellers, by their
+      air and garb&mdash;in a conversation that was hushed at Garnache&rsquo;s
+      entrance. But he paid no heed to them as he stalked with ringing step
+      across the rushstrewn floor, nor observed how covertly and watchfully
+      their glances followed him as returning, in passing the sergeant&rsquo;s prompt
+      salute he vanished through the doorway leading to the stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He reappeared again a moment later, to call the host, and give him orders
+      for the preparing of his own and Rabecque&rsquo;s supper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the landing above he found Rabecque awaiting him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is all well?&rdquo; he asked, and received from his lackey a reassuring answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mademoiselle welcomed him gladly. His long absence, it appeared, had been
+      giving her concern. He told her on what errand he had been, and alarm
+      overspread her face upon hearing its result.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, monsieur,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;you are not proposing that I should remain a
+      night in Grenoble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What alternative have we?&rdquo; he asked, and his brows met, impatient at what
+      he accounted no more than feminine whimsey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not safe,&rdquo; she exclaimed, her fears increasing. &ldquo;You do not know
+      how powerful are the Condillacs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He strode to the fire, and the logs hissed under the pressure of his wet
+      boot. He set his back to the blaze, and smiled down upon her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor do you know how powerful are we,&rdquo; he answered easily. &ldquo;I have below
+      six troopers and a sergeant of the Seneschal&rsquo;s regiment; with myself and
+      Rabecque we are nine men in all. That should be a sufficient guard,
+      mademoiselle. Nor do I think that with all their power the Condillacs will
+      venture here to claim you at the sword point.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And yet,&rdquo; she answered, for all that she was plainly reassured, at least
+      in part, &ldquo;I would rather you had got me a horse, that we might have ridden
+      to Saint Marcellin, where no doubt a carriage might be obtained.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did not see the need to put you to so much discomfort,&rdquo; he returned.
+      &ldquo;It is raining heavily.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, what of that?&rdquo; she flung back impatiently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Besides,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;it seems there are no horses at the post-house. A
+      benighted place this Dauphiny of yours, mademoiselle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But she never heeded the gibe at her native province. &ldquo;No horses?&rdquo; she
+      echoed, and her hazel eyes looked up sharply, the alarm returning to her
+      face. She rose, and approached him. &ldquo;Surely that is impossible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I assure you that it is as I say&mdash;neither at the post-house nor at
+      any of the inns I visited could I find me a spare horse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;I see the hand of Condillac in this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As how?&rdquo; he inquired, and his tone again was quickened by impatience.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They have anticipated you. They seek to keep you here&mdash;to keep us in
+      Grenoble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But to what end?&rdquo; he asked, his impatience growing. &ldquo;The Auberge de
+      France has promised me a carriage in the morning. What shall it avail them
+      at Condillac to keep us here to-night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They may have some project. Oh, monsieur! I am full of fears.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dismiss them,&rdquo; he answered lightly; and to reassure her he added,
+      smiling: &ldquo;Rest assured we shall keep good watch over you, Rabecque and I
+      and the troopers. A guard shall remain in the passage throughout the
+      night. Rabecque and I will take turn about at sentry-go. Will that give
+      you peace?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very good,&rdquo; she said, her voice quivering with feeling and real
+      gratitude, and as he was departing she called after him. &ldquo;You will be
+      careful of yourself,&rdquo; she said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He paused under the lintel, and turned, surprised. &ldquo;It is a habit of
+      mine,&rdquo; said he, with a glint of humour in his eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But there was no answering smile from her. Her face was all anxiety.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beware of pitfalls,&rdquo; she bade him. &ldquo;Go warily; they are cruelly cunning,
+      those folk of Condillac. And if evil should befall you...&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There would still remain Rabecque and the troopers,&rdquo; he concluded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders. &ldquo;I implore you to be careful,&rdquo; she insisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may depend upon me,&rdquo; he said, and closed the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Outside he called Rabecque, and together they went below. But mindful of
+      her fears, he dispatched one of the troopers to stand sentry outside her
+      door whilst he and his lackey supped. That done, he called the host, and
+      set himself at table, Rabecque at his elbow in attendance to hand him the
+      dishes and pour his wine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Across the low-ceilinged room the four travellers still sat in talk, and
+      as Garnache seated himself, one of them shouted for the host and asked in
+      an impatient tone to know if his supper was soon to come.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In a moment, sir,&rdquo; answered the landlord respectfully, and he turned
+      again to the Parisian. He went out to bring the latter&rsquo;s meal, and whilst
+      he was gone Rabecque heard from his master the reason of their remaining
+      that night in Grenoble. The inference drawn by the astute lackey&mdash;and
+      freely expressed by him&mdash;from the lack of horses or carriages in
+      Grenoble that night, coincided oddly with Valerie&rsquo;s. He too gave it as his
+      opinion that his master had been forestalled by the Dowager&rsquo;s people, and
+      without presuming to advise Garnache to go warily&mdash;a piece of advice
+      that Garnache would have resented, to the extent perhaps of boxing the
+      fellow&rsquo;s ears&mdash;he determined, there and then, to keep a close watch
+      upon his master, and under no circumstances, if possible, permit him to
+      leave the Sucking Calf that night.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The host returned, bearing a platter on which there steamed a ragout that
+      gave out an appetizing odour; his wife followed with other dishes and a
+      bottle of Armagnac under her arm. Rabecque busied himself at once, and his
+      hungry master disposed himself to satisfy the healthiest appetite in
+      France, when suddenly a shadow fell across the table. A man had come to
+      stand beside it, his body screening the light of one of the lamps that
+      hung from a rafter of the ceiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At last!&rdquo; he exclaimed, and his voice was harsh with ill-humour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache looked up, pausing in the very act of helping himself to that
+      ragout. Rabecque looked up from behind his master, and his lips tightened.
+      The host looked up from the act of drawing the cork of the flagon he had
+      taken from his wife, and his eyes grew big as in his mind he prepared a
+      judicious blend of apology and remonstrance wherewith to soothe this very
+      impatient gentleman. But before he could speak, Garnache&rsquo;s voice cut
+      sharply into the silence. An interruption at such a moment vexed him
+      sorely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur says?&rdquo; quoth he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To you, sir&mdash;nothing,&rdquo; answered the fellow impudently, and looked
+      him straight between the eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a flush mounting to his cheeks, and his brows drawn together in
+      perplexity, Garnache surveyed him. He was that same traveller who had
+      lately clamoured to know when he might sup, a man of rather more than
+      middle height, lithe and active of frame, yet with a breadth of shoulder
+      and depth of chest that argued strength and endurance as well. He had
+      fair, wavy hair, which he wore rather longer than was the mode, brown
+      eyes, and a face which, without being handsome, was yet more than
+      ordinarily engaging by virtue of its strength and frank ingenuousness. His
+      dress was his worst feature. It was flamboyant and showy; cheap, and
+      tawdrily pretentious. Yet he bore himself with the easy dignity of a man
+      who counts more inferiors than superiors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Despite the arrogant manner of his address, Garnache felt prepossessed in
+      the newcomer&rsquo;s favour. But before he could answer him, the host was
+      speaking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur mistakes...&rdquo; he began.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mistakes?&rdquo; thundered the other in an accent slightly foreign. &ldquo;It is you
+      who mistake if you propose to tell me that this is not my supper. Am I to
+      wait all night, while every jackanapes who follows me into your pigsty is
+      to be served before me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jackanapes?&rdquo; said Garnache thoughtfully, and looked the man in the face
+      again. Behind the stranger pressed his three companions now, whilst the
+      troopers across the room forgot their card-play to watch the altercation
+      that seemed to impend.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The foreigner&mdash;for such, indeed, his French proclaimed him&mdash;turned
+      half-contemptuously to the host, ignoring Garnache with an air that was
+      studiously offensive.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jackanapes?&rdquo; murmured Garnache again, and he, too, turned to the host.
+      &ldquo;Tell me, Monsieur l&rsquo;Hote,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;where do the jackanapes bury their
+      dead in Grenoble? I may need the information.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Before the distressed landlord could utter a word, the stranger had
+      wheeled about again to face Garnache. &ldquo;What shall that mean?&rdquo; he asked
+      sharply, a great fierceness in his glance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That Grenoble may be witnessing the funeral of a foreign bully by
+      to-morrow, Monsieur l&rsquo;Etranger,&rdquo; said Garnache, showing his teeth in a
+      pleasant smile. He became conscious in that moment of a pressure on his
+      shoulder blade, but paid no heed to it, intent on watching the other&rsquo;s
+      countenance. It expressed surprise a moment, then grew dark with anger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean that for me, sir?&rdquo; he growled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache spread his hands. &ldquo;If monsieur feels that the cap fits him, I
+      shall not stay him in the act of donning it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger set one hand upon the table, and leaned forward towards
+      Garnache. &ldquo;May I ask monsieur to be a little more definite?&rdquo; he begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache sat back in his chair and surveyed the man, smiling. Quick though
+      his temper usually might be, it was checked at present by amusement. He
+      had seen in his time many quarrels spring from the flimsiest of motives,
+      but surely never had he seen one quite so self-begotten. It was almost as
+      if the fellow had come there of set purpose to pick it with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A suspicion flashed across his mind. He remembered the warning
+      mademoiselle had given him. And he wondered. Was this a trick to lure him
+      to some guet-apens? He surveyed his man more closely; but the inspection
+      lent no colour to his suspicions. The stranger looked so frank and honest;
+      then again his accent was foreign. It might very well be that he was some
+      Savoyard lordling unused to being kept waiting, and that his hunger made
+      him irritable and impatient. If that were so, assuredly the fellow
+      deserved a lesson that should show him he was now in France, where
+      different manners obtained to those that he displayed; yet, lest he should
+      be something else, Garnache determined to pursue a policy of conciliation.
+      It would be a madness to embroil himself just then, whether this fellow
+      were of Condillac or not.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have asked you, monsieur,&rdquo; the stranger insisted, &ldquo;to be a little more
+      definite.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache&rsquo;s smile broadened and grew more friendly. &ldquo;Frankly,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I
+      experience difficulty. My remark was vague. I meant it so to be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it offended me, monsieur,&rdquo; the other answered sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Parisian raised his eyebrows, and pursed his lips. &ldquo;Then I deplore
+      it,&rdquo; said he. And now he had to endure the hardest trial of all. The
+      stranger&rsquo;s expression changed to one of wondering scorn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do I understand that monsieur apologizes?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache felt himself crimsoning; his self-control was slipping from him;
+      the pressure against his shoulder blade was renewed, and in time he became
+      aware of it and knew it for a warning from Rabecque.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot conceive, sir, that I have offended,&rdquo; said he at length, keeping
+      a tight hand upon his every instinct&mdash;which was to knock this
+      impertinent stranger down. &ldquo;But if I have, I beg that you will believe
+      that I have done so unwittingly. I had no such intent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger removed his hand from the table and drew himself erect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So much for that, then,&rdquo; said he, provokingly contemptuous. &ldquo;If you will
+      be as amiable in the matter of the supper I shall be glad to terminate an
+      acquaintance which I can see no honour to myself in pursuing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This, Garnache felt, was more than he could endure. A spasm of passion
+      crossed his face, another instant and despite Rabecque&rsquo;s frantic proddings
+      he might have flung the ragout in the gentleman&rsquo;s face; when suddenly came
+      the landlord unexpectedly to the rescue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, here comes your supper now,&rdquo; he announced, as his wife
+      reentered from the kitchen with a laden tray.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For a moment the stranger seemed out of countenance. Then he looked with
+      cold insolence from the dishes set before Garnache to those which were
+      being set for himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said he, and his tone was an insult unsurpassable, &ldquo;perhaps it is to
+      be preferred. This ragout grows cold, I think.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He sniffed, and turning on his heel, without word or sign of salutation to
+      Garnache, he passed to the next table, and sat down with his companions.
+      The Parisian&rsquo;s eyes followed him, and they blazed with suppressed wrath.
+      Never in all his life had he exercised such self-control as he was
+      exercising then&mdash;which was the reason why he had failed to achieve
+      greatness&mdash;and he was exercising it for the sake of that child
+      above-stairs, and because he kept ever-present in his mind the thought
+      that she must come to grievous harm if ill befell himself. But he
+      controlled his passion at the cost of his appetite. He could not eat, so
+      enraged was he. And so he pushed the platter from him, and rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned to Rabecque, and the sight of his face sent the lackey back a
+      pace or two in very fear. He waved his hand to the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sup, Rabecque,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Then come to me above.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And followed, as before, by the eyes of the stranger and his companions,
+      Garnache strode out of the room, and mounting the stairs went to find
+      solace in talk with Valerie. But however impossible he might find it to
+      digest the affront he had swallowed, no word of the matter did he utter to
+      the girl, lest it should cause her fears to reawaken.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VII. THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Garnache spent a sleepless night at Grenoble, on guard throughout the
+      greater part of it since nothing short of that would appease the fears of
+      Valerie. Yet it passed without any bellicose manifestation on the part of
+      the Condillacs such as Valerie feared and such as Garnache was satisfied
+      would not&mdash;could not, indeed&mdash;take place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Betimes next morning he dispatched Rabecque to the Auberge de France for
+      the promised carriage, and broke his fast in the common-room what time he
+      awaited his man&rsquo;s return. The chamber was again occupied by the stranger
+      of yesternight, who sat apart, however, and seemed no longer disposed to
+      interfere with the Parisian. Garnache wondered idly, might this be due to
+      the circumstance that that same stranger was supported now by one single
+      companion, and was therefore less valorous than when he had been in the
+      company of three.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At another table were two gentlemen, sprung he knew not whence, quiet in
+      dress and orderly in manner, to whom he paid little heed until one of them
+      a slender, swarthy, hawk-faced fellow&mdash;looking up suddenly, started
+      slightly at sight of the Parisian and addressed him instantly by name.
+      Garnache paused in the act of rising from table, half-turned, and sharply
+      scrutinized the swarthy gentleman, but failed to recognize him. He
+      advanced towards him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have the honour to be known to you, monsieur?&rdquo; he half-stated,
+      half-inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Parbleu, Monsieur de Garnache!&rdquo; exclaimed the other with a ready smile,
+      the more winning since it lighted up a face that at rest was very sombre.
+      &ldquo;Lives there a Parisian to whom you are not known? I have seen you often
+      at the Hotel de Bourgogne.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache acknowledged the courtesy by a slight inclination of the head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And once,&rdquo; continued the other, &ldquo;I had the honour to be presented to you
+      by Monsieur le Duc himself. My name is Gaubert&mdash;Fabre Gaubert.&rdquo; And
+      as he introduced himself he rose out of respect for Garnache, who had
+      remained standing. Garnache knew him not at all, yet never doubted that
+      his tale was true; the fellow had a very courtly, winning air; moreover,
+      Garnache was beginning to feel lonely in the wilds of Dauphiny, so that it
+      rejoiced him to come into the company of one whom he might regard as
+      something of a fellow-creature. He held out his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am honoured in that you should have borne me in your memory, monsieur,&rdquo;
+       said he. He was about to add that he would be overjoyed if it should
+      happen that Monsieur Gaubert was travelling to Paris, since he might give
+      himself the pleasure of his company on that tedious journey; but he
+      checked himself betimes. He had no reason to suspect this gentleman; and
+      yet, all things considered, he bethought him suddenly that he would do
+      well to observe the greatest circumspection. So with a pleasant but
+      meaningless civility touching Monsieur Gaubert&rsquo;s presence in those parts,
+      Garnache passed on and gained the door. He paused in the porch, above
+      which the rebus-like sign of the Sucking Calf creaked and grated in each
+      gust of the chill wind that was blowing from the Alps. The rain had
+      ceased, but the sky was dark and heavy with great banks of scudding
+      clouds. In the street the men of his escort sat their horses, having
+      mounted at his bidding in readiness for the journey. A word or two he
+      exchanged with the sergeant, and then with a great rumble the clumsy
+      carriage from the Auberge de France heralded its approach. It rolled up
+      the street, a vast machine of wood and leather, drawn by three horses, and
+      drew up at the door of the inn. Out sprang Rabecque, to be immediately
+      sent by his master to summon mademoiselle. They would set out upon the
+      instant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque turned to obey; but in that same moment he was thrust rudely
+      aside by a man with the air of a servant, who issued from he inn carrying
+      a valise; after him, following close upon his heels, with head held high
+      and eyes that looked straight before him and took no heed of Garnache,
+      came the foreigner of yesternight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque, his shoulders touching the timbers of the porch, against which
+      he had been thrust, remained at gaze, following with resentful eye the
+      fellow who had so rudely used him. Garnache, on the other side, watched
+      with some wonder the advent of the ingenuous-looking stranger, but as yet
+      with no suspicion of his intent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not until the servant had thrown open the door of the coach and deposited
+      within the valise he carried, did Garnache stir. Not, indeed, until the
+      foreigner&rsquo;s foot was on the step preparatory to mounting did Garnache
+      speak.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hi! monsieur,&rdquo; he called to him, &ldquo;what is your pleasure with my
+      carriage?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger turned, and stared at Garnache with a look of wonder that
+      artfully changed to one of disdainful recognition.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah?&rdquo; said he, and his eyebrows went up. &ldquo;The apologetic gentleman! You
+      said?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache approached him, followed a step not only by Rabecque, but also by
+      Monsieur Gaubert, who had sauntered out a second earlier. Behind them, in
+      the porch, lounged now the foreigner&rsquo;s friend, and behind him again was to
+      be seen the great face and staring, somewhat startled eyes of the
+      landlord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I asked you, monsieur,&rdquo; said Garnache, already at grips with that quick
+      temper of his, &ldquo;what might be your pleasure with my coach?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With your coach?&rdquo; echoed the other, his superciliousness waxing more and
+      more offensive. &ldquo;Voyons! on! my apologetic friend, do all things in
+      Grenoble belong to you?&rdquo; He turned to the post-boy, who looked on
+      stolidly. &ldquo;You are from the Auberge de France, are you not?&rdquo; quoth he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am, monsieur,&rdquo; replied the man. &ldquo;This carriage was ordered last night
+      by a gentleman lodging at the Veau qui Tete?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perfectly,&rdquo; replied the stranger, in a tone of finality. &ldquo;It was ordered
+      by me.&rdquo; And he was about to turn away, when Garnache approached him by yet
+      another step.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will ask you to observe, monsieur,&rdquo; said he and for all that his tone
+      and words were civil, that they were forcedly so was obvious from their
+      quiver&mdash;&ldquo;I will ask you to observe that the carriage was fetched by
+      my own man there, who rode hither in it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger looked him up and down with a curling lip.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems, sir,&rdquo; said he, with a broad sneer, &ldquo;that you are one of those
+      impertinent fellows who will be for ever thrusting themselves upon
+      gentlemen with an eye to such profit as they can make.&rdquo; He produced a
+      purse and opened it. &ldquo;Last night it was my supper you usurped. I suffered
+      that. Now you would do the same by my coach, and that I shall not suffer.
+      But there is for your pains, and to be quit of your company.&rdquo; And he
+      tossed a silver coin at the Parisian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was an exclamation of horror in the background, and Monsieur de
+      Gaubert thrust himself forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir, sir,&rdquo; he exclaimed in an agitated voice, &ldquo;you cannot know whom you
+      are addressing. This is Monsieur Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache,
+      Mestre-de-Champ in the army of the King.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of all those names the one I should opine might fit him best, but for his
+      ugliness, is that of Marie,&rdquo; answered the foreigner, leering, and with a
+      contemptuous shrug he turned again to mount the carriage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that all Garnache&rsquo;s self-control deserted him, and he did a thing
+      deplorable. In one of his blind excesses of fury, heedless of the faithful
+      and watchful Rabecque&rsquo;s arresting tug at his sleeve, he stepped forward,
+      and brought a heavy hand down upon the supercilious gentleman&rsquo;s shoulder.
+      He took him in the instant in which, with one foot off the ground and the
+      other on the step of the carriage, the foreigner was easily thrown&rsquo; off
+      his balance; he dragged him violently backward, span him round and dropped
+      him floundering in the mire of the street-kennel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That done, there fell a pause&mdash;a hush that was ominous of things
+      impending. A little crowd of idlers that had gathered was quickly
+      augmenting now, and from some there came a cry of &ldquo;Shame!&rdquo; at Garnache&rsquo;s
+      act of violence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This is no moment at which to pause to moralize. And yet, how often is it
+      not so? How often does not public sympathy go out to the man who has been
+      assaulted without thought of the extent to which that man may have
+      provoked and goaded his assailant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That cry of &ldquo;Shame!&rdquo; did no more than increase the anger that was
+      mastering Garnache. His mission in Grenoble was forgotten; mademoiselle
+      above-stairs was forgotten; the need for caution and the fear of the
+      Condillacs were forgotten; everything was thrust from his mind but the
+      situation of the moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Amid the hush that followed, the stranger picked himself slowly up, and
+      sought to wipe the filth from his face and garments. His servant and his
+      friend flew to his aid, but he waved them aside, and advanced towards
+      Garnache, eyes blazing, lips sneering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; said he, in that soft, foreign tone of his, laden now with
+      fierce mock-politeness, &ldquo;perhaps monsieur proposes to apologize again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir, you are mad,&rdquo; interposed Gaubert. &ldquo;You are a foreigner, I perceive,
+      else you would&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache thrust him quietly aside. &ldquo;You are very kind, Monsieur
+      Gaubert,&rdquo; said he, and his manner now was one of frozen calm&mdash;a
+      manner that betrayed none of the frenzy of seething passion underneath. &ldquo;I
+      think, sir,&rdquo; said he to the stranger, adopting something of that
+      gentleman&rsquo;s sardonic manner, &ldquo;that it will be a more peaceful world
+      without you. It is that consideration restrains me from apologizing. And
+      yet, if monsieur will express regret for having sought, and with such lack
+      of manners, to appropriate my carriage&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough!&rdquo; broke in the other. &ldquo;We are wasting time, and I have a long
+      journey before me. Courthon,&rdquo; said he, addressing his friend, &ldquo;will you
+      bring me the length of this gentleman&rsquo;s sword? My name, sir,&rdquo; he added to
+      Garnache, &ldquo;is Sanguinetti.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Faith,&rdquo; said Garnache, &ldquo;it sorts well with your bloody spirit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And will sort well, no doubt, with his condition presently,&rdquo; put in
+      hawk-faced Gaubert. &ldquo;Monsieur de Garnache, if you have no friend at hand
+      to act for you, I shall esteem myself honoured.&rdquo; And he bowed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, thanks, sir. You are most opportunely met. You should be a gentleman
+      since you frequent the Hotel de Bourgogne. My thanks.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gaubert went aside to confer with Monsieur Courthon. Sanguinetti stood
+      apart, his manner haughty and impressive, his eye roaming scornfully
+      through the ranks of what had by now become a crowd. Windows were opening
+      in the street, and heads appearing, and across the way Garnache might have
+      beheld the flabby face of Monsieur de Tressan among the spectators of that
+      little scene.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque drew near his master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have a care, monsieur,&rdquo; he implored him. &ldquo;If this should be a trap.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache started. The remark sobered him, and brought to his mind his own
+      suspicions of yesternight, which his present anger had for the moment
+      lulled. Still, he conceived that he had gone too far to extricate himself.
+      But he could at least see to it that he was not drawn away from the place
+      that sheltered mademoiselle. And so he stepped forward, joining Courthon
+      and Gaubert, to insist that the combat should take place in the inn&mdash;either
+      in the common room or in the yard. But the landlord, overhearing this,
+      protested loudly that he could not consent to it. He had his house to
+      think of. He swore that they should not fight on his premises, and
+      implored them in the same breath not to attempt it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that Garnache, now thoroughly on his guard, was for putting off the
+      encounter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur Courthon,&rdquo; said he&mdash;and he felt a flush of shame mounting
+      to his brow, and realized that it may need more courage to avoid an
+      encounter than to engage in one&mdash;&ldquo;there is something that in the heat
+      of passion I forgot; something that renders it difficult for me to meet
+      your friend at present.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Courthon looked at him as he might look at an impertinent lackey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what may that be?&rdquo; he inquired, mightily contemptuous. There was a
+      snigger from some in the crowd that pressed about them, and even Monsieur
+      Gaubert looked askance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely, sir,&rdquo; he began, &ldquo;if I did not know you for Monsieur de Garnache&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache did not let him finish.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Give me air,&rdquo; he cried, and cuffed out to right and left of him at the
+      grinning spectators, who fell back and grinned less broadly. &ldquo;My reason,
+      Monsieur de Courthon,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;is that I do not belong to my self at
+      present. I am in Grenoble on business of the State, as the emissary of the
+      Queen-Regent, and so it would hardly become me to engage in private
+      quarrels.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Courthon raised his brows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You should have thought of that before you rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti in
+      the mud,&rdquo; he answered coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will tender him my apologies for that,&rdquo; Garnache promised, swallowing
+      hard, &ldquo;and if he still insists upon a meeting he shall have it in, say, a
+      month&rsquo;s time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot permit&mdash;&rdquo; began Courthon, very fiercely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will be so good as to inform your friend of what I have said,&rdquo;
+       Garnache insisted, interrupting him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Cowed, Courthon shrugged and went apart to confer with his friend.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; came Sanguinetti&rsquo;s soft voice, yet loud enough to be heard by all
+      present. &ldquo;He shall have a caning then for his impertinence.&rdquo; And he called
+      loudly to the post-boy for his whip. But at that insult Garnache&rsquo;s brain
+      seemed to take fire, and his cautious resolutions were reduced to ashes by
+      the conflagration. He stepped forward, and, virulent of tone and terrific
+      of mien, he announced that since Monsieur Sanguinetti took that tone with
+      him, he would cut his throat for him at once and wherever they should
+      please.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last it was arranged that they should proceed there and then to the
+      Champs aux Capuchins, a half-mile away behind the Franciscan convent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Accordingly they set out, Sanguinetti and Courthon going first, and
+      Garnache following with Gaubert; the rear being brought up by a regiment
+      of rabble, idlers and citizens, that must have represented a very
+      considerable proportion of the population of Grenoble. This audience
+      heartened Garnache, to whom some measure of reflection had again returned.
+      Before such numbers it was unthinkable that these gentlemen&mdash;assuming
+      them to be acting on behalf of Condillac&mdash;should dare to attempt foul
+      measures with him. For the rest he had taken the precaution of leaving
+      Rabecque at the Sucking Calf, and he had given the sergeant strict
+      injunctions that he was not to allow any of his men to leave their posts
+      during his absence, and that the troopers were to hold themselves entirely
+      at the orders of Rabecque. Comparatively easy therefore in his mind, and
+      but little exercised by any thought of the coming encounter, Garnache
+      walked briskly along.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They came at last to the Champs aux Capuchins&mdash;a pleasant stretch of
+      verdure covering perhaps half an acre and set about by a belt of
+      beech-trees.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The crowd disposed itself on the fringe of the sward, and the duellists
+      went forward, and set about the preparations. Principals and seconds threw
+      off cloak and doublet, and Sanguinetti, Courthon, and Gaubert removed
+      their heavy boots, whilst Garnache did no more than detach the spurs from
+      his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Sanguinetti, observing this, drew the attention of the others to it, and
+      an altercation arose. It was Gaubert who came to beg Garnache that he
+      should follow the example they had set him in that respect. But Garnache
+      shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The turf is sodden.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it is precisely on that account, sir,&rdquo; protested Gaubert very
+      earnestly. &ldquo;In your boots you will be unable to stand firm; you will run
+      the risk of slipping every time that you break ground.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I venture to think, sir, that that is my affair,&rdquo; said Garnache stiffly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it is not,&rdquo; the other cried. &ldquo;If you fight in your boots, we must all
+      do the same, and for myself&mdash;well, I have not come here to commit
+      suicide.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look you, Monsieur Gaubert,&rdquo; said Garnache quietly, &ldquo;your opponent will
+      be Monsieur Courthon, and since he is in his stockinged feet, there is no
+      reason why you yourself should not remain so too. As for me, I retain my
+      boots, and Monsieur Sanguinetti may have all the advantage that may give
+      him. Since I am content, in Heaven&rsquo;s name let the fight go forward. I am
+      in haste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gaubert bowed in submission; but Sanguinetti, who had overheard, turned
+      with an oath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By God, no!&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I need no such advantage, sir. Courthon, be so
+      good as to help me on with my boots again.&rdquo; And there was a fresh delay
+      whilst he resumed them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, however, the four men came together, and proceeded to the
+      measurement of swords. It was found that Sanguinetti&rsquo;s was two inches
+      longer than any of the other three.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the usual length in Italy,&rdquo; said Sanguinetti with a shrug.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If monsieur had realized that he was no longer in Italy, we might perhaps
+      have been spared this very foolish business,&rdquo; answered Garnache testily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what are we to do?&rdquo; cried the perplexed Gaubert.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fight,&rdquo; said Garnache impatiently. &ldquo;Is there never to be an end to these
+      preliminaries?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I cannot permit you to oppose yourself to a sword two inches longer
+      than your own,&rdquo; cried Gaubert, almost in a temper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not, if I am satisfied?&rdquo; asked Garnache. &ldquo;Mine is the longer reach;
+      thus matters will stand equal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Equal?&rdquo; roared Gaubert. &ldquo;Your longer reach is an advantage that you had
+      from God, his longer sword is one he had from an armourer. Is that
+      equality?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He may have my sword, and I&rsquo;ll take his,&rdquo; cut in the Italian, also
+      showing impatience. &ldquo;I too am in haste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In haste to die, then,&rdquo; snapped Gaubert.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, this is not seemly,&rdquo; Courthon reproved him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall teach me manners when we engage,&rdquo; snapped the hawk-faced
+      gentleman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sirs, sirs,&rdquo; Garnache implored them, &ldquo;are we to waste the day in words?
+      Monsieur Gaubert, there are several gentlemen yonder wearing swords; I
+      make no doubt that you will find one whose blade is of the same length as
+      your own, sufficiently obliging to lend it to Monsieur Sanguinetti.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is an office that my friend can do for me,&rdquo; interposed Sanguinetti,
+      and thereupon Courthon departed, to return presently with a borrowed
+      weapon of the proper length.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last it seemed that they might proceed with the business upon which
+      they were come; but Garnache was wrong in so supposing. A discussion now
+      arose between Gaubert and Courthon as to the choice of spot. The turf was
+      drenched and slippery, and for all that they moved from place to place
+      testing the ground, their principals following, nowhere could they find
+      the conditions sufficiently improved to decide upon engaging. To Garnache
+      the utility of this was apparent from the first. If these gentlemen had
+      thought to avoid slippery ground, they should have elected to appoint the
+      meeting elsewhere. But having chosen the Champs aux Capuchins, it was idle
+      to expect that one stretch of turf would prove firmer than another.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Wearied at last by this delay, he gave expression to his thoughts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are quite right, monsieur,&rdquo; said Courthon. &ldquo;But your second is
+      over-fastidious. It would simplify matters so much if you would remove
+      your boots.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look you, sirs,&rdquo; said Garnache, taking a firm stand, &ldquo;I will engage in my
+      boots and on this very spot or not at all. I have told you that I am in
+      haste. As for the slipperiness of the ground, my opponent will run no
+      greater risks than I. I am not the only impatient one. The spectators are
+      beginning to jeer at us. We shall have every scullion in Grenoble
+      presently saying that we are afraid of one another. Besides which, sirs, I
+      think I am taking cold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite of monsieur&rsquo;s mind, myself,&rdquo; drawled Sanguinetti.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You hear, sir,&rdquo; exclaimed Courthon, turning to Gaubert. &ldquo;You can scarce
+      persist in finding objections now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, since all are satisfied, so be it,&rdquo; said Gaubert, with a shrug. &ldquo;I
+      sought to do the best for my principal. As it is, I wash my hands of all
+      responsibility, and by all means let us engage, sirs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They disposed themselves accordingly, Gaubert engaging Courthon, on
+      Garnache&rsquo;s right hand, and Garnache himself falling on guard to receive
+      the attack of Sanguinetti. The jeers and murmurs that had been rising from
+      the ever-growing crowd that swarmed about the outskirts of the place fell
+      silent as the clatter of meeting swords rang out at last. And then, scarce
+      were they engaged when a voice arose, calling angrily:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hold, Sanguinetti! Wait!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A big, broad-shouldered man, in a suit of homespun and a featherless hat,
+      thrust his way rudely trough the crowd and broke into the space within the
+      belt of trees. The combatants had fallen apart at this commanding cry, and
+      the newcomer now dashed forward, flushed and out of breath as if with
+      running.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;<i>Vertudieu</i>! Sanguinetti,&rdquo; he swore, and his manner was half-angry,
+      half-bantering; &ldquo;do you call this friendship?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Francois&rdquo; returned the foreigner, &ldquo;you arrive most
+      inopportunely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And is that all the greeting you have for me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Looking more closely, Garnache thought that he recognized in him one of
+      Sanguinetti&rsquo;s companions of yesternight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But do you not see that I am engaged?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay; and that is my grievance that you should be engaged upon such an
+      affair, and that I should have no share in it. It is to treat me like a
+      lackey, and have the right to feel offended. Enfin! It seems I am not come
+      too late.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache cut in. He saw the drift of the fellow&rsquo;s intentions, and he was
+      not minded to submit to fresh delays; already more than half an hour was
+      sped since he had left the Sucking Calf. He put it plainly to them that
+      more than enough delay had there been already and he begged the newcomer
+      to stand aside and allow them to terminate the business on which they were
+      met. But Monsieur Francois&mdash;as Sanguinetti had called him&mdash;would
+      not hear of it. He proved, indeed, a very testy fellow, and he had,
+      moreover, the support of the others, including even Monsieur Gaubert.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me implore you not to spoil sport, sir,&rdquo; the latter begged Garnache.
+      &ldquo;I have a friend at the inn who would never forgive me if I permitted him
+      to miss such a morning&rsquo;s diversion as this gentleman is willing to afford
+      him. Suffer me to go for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look you, sir,&rdquo; answered Garnache sharply, &ldquo;however you may view this
+      meeting, it is not with me an affair of jest or sport. I am in a quarrel
+      that has been forced upon me, and&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely not, sir,&rdquo; Courthon interrupted sweetly. &ldquo;You forget that you
+      rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti in the mud. That is hardly to have a quarrel
+      forced upon you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache bit his lip to the blood in his vexation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;However the quarrel may have originated,&rdquo; said Francois, with a great
+      laugh, &ldquo;I swear that it goes not forward until I am accommodated, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had better accede, monsieur,&rdquo; murmured Gaubert. &ldquo;I shall not be gone
+      five minutes, and it will save time in the end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, very well,&rdquo; cried poor Garnache in his despair. &ldquo;Anything to save
+      time; anything! In God&rsquo;s name fetch your friend, and I hope you and he and
+      every man here will get his fill of fighting for once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gaubert departed on his errand, and there were fresh murmurs in the mob
+      until the reason of his going was understood. Five minutes sped; ten
+      minutes, and yet he returned not. Grouped together were Sanguinetti and
+      his two friends, in easy, whispered talk. At a little distance from them,
+      Garnache paced up and down to keep himself warm. He had thrown his cloak
+      over his shoulders again, and with sword tucked under arm and head thrust
+      forward, he stamped backwards and forwards, the very picture of
+      ill-humour. Fifteen minutes passed; twelve o&rsquo;clock boomed from the Church
+      of Saint Francois d&rsquo;Assisi and still Monsieur Gaubert returned not.
+      Garnache stood still a moment, in angry thought. This must not go on.
+      There must be an end, and at once. The tastes and inclinations of brawlers
+      were no concern of his. He had business of State&mdash;however unworthy&mdash;to
+      dispatch. He turned, intending to demand of Monsieur Sanguinetti that they
+      should engage at once and be done, when suddenly a fellow roughly dressed,
+      with dirty face and a shock head of fair hair, pushed his way through the
+      throng and advanced towards Monsieur Sanguinetti and his friends. Garnache
+      checked in his movement to look at the fellow, for he recognized in him
+      the ostler of the Auberge de France: He spoke at that moment, and Garnache
+      overheard the words he uttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur Sanguinetti,&rdquo; said he, addressing that gentleman, &ldquo;my master
+      sends to inquire if you shall want the carriage you ordered for to-day. It
+      has been standing for an hour at the door of the Auberge de France,
+      awaiting you, and if you don&rsquo;t want it&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Standing where?&rdquo; asked Sanguinetti harshly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At the door of the Auberge de France.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Peste, fool!&rdquo; cried the foreigner, &ldquo;why is it there, when I bade it be
+      sent to the Sucking Calf?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know, sir. I know no more than Monsieur l&rsquo;Hote told me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, a plague on Monsieur l&rsquo;Hote,&rdquo; swore Sanguinetti, and in that moment
+      his eye fell upon Garnache, standing there, attentive. At sight of the
+      Parisian he seemed lost in confusion. He dropped his glance and appeared
+      on the point of turning aside. Then to the ostler: &ldquo;I shall want the
+      carriage, and I shall come for it anon. Carry that message to your
+      master.&rdquo; And with that he turned and advanced to Garnache. His whilom
+      arrogance was all fallen from him; he wore instead an air of extreme
+      contrition.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, what shall I say to you?&rdquo; he asked in a voice that was rather
+      small. &ldquo;It seems there has been an error. I am deeply grieved, believe me&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say no more, I beg,&rdquo; cried Garnache, immensely relieved that at last
+      there should be a conclusion to an affair which had threatened to be
+      interminable. &ldquo;Let me but express my regrets for the treatment you
+      received at my hands.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I accept your expressions, and I admire their generosity,&rdquo; returned the
+      other as courteous now as subservient, indeed, in his courtesy&mdash;as he
+      had been erstwhile fierce and intractable. &ldquo;As for the treatment I
+      received, I confess that my mistake and my opinionativeness deserved it
+      me. I deplore to deprive these gentlemen of the entertainment to which
+      they were looking forward, but unless you should prove of an excessive
+      amiability I am afraid they must suffer with me the consequences of my
+      error.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache assured him very briefly, and none too politely that he did not
+      intend to prove of any excessive amiability. He spoke whilst struggling
+      into his doublet. He felt that he could cheerfully have caned the fellow
+      for the inconvenience he had caused him, and yet he realized that he had
+      other more pressing matters to attend to. He sheathed his sword, took up
+      his cloak and hat, made those gentlemen the compliments that became the
+      occasion, in terms a trifle more brief, perhaps, than were usual, and,
+      still wondering why Monsieur de Gaubert had not yet returned, he stalked
+      briskly away. Followed by the booings of the disappointed crowd, he set
+      out for the Sucking Calf at a sharp pace, taking the shorter way behind
+      the Church and across the graveyard of Saint Francois.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VIII. THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Upon leaving the Champs aux Capuchins, hawk-faced Monsieur Gaubert had run
+      every foot of the way to the Sucking Calf, and he had arrived there within
+      some five minutes, out of breath and wearing every appearance of distress&mdash;of
+      a distress rather greater than his haste to find his friend should
+      warrant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the door of the inn he found the carriage still waiting; the post-boy,
+      however, was in the porch, leaning in talk with one of the drawers. The
+      troopers sat their horses in stolid patience, keeping guard, and awaiting,
+      as they had been bidden, the return of Monsieur de Garnache. Rabecque,
+      very watchful, lounged in the doorway, betraying in his air none of the
+      anxiety and impatience with which he looked for his master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At sight of Monsieur Gaubert, running so breathlessly, he started forward,
+      wondering and uneasy. Across the street, from the Palais Seneschal, came
+      at that same moment Monsieur de Tressan with rolling gait. He reached the
+      door of the inn together with Monsieur Gaubert.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Full of evil forebodings, Rabecque hailed the runner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What has happened?&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Where is Monsieur de Garnache?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gaubert came to a staggering halt; he groaned and wrung his hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Killed!&rdquo; he panted, rocking himself in a passion of distress. &ldquo;He has
+      been butchered! Oh! it was horrible!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque gripped him by the shoulder, and steadied him with a hand that
+      hurt. &ldquo;What do you say?&rdquo; he gasped, his face white to the lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan halted, too, and turned upon Gaubert, a look of incredulity in his
+      fat countenance. &ldquo;Who has been killed?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;Not Monsieur de
+      Garnache?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Helas! yes,&rdquo; groaned the other. &ldquo;It was a snare, a guet-apens to which
+      they led us. Four of them set upon us in the Champs aux Capuchins. As long
+      as he lived, I stood beside him. But seeing him fallen, I come for help.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My God!&rdquo; sobbed Rabecque, and loosed his grasp of Monsieur Gaubert&rsquo;s
+      shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who did it?&rdquo; inquired Tressan, and his voice rumbled fiercely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know not who they were. The man who picked the quarrel with Monsieur de
+      Garnache called himself Sanguinetti. There is a riot down there at
+      present. There was a crowd to witness the combat, and they have fallen to
+      fighting among themselves. Would to Heaven they had stirred in time to
+      save that poor gentleman from being murdered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A riot, did you say?&rdquo; cried Tressan, the official seeming to awaken in
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye,&rdquo; answered the other indifferently; &ldquo;they are cutting one another&rsquo;s
+      throats.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But... But... Are you sure that he is dead, monsieur?&rdquo; inquired Rabecque;
+      and his tone was one that implored contradiction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Gaubert looked and paused, seeming to give the matter a second&rsquo;s thought.
+      &ldquo;I saw him fall,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;It may be that he was no more than wounded.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you left him there?&rdquo; roared the servant. &ldquo;You left him there?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gaubert shrugged his shoulders. &ldquo;What could I do against four? Besides,
+      the crowd was interfering already, and it seemed best to me to come for
+      help. These soldiers, now&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye,&rdquo; cut in Tressan, and he turned about and called the sergeant. &ldquo;This
+      becomes my affair.&rdquo; And he announced his quality to Monsieur Gaubert. &ldquo;I
+      am the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am fortunate in finding you,&rdquo; returned Gaubert, and bowed. &ldquo;I could
+      place the matter in no better hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Tressan, without heeding him, was already ordering the sergeant to
+      ride hard with his troopers for the Champs aux Capuchins. Rabecque,
+      however, thrust himself suddenly forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so, Monsieur le Seneschal,&rdquo; he interposed in fresh alarm, and mindful
+      of his charge. &ldquo;These men are here to guard Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+      Let them remain. I will go to Monsieur de Garnache.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal stared at him with contemptuously pouting underlip. &ldquo;You
+      will go?&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;And what can you do alone? Who are you?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am Monsieur de Garnache&rsquo;s servant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A lackey? Ah!&rdquo; And Tressan turned aside and resumed his orders as if
+      Rabecque did not exist or had never spoken. &ldquo;To the Champs aux Capuchins!&rdquo;
+       said he. &ldquo;At the gallop, Pommier! I will send others after you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sergeant rose in his stirrups and growled an order. The troopers
+      wheeled about; another order, and they were off, their cantering hoofs
+      thundering down the narrow street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque clutched at the Lord Seneschal&rsquo;s arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stop them, monsieur!&rdquo; he almost screamed in his excitement. &ldquo;Stop them!
+      There is some snare, some trick in this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stop them?&rdquo; quoth the Seneschal. &ldquo;Are you mad?&rdquo; He shook off Rabecque&rsquo;s
+      detaining hand, and left him, to cross the street again with ponderous and
+      sluggish haste, no doubt to carry out his purpose of sending more troopers
+      to the scene of the disturbance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque swore angrily and bitterly, and his vexation had two entirely
+      separate sources. On the one hand his anxiety and affection for his master
+      urged him to run at once to his assistance, whilst Tressan&rsquo;s removal of
+      the troopers rendered it impossible for him to leave Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye unguarded&mdash;though what he should do with her if Garnache
+      came not back at all, he did not at this stage pause to consider. On the
+      other hand, an instinctive and growing suspicion of this Monsieur Gaubert&mdash;who
+      was now entering the inn&mdash;inspired him with the opinion that the fat
+      Seneschal had been duped by a wild tale to send the troopers from the spot
+      where they might presently become very necessary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Full of fears, anxiety, and mistrust, it was a very dispirited Rabecque
+      that now slowly followed Monsieur Gaubert into the inn. But as he set his
+      foot across the threshold of the common-room, a sight met his eyes that
+      brought him to a momentary standstill, and turned to certainty all his
+      rising suspicions. He found it tenanted by a half-dozen fellows of very
+      rude aspect, all armed and bearing an odd resemblance in air and
+      accoutrements to the braves he had seen at Condillac the day before. As to
+      how they came there, he could only surmise that they had entered through
+      the stable-yard, as otherwise he must have observed their approach. They
+      were grouped now at the other end of the long, low chamber, by the door
+      leading to the interior of the inn. A few paces distant the landlord
+      watched them with uneasy eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But what dismayed Garnache&rsquo;s servant most of all was to see the man who
+      called himself Gaubert standing in talk with a slender, handsome youth,
+      magnificently arrayed, in whom he recognized Marius de Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque checked in his advance, and caught in that moment from Marius the
+      words: &ldquo;Let her be told that it is Monsieur de Garnache wishes her to
+      descend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At that Rabecque stepped towards them, very purposeful of mien. Gaubert
+      turned at his approach, and smiled. Marius looked up quickly; then made a
+      sign to the men. Instantly two of them went out by the door they guarded,
+      and ere it swung back again Rabecque saw that they were making for the
+      stairs. The remaining four ranged themselves shoulder to shoulder across
+      the doorway, plainly with intent to bar the way. Gaubert, followed
+      immediately by Marius, stepped aside and approached the landlord with arms
+      akimbo and a truculent smile on his pale hawk face. What he and Marius
+      said, Rabecque could not make out, but he distinctly heard the landlord&rsquo;s
+      answer delivered with a respectful bow to Marius:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bien, Monsieur de Condillac. I would not interfere in your concerns&mdash;not
+      for the world. I will be blind and deaf.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius acknowledged the servile protestation by a sneer, and Rabecque,
+      stirring at last, went forward boldly towards the doorway and its ugly,
+      human barrier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By your leave, sirs,&rdquo; said he&mdash;and he made to thrust one of them
+      aside.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You cannot pass this way, sir,&rdquo; he was answered, respectfully but firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque stood still, clenching and unclenching his hands and quivering
+      with anger. It was in that moment that he most fervently cursed Tressan
+      and his stupid meddling. Had the troopers still been there, they could
+      have made short work of these tatter-demalions. As it was, and with
+      Monsieur de Garnache dead, or at least absent, everything seemed at an
+      end. He might have contended that, his master being slain, it was no great
+      matter what he did, for in the end the Condillacs must surely have their
+      way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But he never paused to think of that
+      just then. His sense of trust was strong; his duty to his master plain. He
+      stepped back, and drew his sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me pass!&rdquo; he roared. But at the same instant there came the soft
+      slither of another weapon drawn, and Rabecque was forced to turn to meet
+      the onslaught of Monsieur Gaubert.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You dirty traitor,&rdquo; cried the angry lackey, and that was all they left
+      him breath to say. Strong arms gripped him from behind. The sword was
+      wrenched from his hand. He was flung down heavily, and pinned prone in a
+      corner by one of those bullies who knelt on his spine. And then the door
+      opened again, and poor Rabecque groaned in impotent anguish to behold
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye pause white-faced and wide-eyed on, the
+      threshold at sight of Monsieur de Condillac bowing low before her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood there a moment between the two ruffians who had been sent to
+      fetch her, and her eyes travelling round that room discovered Rabecque in
+      his undignified and half; strangled condition.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where... Where is Monsieur de Garnache?&rdquo; she faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is where all those who cross the will of Condillac must sooner or
+      later find themselves,&rdquo; said Marius airily. &ldquo;He is... disposed of.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean that he is dead?&rdquo; she cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think it very probable by now,&rdquo; he smiled. &ldquo;So you see, mademoiselle,
+      since the guardian the Queen appointed you has... deserted you, you would
+      do well to return to my mother&rsquo;s roof. Let me assure you that we shall
+      very gladly welcome your return. We blame none but Garnache for your
+      departure, and he has paid for the brutality of his abduction of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned in despair from that mocking gentleman, and attempted to make
+      appeal to the landlord, as though he could help her who could not help
+      himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur l&rsquo;Hote&mdash;&rdquo; she began, but Marius cut in sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take her out that way,&rdquo; he said, and pointed back down the passage by the
+      stairs. &ldquo;To the coach. Make haste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sought to resist them now; but they dragged her back, and there was a
+      rush of the others following through the doorway, the rear being brought
+      up by Gaubert.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Follow presently,&rdquo; was his parting command to the man who still knelt
+      upon Rabecque, and with that he vanished too.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Their steps died away in the passage; a door banged in the distance. There
+      followed a silence, disturbed only by the sound of Rabecque&rsquo;s laboured
+      breathing; then came a stir outside the door of the inn; some one shouted
+      an order. There was a movement of hoofs, a creak and crunch of wheels, and
+      presently the rumble of a heavy carriage being driven rapidly away. But
+      too well did Rabecque surmise what had taken place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ruffian released him at last, and, leaping to his feet, was gone
+      before Rabecque could rise. Once up, however, the lackey darted to the
+      door. In the distance he saw his late assailant running hard; the coach
+      had disappeared. He turned, and his smouldering eye fell upon the
+      landlord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O pig!&rdquo; he apostrophized him, snarling at him to vent some of his pent-up
+      rage. &ldquo;O cowardly pig.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What would you?&rdquo; expostulated the frightened taverner. &ldquo;They had cut my
+      throat if I resisted them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque poured abuse upon him, until for very lack of words he was forced
+      to cease, then, with a final bark of contempt, he went to recover his
+      sword, which had been flung into a corner of the room. He was stooping in
+      the act, when a quick step rang behind him on the threshold, an angry
+      voice harsh and metallic pronounced his name:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rebecque!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sword clattered from Rabecque&rsquo;s hand suddenly gone nerveless&mdash;nerveless
+      with sheer joy, all else forgotten in the perception that there, safe and
+      sound, stood his beloved master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur!&rdquo; he cried, and the tears welled up to the rough servant&rsquo;s eyes.
+      &ldquo;Monsieur!&rdquo; he cried again, and then with the tears streaming down his
+      cheeks, sallow and wrinkled as parchment, &ldquo;Oh, thank God!&rdquo; he blubbered.
+      &ldquo;Thank God!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For what?&rdquo; asked Garnache, coming forward, a scowl like a thunder-cloud
+      upon his brow. &ldquo;Where is the coach, where the troopers? Where is
+      mademoiselle? Answer me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He caught Rabecque&rsquo;s wrist in a grip that threatened to snap it. His face
+      was livid, his eyes aflame.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They&mdash;they&mdash;&rdquo; stammered Rabecque. He had not the courage to
+      tell the thing that had happened. He feared Garnache would strike him
+      dead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And then out of his terror he gathered an odd daring. He spoke to Garnache
+      as never he had dreamt to speak to him, and it may well be that by his
+      tone and by what he said he saved his life just then.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You fool,&rdquo; he cried to him. &ldquo;I told you to be on your guard. I warned you
+      to go warily. But you would not heed me. You know better than Rabecque.
+      You would have your way. You must go a-brawling. And they duped you, they
+      fooled you to the very top of their bent, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache dropped the servant&rsquo;s hand and stood back a pace. That
+      counter-blast of passion and that plain speaking from a quarter so
+      unexpected served, in part at least, to sober him. He understood the thing
+      that had happened, the thing that already he suspected must have happened;
+      but he understood too that he alone was to blame for it&mdash;he and his
+      cursed temper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who&mdash;who fooled me?&rdquo; he stammered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Gaubert&mdash;the fellow that calls himself Gaubert. He and his friends.
+      They fooled you away. Then Gaubert returned with a tale that you had been
+      killed and that there was a disturbance in the Champs aux Capuchins.
+      Monsieur de Tressan was here, as ill-luck would have it, and Gaubert
+      implored him to send soldiers thither to quell the riot. He dispatched the
+      escort. I sought in vain to stay them. He would not listen to me. The
+      troopers went, and then Monsieur Gaubert entered the inn, to join Monsieur
+      de Condillac and six of his braves who were waiting there. They
+      overpowered me, and carried mademoiselle off in the coach. I did what I
+      could, but&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How long have they been gone?&rdquo; Garnache interrupted him to inquire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But few minutes before you came.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It would be, then, the coach that passed me near the Porte de Savoie. We
+      must go after them, Rabecque. I made a short cut across the graveyard of
+      Saint Francis, or I must have met the escort. Oh, perdition!&rdquo; he cried,
+      smiting his clenched right hand into his open left. &ldquo;To have so much good
+      work undone by a moment&rsquo;s unguardedness.&rdquo; Then abruptly he turned on his
+      heels. &ldquo;I am going to Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; said he over his shoulder, and
+      went out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As he reached the threshold of the porch, the escort rode up the street,
+      returned at last. At sight of him the sergeant broke into a cry of
+      surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least you are safe, monsieur,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;We had heard that you were
+      dead, and I feared it must be so, for all that the rest of the story that
+      was told us was clearly part of a very foolish jest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jest? It was no jest, <i>Vertudieu</i>!&rdquo; said Garnache grimly. &ldquo;You had best
+      return to the Palais Seneschal. I have no further need of an escort,&rdquo; he
+      added bitterly. &ldquo;I shall require a larger force.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And he stepped out into the rain, which had begun again a few minutes
+      earlier, and was now falling in a steady downpour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IX. THE SENESCHAL&rsquo;S ADVICE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Straight across to the Palais Seneschal went Garnache. And sorely though his
+      temper might already have been tried that day, tempestuously though it had
+      been vented, there were fresh trials in store for him, fresh storms for
+      Tressan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May I ask, Monsieur le Seneschal,&rdquo; he demanded arrogantly, &ldquo;to what end
+      it was that you permitted yourself to order from its post the escort you
+      had placed under my command?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To what end?&rdquo; returned the Seneschal, between sorrow and indignation.
+      &ldquo;Why, to the end that it might succour you if still in time. I had heard
+      that if not dead already, you were in danger of your life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The answer was one that disarmed Garnache, in spite of his mistrust of
+      Tressan, and followed as it now was by the Seneschal&rsquo;s profuse expressions
+      of joy at seeing Garnache safe and well, it left him clearly unable to
+      pursue the subject of his grievance in this particular connection.
+      Instead, he passed on to entertain Tressan with the recital of the thing
+      that had been done; and in reciting it his anger revived again, nor did
+      the outward signs of sympathetic perturbation which the Seneschal thought
+      it judicious to display do aught to mollify his feelings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now, monsieur,&rdquo; he concluded, &ldquo;there remains but one course to be
+      pursued&mdash;to return in force, and compel them at the sword-point to
+      surrender me mademoiselle. That accomplished, I shall arrest the Dowager
+      and her son and every jackanapes within that castle. Her men can lie in
+      Grenoble gaol to be dealt with by yourself for supporting her in an
+      attempt to resist the Queen&rsquo;s authority. Madame and her son shall go with
+      me to Paris to answer there for their offence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal looked grave. He thoughtfully combed his beard with his
+      forefinger, and his little eyes peered a shade fearfully at Garnache
+      through his horn-rimmed spectacles&mdash;Garnache had found him at his
+      never-failing pretence of work.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, yes,&rdquo; he agreed, speaking slowly, &ldquo;that way lies your duty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I rejoice, monsieur, to hear you say so. For I shall need your aid.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My aid?&rdquo; The Seneschal&rsquo;s face assumed a startled look.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall require of you the necessary force to reduce that garrison.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal blew out his cheeks almost to bursting point, then wagged
+      his head and smiled wistfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And where,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;am I to find such a force?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have upwards of ten score men in quarters at Grenoble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I had those men&mdash;which I have not&mdash;what, think you, could
+      they do against a fortress such as Condillac? Monsieur deludes himself. If
+      they resist, you&rsquo;ll need ten times that number to bring them to their
+      senses. They are well victualled; they have an excellent water-supply. My
+      friend, they would just draw up the bridge, and laugh at you and your
+      soldiers from the ramparts.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache looked at him from under lowering brows. But for all his mistrust
+      of the man&mdash;a mistrust most excellently founded&mdash;he was forced
+      to confess that there was wisdom in what Tressan said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll sit down and besiege them if need be,&rdquo; he announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again the Seneschal wagged his head. &ldquo;You would have to be prepared to
+      spend your winter there in that case, and it can be cold in the valley of
+      Isere. Their garrison is small&mdash;some twenty men at most; but it is
+      sufficient for their defence, and not too many mouths to feed. No, no,
+      monsieur, if you would win your way by force you must count upon more than
+      ten score men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And now a flash of inspiration helped Tressan. It was his aim, as we know,
+      to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. Break with Madame de
+      Condillac his foolish hopeful heart would not permit him. Break with this
+      man, who personified authority and the King, he dared not. He had sought&mdash;and
+      it had given him much to do&mdash;to steer a middle course, serving the
+      Dowager and appearing not to withstand the Parisian. Now it almost seemed
+      to him as if he were come to an impasse beyond which he could no longer
+      pursue that course, but must halt and declare his side. But the notion
+      that now occurred to him helped him to win through this difficulty. For
+      Madame de Condillac&rsquo;s schemes he cared not a jot; whether they came safe
+      to harbour or suffered shipwreck on the way was all one to him; whether
+      Valerie de La Vauvraye married Marius de Condillac or the meanest cobbler
+      in Grenoble was, similarly, a matter that never disturbed his mind. He
+      would not even be concerned if he, himself, were to help the Dowager&rsquo;s
+      schemes to frustration, so long as she were to remain in ignorance of his
+      defection, so long as outwardly he were to appear faithful to her
+      interests.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said he gravely, &ldquo;the only course that promises you success is
+      to return to Paris, and, raising sufficient men, with guns and other
+      modern siege appliances such as we possess not here, come back and batter
+      down the walls of Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There the Seneschal spoke good sense. Garnache realized it, so much so
+      that he almost began to doubt whether he had not done the man an injustice
+      in believing him allied to the other party. But, however fully he might
+      perceive the wisdom of the advice, such a step was one that must wound his
+      pride, must be an acknowledgment that his own resources, upon which the
+      Queen had relied when she sent him single-handed to deal with this
+      situation, had proved insufficient.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He took a turn in the apartment without answering, tugging at his
+      mustachios and pondering the situation what time the Seneschal furtively
+      watched him in the candle-light. At last he came abruptly to a standstill
+      by the Seneschal&rsquo;s writing-table, immediately opposite Tressan. His hand
+      fell to his side, his eyes took on a look of determination.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As a last resource your good advice may guide me, Monsieur le Seneschal,&rdquo;
+       said he. &ldquo;But first I&rsquo;ll see what can be done with such men as you have
+      here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I have no men,&rdquo; answered Tressan, dismayed to see the failure of his
+      effort.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache stared at him in an unbelief that was fast growing to suspicion.
+      &ldquo;No men?&rdquo; he echoed dully. &ldquo;No men?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I might muster a score&mdash;no more than that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, monsieur, it is within my knowledge that you have at least two
+      hundred. I saw at least some fifty drawn up in the courtyard below here
+      yesterday morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had them, monsieur,&rdquo; the Seneschal made haste to cry, his hands upheld,
+      his body leaning forward over his table. &ldquo;I had them. But, unfortunately,
+      certain disturbances in the neighbourhood of Montelimar have forced me to
+      part with them. They were on the point of setting out when you saw them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache looked at him a moment without speaking. Then, sharply:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They must be recalled, monsieur,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now the Seneschal took refuge in a fine pretence of indignation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Recalled?&rdquo; he cried, and besides indignation there was some horror in his
+      voice. &ldquo;Recalled? And for what? That they may assist you in obtaining
+      charge of a wretched girl who is so headstrong as to wish to marry other
+      than her guardians have determined. A pretty affair that, as God&rsquo;s my
+      life! And for the adjustment of such a family dispute as this, a whole
+      province is to go to ruin, a conflagration of rebellion is to spread
+      unquenched? On my soul, sir, I begin to think that this mission of yours
+      has served to turn your head. You begin to see it out of all proportion to
+      its size.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, it may have turned my head, or it may not; but I shall not be
+      amazed if in the end it be the means of losing you yours. Tell me now:
+      What is the disturbance you speak of in Montelimar?&rdquo; That was a question
+      all Tressan&rsquo;s ingenuity could not answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What affair is it of yours?&rdquo; he demanded. &ldquo;Are you Seneschal of Dauphiny,
+      or am I? If I tell you that there is a disturbance, let that suffice. In
+      quelling it I do but attend to my own business. Do you attend to yours&mdash;which
+      seems to be that of meddling in women&rsquo;s matters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was too much. There was such odious truth in it that the iron sank
+      deep into Garnache&rsquo;s soul. The very reflection that such a business should
+      indeed be his, was of itself enough to put him in a rage, without having
+      it cast in his teeth as Tressan had none too delicately done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stormed and raged; he waved his arms and thumped the table, and talked
+      of cutting men to ribbons&mdash;among which men no doubt he counted my
+      Lord the Seneschal of Dauphiny. But from the storm of fierce invective, of
+      threats and promises with which he filled the air, the Seneschal gathered
+      with satisfaction the one clear statement that he would take his advice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll do as you say,&rdquo; Garnache had ended. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get me back to Paris as
+      fast as horse can carry me. When I return woe betide Condillac! And I
+      shall send my emissaries into the district of Montelimar to inquire into
+      these disturbances you tell of. Woe betide you if they find the country
+      quiet. You shall pay a heavy price for having dispatched your soldiers
+      thither to the end that they might not be here to further the Queen&rsquo;s
+      business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that he caught up his rain-sodden hat, flung it on his head, and
+      stalked out of the room, and, so, out of the Palace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He left Grenoble next morning, and it was a very tame and crestfallen
+      Garnache who quitted the Auberge du Veau qui Tete and rode out of the town
+      to take the road to Paris. How they would laugh at him at the Luxembourg!
+      Not even an affair of this kind was he fit to carry through; not even as a
+      meddler in women&rsquo;s matters as Tressan had called him&mdash;could he
+      achieve success. Rabecque, reflecting his master&rsquo;s mood&mdash;as becomes a
+      good lackey&mdash;rode silent and gloomy a pace or two in the rear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By noon they had reached Voiron, and here, at a quiet hostelry, they
+      descended to pause awhile for rest and refreshment. It was a chill,
+      blustering day, and although the rain held off, the heavens were black
+      with the promise of more to come. There was a fire burning in the
+      general-room of the hostelry, and Garnache went to warm him at its
+      cheerful blaze. Moodily he stood there, one hand on the high mantel shelf,
+      one foot upon an andiron, his eyes upon the flames.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was disconsolately considering his position; considering how utterly,
+      how irrevocably he had failed; pondering the gibes he would have to
+      stomach on his return to Paris, the ridicule it would incumb him to live
+      down. It had been a fine thing to breathe fire and blood and vengeance to
+      Tressan yesterday, to tell him of the great deeds he would perform on his
+      return. It was odds he never would return. They would send another in his
+      place, if indeed they sent at all. For, after all, before he could reach
+      Paris and the force required be in Dauphiny, a fortnight must elapse, let
+      them travel never so quickly. By that time they must be singularly
+      sluggish at Condillac if they did not so contrive that no aid that came
+      should come in time for mademoiselle, now that they were warned that the
+      Queen was stirring in the matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Oh! he had blundered it all most cursedly. Had he but kept his temper
+      yesterday at Grenoble; had he but had the wit to thwart their plans, by
+      preserving an unruffled front to insult, he might have won through and
+      carried mademoiselle out of their hands. As it was&mdash;! he let his arms
+      fall to his sides in his miserable despair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your wine, monsieur,&rdquo; said Rabecque at his elbow. He turned, and took the
+      cup of mulled drink from his servant. The beverage warmed him in body; but
+      it would need a butt of it to thaw the misery from his soul.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rabecque,&rdquo; he said with a pathetic grimness, &ldquo;I think I am the most
+      cursed blunderer that ever was entrusted with an errand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The thing so obsessed his mind that he must speak of it, if it be only to
+      his lackey. Rabecque&rsquo;s sharp face assumed a chastened look. He sighed most
+      dutifully. He sought for words of consolation. At last:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least, monsieur has made them fear him up there at Condillac,&rdquo; said
+      he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fear me?&rdquo; laughed Garnache. &ldquo;Pish! Deride me, you would say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fear you, I repeat, monsieur. Else why are they at such pains to
+      strengthen the garrison?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Eh?&rdquo; he questioned. But his tone was not greatly interested. &ldquo;Are they
+      doing that? Are they strengthening it? How know you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had it from the ostler at the Veau qui Tete that a certain Captain
+      Fortunio&mdash;an Italian soldier of fortune who commands the men at
+      Condillac&mdash;was at the Auberge de France last night, offering wine to
+      whomsoever would drink with him, and paying for it out of Madame la
+      Marquise&rsquo;s purse. To such as accepted his hospitality he talked of the
+      glory of a military career, particularly a free-lance&rsquo;s; and to those who
+      showed interest in what he said he offered a pike in his company.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enrolled he many, did you learn?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not one, monsieur, the ostler told me; and it seems he spent the evening
+      watching him weave his spider&rsquo;s web. But the flies were over-wary. They
+      knew whence he came; they knew the business for which he desired to enrol
+      them&mdash;for a rumour had gone round that Condillac was in rebellion
+      against the Queen&rsquo;s commands&mdash;and there were none so desperate at the
+      Auberge de France as to risk their necks by enlisting, no matter what the
+      wage he offered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache shrugged his shoulders. &ldquo;No matter,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Get me another cup
+      of wine.&rdquo; But as Rabecque turned away to obey him there came a sudden
+      gleam into the eye of Monsieur de Garnache which lightened the depression
+      of his countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER X. THE RECRUIT
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      In the great hall of the Chateau de Condillac sat the Dowager, her son,
+      and the Lord Seneschal, in conference.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was early in the afternoon of the last Thursday in October, exactly a
+      week since Monsieur de Garnache all but broken-hearted at the failure of
+      his mission&mdash;had departed from Grenoble. They had dined, and the
+      table was still strewn with vessels and the fragments of their meal, for
+      the cloth had not yet been raised. But the three of them had left the
+      board&mdash;the Seneschal with all that reluctance with which he was wont
+      to part company with the table, no matter how perturbed in spirit he might
+      be&mdash;and they had come to group themselves about the great open
+      fireplace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A shaft of pale October sunshine entering through the gules of an
+      escutcheon on the mullioned windows struck a scarlet light into silver and
+      glass upon the forsaken board.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame was speaking. She was repeating words that she had uttered at least
+      twenty times a day during the past week.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a madness to let that fellow go. Had we but put him and his
+      servant out of the way, we should be able now to sleep tranquil in our
+      beds. I know their ways at Court. They might have marvelled a little at
+      first that he should tarry so long upon his errand, that he should send
+      them no word of its progress; but presently, seeing him no more, he would
+      little by little have been forgotten, and with him the affair in which the
+      Queen has been so cursedly ready to meddle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As it is, the fellow will go back hot with the outrage put upon him;
+      there will be some fine talk of it in Paris; it will be spoken of as
+      treason, as defiance of the King&rsquo;s Majesty, as rebellion. The Parliament
+      may be moved to make outlaws of us, and the end of it all&mdash;who shall
+      foresee?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a long distance from Condillac to Paris, madame,&rdquo; said her son,
+      with a shrug.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you will find them none so ready to send soldiers all this way,
+      Marquise,&rdquo; the Seneschal comforted her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bah! You make too sure of your security. You make too sure of what they
+      will do, what leave undone. Time will show, my friends; and, mor-dieu! I
+      am much at fault if you come not both to echo my regret that we did not
+      dispose of Monsieur de Garnache and his lackey when we had them in our
+      power.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eye fell with sinister promise upon Tressan, who shivered slightly and
+      spread his hands to the blaze, as though his shiver had been of cold. But
+      Marius did not so readily grow afraid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;at the worst we can shut our gates and fling defiance
+      at them. We are well-manned, and Fortunio is seeking fresh recruits.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Seeking them, yes,&rdquo; she sneered. &ldquo;For a week has the fellow been spending
+      money like water, addling the brains of half Grenoble with the best wine
+      at the Auberge de France, yet not a single recruit has come in, so far.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius laughed. &ldquo;Your pessimism leads you into rash conclusions,&rdquo; he
+      cried. &ldquo;You are wrong. One recruit has come in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One!&rdquo; she echoed. &ldquo;A thousand devils! A brave number that! A fine return
+      for the river of wine with which we have washed the stomachs of Grenoble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Still, it is a beginning,&rdquo; ventured the Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, and, no doubt, an ending,&rdquo; she flashed back at him. &ldquo;And what manner
+      of fool may this one be, whose fortunes were so desperate that he could
+      throw them in with ours?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is an Italian&mdash;a Piedmontese who has tramped across Savoy and was
+      on his way to Paris to make his fortune, when Fortunio caught him and made
+      it clear to him that his fortune was made for him at Condillac. He is a
+      lusty, stalwart fellow, speaking no word of French, who was drawn to
+      Fortunio by discovering in him a fellow-countryman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mockery flashed from the Dowager&rsquo;s beautiful eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In that you have the reason of his enrolling himself. He knew no word of
+      French, poor devil, so could not learn how rash his venture was. Could we
+      find more such men as this one it might be well. But where shall we find
+      them? Pish! my dear Marius, matters are little mended, nor ever will be,
+      for the mistake we made in allowing Garnache to go his ways.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame;&rdquo; again ventured Tressan, &ldquo;I think that you want for hopefulness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least, I do not want for courage, Monsieur le Comte,&rdquo; she answered
+      him; &ldquo;and I promise you that while I live&mdash;to handle a sword if need
+      be&mdash;no Paris men shall set foot in Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye,&rdquo; grumbled Marius, &ldquo;you can contemplate that, and it is all you do
+      contemplate. You will not see, madame that our position is far from
+      desperate; that, after all, there may be no need to resist the King. It is
+      three months since we had news of Florimond. Much may happen in three
+      months when a man is warring. It may well be that he is dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish I knew he was&mdash;and damned,&rdquo; she snapped, with a tightening of
+      her scarlet lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; agreed Marius, with a sigh, &ldquo;that were an end to all our troubles.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m none so sure. There is still mademoiselle, with her new-formed
+      friends in Paris&mdash;may a pestilence blight them all! There are still
+      the lands of La Vauvraye to lose. The only true end to our troubles as
+      they stand at present lies in your marrying this headstrong baggage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That the step should be rendered impossible, you can but blame yourself,&rdquo;
+       Marius reminded her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How so?&rdquo; she cried, turning sharply upon him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Had you kept friends with the Church, had you paid tithes and saved us
+      from this cursed Interdict, we should have no difficulty in getting hither
+      a priest, and settling the matter out of hand, be Valerie willing or not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him, scorn kindling in her glance. Then she swung round to
+      appeal to Tressan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You hear him, Count,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;There is a lover for you! He would wed
+      his mistress whether she love him or not&mdash;and he has sworn to me that
+      he loves the girl.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How else should the thing be done since she opposes it?&rdquo; asked Marius,
+      sulkily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How else? Do you ask me how else? God! Were I a man, and had I your shape
+      and face, there is no woman in the world should withstand me if I set my
+      heart on her. It is address you lack. You are clumsy as a lout where a
+      woman is concerned. Were I in your place, I had taken her by storm three
+      months ago, when first she came to us. I had carried her out of Condillac,
+      out of France, over the border into Savoy, where there are no Interdicts
+      to plague you, and there I would have married her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius frowned darkly, but before he could speak, Tressan was insinuating
+      a compliment to the Marquise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True, Marius,&rdquo; he said, with pursed lips. &ldquo;Nature has been very good to
+      you in that she has made you the very counterpart of your lady mother. You
+      are as comely a gentleman as is to be found in France&mdash;or out of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pish!&rdquo; snapped Marius, too angered by the reflection cast upon his
+      address, to be flattered by their praises of his beauty. &ldquo;It is an easy
+      thing to talk; an easy thing to set up arguments when we consider but the
+      half of a question. You forget, madame, that Valerie is betrothed to
+      Florimond and that she clings faithfully to her betrothal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;<i>Vertudieu</i>!&rdquo; swore the Marquise, &ldquo;and what is this betrothal, what this
+      faithfulness? She has not seen her betrothed for three years. She was a
+      child at the time of their fiancailles. Think you her faithfulness to him
+      is the constancy of a woman to her lover? Go your ways, you foolish boy.
+      It is but the constancy to a word, to the wishes of her father. Think you
+      constancy that has no other base than that would stand between her and any
+      man who&mdash;as you might do, had you the address&mdash;could make her
+      love him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do say so,&rdquo; answered Marius firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled the pitying smile of one equipped with superior knowledge when
+      confronted with an obstinate, uninformed mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a droll arrogance about you, Marius,&rdquo; she told him, quietly.
+      &ldquo;You, a fledgling, would teach me, a woman, the ways of a woman&rsquo;s heart!
+      It is a thing you may live to regret.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As how?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Once already has mademoiselle contrived to corrupt one of our men, and
+      send him to Paris with a letter. Out of that has sprung our present
+      trouble. Another time she may do better. When she shall have bribed
+      another to assist her to escape; when she, herself, shall have made off to
+      the shelter of the Queen-mother, perhaps you will regret that my counsel
+      should have fallen upon barren ground.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is to prevent any such attempt that we have placed her under guard,&rdquo;
+       said he. &ldquo;You are forgetting that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgetting it? Not I. But what assurance have you that she will not bribe
+      her guard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius laughed, rose, and pushed back his chair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you are back at your contemplation of the worst side
+      of this affair; you are persisting in considering only how we may be
+      thwarted. But set your mind at rest. Gilles is her sentinel. Every night
+      he sleeps in her anteroom. He is Fortunio&rsquo;s most trusted man. She will not
+      corrupt him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager smiled pensively, her eyes upon the fire. Suddenly she raised
+      them to his face. &ldquo;Berthaud was none the less trusted. Yet, with no more
+      than a promise of reward at some future time should she succeed in
+      escaping from us, did she bribe him to carry her letter to the Queen. What
+      happened to Berthaud that may not happen to Gilles?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You might change her sentry nightly,&rdquo; put in the Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, if we knew whom we could trust; who would be above corruption. As it
+      is&rdquo;&mdash;she shrugged her shoulders &ldquo;that would be but to afford her
+      opportunities to bribe them one by one until they were all ready to act in
+      concert.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why need she any sentinel at all?&rdquo; asked Tressan, with some show of
+      sense.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To ward off possible traitors,&rdquo; she told him, and Marius smiled and
+      wagged his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame is never done foreseeing the worst, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Which shows my wisdom. The men in our garrison are mercenaries, all
+      attached to us only because we pay them. They all know who she is and what
+      her wealth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pity you have not a man who is deaf and dumb,&rdquo; said Tressan, half in
+      jest. But Marius looked up suddenly, his eyes serious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have as good,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;There is the Italian knave Fortunio enrolled
+      yesterday, as I have told you. He knows neither her wealth nor her
+      identity; nor if he did could he enter into traffic with her, for he knows
+      no French, and she no Italian.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager clapped her hands. &ldquo;The very man!&rdquo; she cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Marius, either from sheer perverseness, or because he did not share
+      her enthusiasm, made answer: &ldquo;I have faith in Gilles.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; she mocked him, &ldquo;and you had faith in Berthaud. Oh, if you have
+      faith in Gilles, let him remain; let no more be said.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The obstinate boy took her advice, and shifted the subject, speaking to
+      Tressan of some trivial business connected with the Seneschalship.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But madame, woman-like, returned to the matter whose abandoning she had
+      herself suggested. Marius, for all his affected disdain of it, viewed it
+      with a certain respect. And so in the end they sent for the recruit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio&mdash;who was no other than the man Garnache had known as
+      &ldquo;Sanguinetti&rdquo;&mdash;brought him, still clad in the clothes in which he had
+      come. He was a tall, limber fellow, with a very swarthy skin and black,
+      oily-looking hair that fell in short ringlets about his ears and neck, and
+      a black, drooping mustache which gave him a rather hang-dog look. There
+      was a thick stubble of beard of several days&rsquo; growth about his chin and
+      face; his eyes were furtive in their glances, but of a deep blue that
+      contrasted oddly with his blackness when he momentarily raised them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He wore a tattered jerkin, and his legs, in default of stockings, were
+      swathed in soiled bandages and cross-gartered from ankle to knee. He stood
+      in a pair of wooden shoes, from one of which peeped forth some wisps of
+      straw, introduced, no doubt, to make the footgear fit. He slouched and
+      shuffled in his walk, and he was unspeakably dirty. Nevertheless, he was
+      girt with a sword in a ragged scabbard hanging from a frayed and shabby
+      belt of leather.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame scanned him with interest. The fastidious Marius eyed him with
+      disgust. The Seneschal peered at him curiously through shortsighted eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not think I have ever seen a dirtier ruffian,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I like his nose,&rdquo; said madame quietly. &ldquo;It is the nose of an intrepid
+      man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It reminds me of Garnache&rsquo;s,&rdquo; laughed the Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You flatter the Parisian,&rdquo; commented Marius.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The mercenary, meanwhile, stood blandly smiling at the party, showing at
+      least a fine array of teeth, and wearing the patient, attentive air of one
+      who realizes himself to be under discussion, yet does not understand what
+      is being said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A countryman of yours, Fortunio?&rdquo; sneered Marius.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain, whose open, ingenuous countenance dissembled as villainous a
+      heart as ever beat in the breast of any man, disowned the compatriotism
+      with a smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hardly, monsieur,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;&lsquo;Battista&rsquo; is a Piedmontese.&rdquo; Fortunio
+      himself was a Venetian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is he to be relied upon, think you?&rdquo; asked madame. Fortunio shrugged his
+      shoulders and spread his hands. It was not his habit to trust any man
+      inordinately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is an old soldier,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;He has trailed a pike in the Neapolitan
+      wars. I have cross-questioned him, and found his answers bore out the
+      truth of what he said.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what brings him to France?&rdquo; asked Tressan. The captain smiled again,
+      and there came again that expressive shrug of his. &ldquo;A little over-ready
+      with the steel,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They told Fortunio that they proposed to place him sentry over
+      mademoiselle instead of Gilles, as the Italian&rsquo;s absolute lack of French
+      would ensure against corruption. The captain readily agreed with them. It
+      would be a wise step. The Italian fingered his tattered hat, his eyes on
+      the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly madame spoke to him. She asked him for some account of himself
+      and whence he came, using the Italian tongue, of which she had a passing
+      knowledge. He followed her questions very attentively, at times with
+      apparent difficulty, his eyes on her face, his head craned a little
+      forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now and then Fortunio had to intervene, to make plainer to this ignorant
+      Piedmontese mind the Marquise&rsquo;s questions. His answers came in a deep,
+      hoarse voice, slurred by the accent of Piedmont, and madame&mdash;her
+      knowledge of Italian being imperfect&mdash;had frequently to have recourse
+      to Fortunio to discover the meaning of what he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last she dismissed the pair of them, bidding the captain see that he
+      was washed and more fittingly clothed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An hour later, after the Seneschal had taken his departure to ride home to
+      Grenoble, it was madame herself, accompanied by Marius and Fortunio, who
+      conducted Battista&mdash;such was the name the Italian had given&mdash;to
+      the apartments above, where mademoiselle was now confined practically a
+      prisoner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XI. VALERIE&rsquo;S GAOLER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      My child, said the Dowager, and her eyes dwelt on Valerie with a look of
+      studied gentleness, &ldquo;why will you not be reasonable?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The constant reflection that Garnache was at large, making his way back to
+      Paris to stir up vengeance for the outrage put upon him, was not without a
+      certain chastening effect upon the Dowager. She had a way of saying that
+      she had as good a stomach for a fight as any man in France, and a fight
+      there should be if it came to it and Garnache should return to assail
+      Condillac. Yet a certain pondering of the consequences, a certain counting
+      of the cost&mdash;ordinarily unusual to her nature led her to have
+      recourse to persuasion and to a gentleness no less unusual.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie&rsquo;s eyes were raised to hers with a look that held more scorn than
+      wonder. They were standing in the antechamber of Valerie&rsquo;s room. Yonder at
+      his post lounged the recruit &ldquo;Battista,&rdquo; looking a trifle cleaner than
+      when first he had been presented to the Marquise, but still not clean
+      enough for a lady&rsquo;s antechamber. He was leaning stolidly against the sill
+      of the window, his eyes on the distant waters of the Isere, which shone a
+      dull copper colour in the afterglow of the October sunset. His face was
+      vacant, his eyes pensive, as he stood there undisturbed by the flow of a
+      language he did not understand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio and Marius had departed, and the Marquise&mdash;played upon by
+      her unusual tremors&mdash;had remained behind for a last word with the
+      obstinate girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In what, madame,&rdquo; asked Valerie, &ldquo;does my conduct fall short of
+      reasonableness?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager made a movement of impatience. If at every step she were to be
+      confronted by these questions, which had in them a savour of challenge,
+      she was wasting time in remaining.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are unreasonable, in this foolish clinging to a promise given for
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Given by me, madame,&rdquo; the girl amended, knowing well to what promise the
+      Dowager referred.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Given by you, then; but given at an age when you could not understand the
+      nature of it. They had no right to bind you so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If it is for any to question that right, it is for me,&rdquo; Valerie made
+      answer, her eyes ever meeting the Dowager&rsquo;s unflinchingly. &ldquo;And I am
+      content to leave that right unquestioned. I am content to fill the promise
+      given. In honour I could not do less.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! In honour!&rdquo; The Dowager sighed. Then she came a step nearer, and her
+      face grew sweetly wistful. &ldquo;But your heart, child; what of your heart?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My heart concerns myself. I am the betrothed of Florimond&mdash;that is
+      all that concerns the world and you. I respect and admire him more than
+      any living man, and I shall be proud to become his wife when he returns,
+      as his wife I shall become in spite of all that you and your son may do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager laughed softly, as if to herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And if I tell you that Florimond is dead?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When you give me proof of that, I shall believe it,&rdquo; the girl replied.
+      The Marquise looked at her, her face manifesting no offence at the almost
+      insulting words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And if I were to lay that proof before you?&rdquo; she inquired, sadly almost.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie&rsquo;s eyes opened a trifle wider, as if in apprehension. But her
+      answer was prompt and her voice steady. &ldquo;It still could have no effect
+      upon my attitude towards your son.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is foolishness, Valerie&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In you it is, madame,&rdquo; the girl broke in; &ldquo;a foolishness to think you can
+      constrain a girl, compel her affections, command her love, by such means
+      as you have employed towards me. You think that it predisposes me to be
+      wooed, that it opens my heart to your son, to see myself gaoled that he
+      may pay me his court.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Gaoled, child? Who gaols you?&rdquo; the Dowager cried, as if the most
+      surprising utterance had fallen from Valerie&rsquo;s lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mademoiselle smiled in sorrow and some scorn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I not gaoled, then?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;What call you this? What does that
+      fellow there? He is to lie outside my door at nights to see that none
+      holds communication with me. He is to go with me each morning to the
+      garden, when, by your gracious charity I take the air. Sleeping and waking
+      the man is ever within hearing of any word that I may utter&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But he has no French!&rdquo; the Dowager protested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To ensure, no doubt, against any attempt of mine to win him to my side,
+      to induce him to aid me escape from this prison. Oh, madame, I tell you
+      you do but waste time, and you punish me and harass yourself to little
+      purpose. Had Marius been such a man as I might have felt it in my nature
+      to love&mdash;which Heaven forbid!&mdash;these means by which you have sought to
+      bring that thing about could but have resulted in making me hate him as I
+      do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager&rsquo;s fears were banished from her mind at that, and with them
+      went all thought of conciliating Valerie. Anger gleamed in her eyes; the
+      set of her lips grew suddenly sneering and cruel, so that the beauty of
+      her face but served to render it hateful the more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So that you hate him, ma mie?&rdquo; a ripple of mockery on the current of her
+      voice, &ldquo;and he a man such as any girl in France might be proud to wed.
+      Well, well, you are not to be constrained, you say.&rdquo; And the Marquise&rsquo;s
+      laugh was menacing and unpleasant. &ldquo;Be not so sure, mademoiselle. Be not
+      so sure of that. It may well betide that you shall come to beg upon your
+      knees for this alliance with a man whom you tell me that you hate. Be not
+      so sure you cannot be constrained.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Their eyes met; both women were white to the lips, but it was curbed
+      passion in the one, and deadly fear in the other; for what the Dowager&rsquo;s
+      words left unsaid her eyes most eloquently conveyed. The girl shrank back,
+      her hands clenched, her lip caught in her teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a God in heaven, madame,&rdquo; she reminded the Marquise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye&mdash;in heaven,&rdquo; laughed the Marquise, turning to depart. She paused
+      by the door, which the Italian had sprung forward to open for her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marius shall take the air with you in the morning if it is fine. Ponder
+      meanwhile what I have said.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does this man remain here, madame?&rdquo; inquired the girl, vainly seeking to
+      render her voice steady.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the outer anteroom is his place: but as the key of this room is on his
+      side of the door, he may enter here when he so pleases, or when he thinks
+      that he has reason to. If the sight of him displeases you, you may lock
+      yourself from it in your own chamber yonder.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The same she said in Italian to the man, who bowed impassively, and
+      followed the Dowager into the outer room, closing the door upon
+      mademoiselle. It was a chamber almost bare of furniture, save for a table
+      and chair which had been placed there, so that the gaoler might take his
+      meals.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man followed the Marquise across the bare floor, their steps
+      resounding as they went, and he held the outer door for her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Without another word she left him, and where he stood he could hear her
+      steps as she tripped down the winding staircase of stone. At last the door
+      of the courtyard closed with a bang, and the grating of a key announced to
+      the mercenary that he and his charge were both imprisoned in that tower of
+      the Chateau de Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Left alone in the anteroom, mademoiselle crossed to the window and dropped
+      limply into a chair. Her face was still very white, her heart beating
+      tumultuously, for the horrid threat that had been conveyed in the
+      Dowager&rsquo;s words had brought her her first thrill of real fear since the
+      beginning of this wooing-by-force three months ago, a wooing which had
+      become more insistent and less like a wooing day by day, until it had
+      culminated in her present helpless position.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was a strong-souled, high-spirited girl, but tonight hope seemed
+      extinguished in her breast. Florimond, too, seemed to have abandoned her.
+      Either he had forgotten her, or he was dead, as the Dowager said. Which
+      might be the true state of things she did not greatly care. The
+      realization of how utterly she was in the power of Madame de Condillac and
+      her son, and the sudden chance discovery of how unscrupulously that power
+      might be wielded, filled her mind to the exclusion of all else.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By the window she sat, watching, without heeding them, the fading colours
+      in the sky. She was abandoned to these monsters, and it seemed they would
+      devour her. She could hope for no help from outside since they had as she
+      believed&mdash;slain Monsieur de Garnache. Her mind dwelt for a moment on
+      that glimpse of rescue that had been hers a week ago, upon the few hours
+      of liberty which she had enjoyed, but which only seemed now to increase
+      the dark hopelessness of her imprisonment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again with the eyes of her mind she beheld that grim, stalwart figure, saw
+      his great nose, his greying hair, his fierce mustachios and his stern,
+      quick eyes. Again she heard the rasp of his metallic voice with its brisk
+      derision. She saw him in the hall below, his foot upon the neck of that
+      popinjay of Condillac daring them all to draw a breath, should he forbid
+      it; again in fancy she rode on the withers of his horse at the gallop
+      towards Grenoble. A sigh escaped her. Surely that was the first man who
+      was indeed a man she had ever set eyes on since her father died. Had
+      Garnache been spared, she would have felt courage and she would have
+      hoped, for there was something about him that suggested energy and
+      resource such as it is good to lean upon in times of stress. Again she
+      heard that brisk, metallic voice: &ldquo;Are you content, madame? Have you had
+      fine deeds enough for one day?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And then, breaking in upon her musings came the very voice of her
+      day-dream, so suddenly, sounding so natural and lifelike that she almost
+      screamed, so startled was she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; it said, &ldquo;I beg that you&rsquo;ll not utterly lose heart. I have
+      come back to the thing Her Majesty bade me do, and I&rsquo;ll do it, in spite of
+      that tigress and her cub.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat still as a statue, scarce breathing, her eyes fixed upon the
+      violet sky. The voice had ceased, but still she sat on. Then it was slowly
+      borne in upon her that that was no dream-voice, no trick of her
+      overburdened mind. A voice, a living, actual voice had uttered those words
+      in this room, here at her elbow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned, and again she almost screamed; for there, just behind her, his
+      glittering eyes fixed upon her with singular intentness, stood the
+      swarthy, black-haired Italian gaoler they had given her because he had no
+      French.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had come up so quietly behind her that she had not heard his approach,
+      and he was leaning forward now, with an odd suggestion of crouching in his
+      attitude, like a beast about to spring. Yet his gaze riveted hers as with
+      a fascination. And so, while she looked, his lips moved, and from them, in
+      that same voice of her dreams, came from this man who had no French, the
+      words:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be not afraid, mademoiselle. I am that blunderer, Garnache, that unworthy
+      fool whose temper ruined what chance of saving you he had a week ago.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stared like one going mad.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Garnache!&rdquo; said she, in a husky whisper. &ldquo;You Garnache?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet the voice, she knew, was Garnache&rsquo;s and none other. It was a voice not
+      easily mistaken. And now, as she looked and looked, she saw that the man&rsquo;s
+      nose was Garnache&rsquo;s, though oddly stained, and those keen eyes, they were
+      Garnache&rsquo;s too. But the hair that had been brown and flecked with grey was
+      black; the reddish mustachios that had bristled like a mountain cat&rsquo;s were
+      black, too, and they hung limp and hid from sight the fine lines of his
+      mouth. A hideous stubble of unshorn beard defaced his chin and face, and
+      altered its sharp outline; and the clear, healthy skin that she remembered
+      was now a dirty brown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly the face smiled, and it was a smile that reassured her and drove
+      away the last doubt that she had. She was on her feet in an instant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, monsieur,&rdquo; was all that she could say; but her longing was to
+      fling her arms about the neck of this man, as she might have flung them
+      about the neck of a brother or a father, and sob out upon his shoulder the
+      sudden relief and revulsion that his presence brought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache saw something of her agitation, and to relieve it he smiled and
+      began to tell her the circumstances of his return and his presentation to
+      Madame as a knave who had no French.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fortune was very good to me, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I had little hope
+      that such a face as mine could be disguised, but I take no pride in what
+      you see. It is the handiwork of Rabecque, the most ingenious lackey that
+      ever served a foolish master. It helped me that having been ten years in
+      Italy when I was younger, I acquired the language so well as to be able to
+      impose even upon Fortunio. In that lay a circumstance which at once
+      disarmed suspicion, and if I stay not so long as it shall take the dye to
+      wear from my hair and beard and the staining from my face, I shall have
+      little to fear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, monsieur,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;you have everything to fear!&rdquo; And alarm grew
+      in her eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But he laughed again for answer. &ldquo;I have faith in my luck, mademoiselle,
+      and I think I am on the tide of it at present. I little hoped when I made
+      my way into Condillac in this array that I should end, by virtue of my
+      pretended ignorance of French, in being appointed gaoler to you. I had
+      some ado to keep the joy from my eyes when I heard them planning it. It is
+      a thing that has made all else easy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what can you do alone, monsieur?&rdquo; she asked him; and there was a note
+      almost of petulance in her voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He moved to the window, and leaned his elbow on the sill. The light was
+      fast fading. &ldquo;I know not yet. But I am here to contrive a means. I shall
+      think and watch.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know in what hourly peril I am placed,&rdquo; she cried, and suddenly
+      remembering that he must have overheard and understood the Dowager&rsquo;s
+      words, a sudden heat came to her cheeks to recede again and leave them
+      marble-pale. And she thanked Heaven that in the dusk and in the shadow
+      where she stood he could but ill make out her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you think that I have been rash in returning&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no, not rash, monsieur; noble and brave above all praise. I would
+      indeed I could tell you how noble and brave I account your action.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is as nothing to the bravery required to let Rabecque do this hideous
+      work upon a face for which I have ever entertained some measure of
+      respect.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He jested, sooner than enlighten her that it was his egregious pride had
+      fetched him back when he was but a few hours upon his journey Pariswards,
+      his inability to brook the ridicule that would be his when he announced at
+      the Luxembourg that failure had attended him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, but what can you do alone?&rdquo; she repeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Give me at least a day or two to devise some means; let me look round and
+      take the measure of this gaol. Some way there must be. I have not come so
+      far and so successfully to be beaten now. Still,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;if you
+      think that I overrate my strength or my resource, if you would sooner that
+      I sought men and made an assault upon Condillac, endeavouring to carry it
+      and to let the Queen&rsquo;s will prevail by force of arms, tell me so, and I am
+      gone tomorrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whither would you go?&rdquo; she cried, her voice strained with sudden
+      affright.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I might seek help at Lyons or Moulins. I might find loyal soldiers who
+      would be willing to follow me by virtue of my warrant to levy such help as
+      I may require, if I but tell them that the help was refused me in
+      Grenoble. I am not sure that it would be so, for, unfortunately, my
+      warrant is for the Seneschal of Dauphiny only. Still, I might make the
+      attempt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she implored him, and in her eagerness to have him put all
+      thought of leaving her from his mind, she caught him by the arm and raised
+      a pleading face to his. &ldquo;Do not leave me here, monsieur; of your pity do
+      not leave me alone amongst them. Think me a coward if you will, monsieur:
+      I am no less. They have made a coward of me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He understood the thing she dreaded, and a great pity welled up from his
+      generous heart for this poor unfriended girl at the mercy of the beautiful
+      witch of Condillac and her beautiful rascally son. He patted the hand that
+      clutched his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think, myself, that it will be best if I remain, now that I have come
+      so far,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Let me ponder things. It may well be that I shall
+      devise some way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May Heaven inspire you, monsieur. I shall spend the night in prayer, I
+      think, imploring God and His saints to show you the way you seek.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven, I think, should hear your prayers, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he answered
+      musingly, his glance upon the white, saintly face that seemed to shine in
+      the deepening gloom. Then, suddenly he stirred and bent to listen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sh! Some one is coming,&rdquo; he whispered. And he sped quickly from her side
+      and into the outer room, where he sank noiselessly on to his chair as the
+      steps ascended the stone staircase and a glow of yellow light grew
+      gradually in the doorway that opened on to it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XII. A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      That he might inspire the more confidence in the Dowager and her son
+      Garnache organized and performed a little comedy at Condillac a couple of
+      nights after his appointment as mademoiselle&rsquo;s gaoler. He gave an alarm at
+      dead midnight, and when half-clad men, followed presently by madame and
+      Marian, rushed into the anteroom where he stood, a very picture of the
+      wildest excitement, he drew their attention to two twisted sheets, tied
+      end to end, hanging from the window which overlooked the moat; and in
+      answer to the marquise&rsquo;s questions he informed her that he had been
+      disturbed by sounds of movements and upon entering the chamber he had
+      discovered mademoiselle making these preparations for departure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie, locked in the inner chamber, refused to come forth as the
+      Marquise bade her, but her voice reassured Madame de Condillac of her
+      presence, and so, since her attempt had failed, madame was content to let
+      her be.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The little fool,&rdquo; she said, peering down from the window into the night;
+      &ldquo;she would have been killed for certain. Her rope of sheets does not reach
+      more than a third of the way down. She would have had over thirty feet to
+      fall, and if that had not been enough to finish her, she would of a
+      certainty have, been drowned in the moat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She signified her satisfaction with the faithful &ldquo;Battista&rsquo;s&rdquo; vigilance by
+      a present of some gold pieces in the morning, and since the height of the
+      window and the moat beneath it did not appear sufficient obstacles to
+      mademoiselle&rsquo;s attempts at effecting her escape, the Dowager had the
+      window nailed down. Thus, only by breaking it could egress be obtained,
+      and the breaking of it could not be effected without such a noise as must
+      arouse &ldquo;Battista.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Under Garnache&rsquo;s instructions the comedy was carried a little further.
+      Mademoiselle affected for her gaoler a most unconquerable aversion, and
+      this she took pains to proclaim.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One morning, three days after her attempted escape, she was taking the air
+      in the garden of Condillac, &ldquo;Battista,&rdquo; ever watchful, a few paces behind
+      her, when suddenly she was joined by Marius&mdash;a splendid, graceful
+      figure in a riding-suit of brown velvet and biscuit-coloured hose, his
+      points tipped with gold, his long boots of the finest marroquin leather,
+      his liver-coloured hound at his heels. It was the last day of October, but
+      the weather, from cold and wet that it had been for the past fortnight,
+      had taken on a sudden improvement. The sun shone, the air was still and
+      warm, and but for the strewn leaves and the faint smell of decay with
+      which the breath of autumn is ever laden, one might have fancied it a day
+      of early spring.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was not Valerie&rsquo;s wont to pause when Marius approached. Since she might
+      not prevent him from walking where he listed, she had long since abandoned
+      the futility of bidding him begone when he came near her. But, at least,
+      she had never stopped in her walk, never altered its pace; she had
+      suffered what she might not avoid, but she had worn the outward air of
+      suffering it with indifference. This morning, however, she made a
+      departure from her long habit. Not only did she pause upon observing his
+      approach, but she called to him as if she would have him hasten to her
+      side. And hasten he did, a new light in his eyes that was mostly of
+      surprise, but a little, also, of hope.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was gracious to him for once, and gave him good morning in a manner
+      that bordered upon the pleasant. Wondering, he fell into step beside her,
+      and they paced together the yew-bordered terrace, the ever-vigilant but
+      discreet &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; following them, though keeping now a few paces farther
+      in the rear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For a little while they appeared constrained, and their talk was of the
+      falling leaves and the grateful change that had so suddenly come upon the
+      weather. Suddenly she stopped and faced him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you do me a favour, Marius?&rdquo; she asked. He halted too, and turned to
+      her, studying her gentle face, seeking to guess her mind in the clear
+      hazel eyes she raised to his. His eyebrows lifted slightly with surprise.
+      Nevertheless&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is in all the world, Valerie, nothing you could ask me that I would
+      not do,&rdquo; he protested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled wistfully. &ldquo;How easy it is to utter words!&rdquo; she sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marry me,&rdquo; he answered, leaning towards her, his eyes devouring her now,
+      &ldquo;and you shall find my words very quickly turned to deeds.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said she, and her smile broadened and took on a scornful twist, &ldquo;you
+      make conditions now. If I will marry you, there is nothing you will not do
+      for me; so that, conversely, I may take it that if I do not marry you,
+      there is nothing you will do. But in the meantime, Marius, until I resolve
+      me whether I will marry you or not, would you not do a little thing that I
+      might ask of you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Until you resolve?&rdquo; he cried, and his face flushed with the sudden hope
+      he gathered from those words. Hitherto there had been no suggestion of a
+      possible modification of attitude towards his suit. It had been repulsion,
+      definite and uncompromising. Again he studied her face. Was she fooling
+      him, this girl with the angel-innocence of glance? The thought of such a
+      possibility cooled him instantly. &ldquo;What is it you want of me?&rdquo; he asked,
+      his voice ungracious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only a little thing, Marius.&rdquo; Her glance travelled back over her shoulder
+      to the tall, limber fellow in leather jerkin and with cross-gartered legs
+      who lounged a dozen steps behind them. &ldquo;Rid me of that ruffian&rsquo;s company,&rdquo;
+       said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius looked back at &ldquo;Battista,&rdquo; and from him to Valerie. Then he smiled
+      and made a slight movement with his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But to what end?&rdquo; he asked, as one who pleadingly opposes an argument
+      that is unreasonable. &ldquo;Another would replace him, and there is little to
+      choose among the men that garrison Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Little, perhaps; but that little matters.&rdquo; Sure of her ground, and
+      gathering from his tone and manner that the more ardently she begged this
+      thing the less likely would it be that she should prevail, she pursued her
+      intercessions with a greater heat. &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; she cried, in a pretended rage,
+      &ldquo;it is to insult me to give me that unclean knave for perpetual company. I
+      loathe and detest him. The very sight of him is too much to endure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You exaggerate,&rdquo; said he coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not; indeed I do not,&rdquo; she rejoined, looking frankly, pleadingly
+      into his face. &ldquo;You do not realize what it is to suffer the insolent
+      vigilance of such as he; to feel that your every step is under
+      surveillance; to feel his eyes ever upon you when you are within his
+      sight. Oh, it is insufferable!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly he gripped her arm, his face within a hand&rsquo;s breadth of her own,
+      his words falling hot and quickly on her ear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is yours to end it when you will, Valerie,&rdquo; he passionately reminded
+      her. &ldquo;Give yourself into my keeping. Let it be mine to watch over you
+      henceforth. Let me&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Abruptly he ceased. She had drawn back her head, her face was white to the
+      lips, and in her eyes, as they dwelt on his at such close quarters, there
+      appeared a look of terror, of loathing unutterable. He saw it, and
+      releasing her arm he fell back as if she had struck him. The colour left
+      his face too.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Or is it,&rdquo; he muttered thickly, &ldquo;that I inspire you, with much the same
+      feeling as does he?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood before him with lowered eyelids, her bosom heaving still from
+      the agitation of fear his closeness had aroused in her. He studied her in
+      silence a moment, with narrowing eyes and tightening lips. Then anger
+      stirred in him, and quenched the sorrow with which at first he had marked
+      the signs of her repulsion. But anger in Marius de Condillac was a cold
+      and deadly emotion that vented itself in no rantings, uttered no
+      loud-voiced threats or denunciations, prompted no waving of arms or
+      plucking forth of weapons.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stooped towards her again from his stately, graceful height. The
+      cruelty hidden in the beautiful lines of his mouth took instant prominence
+      in the smile that flickered round it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think that Battista makes a very excellent watchdog,&rdquo; he said, and you
+      would have thought him amused, as if at the foolish subterfuge of some
+      little child. &ldquo;You may be right to dislike him. He knows no French, so
+      that it may not be yours to pervert and bribe him with promises of what
+      you will do if he assists you to escape; but you will see that this very
+      quality which renders him detestable to you renders him invaluable to us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He laughed softly, as one well pleased with his own astuteness, doffed his
+      hat with a politeness almost exaggerated, and whistling his dog he
+      abruptly left her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus were Marius and his mother&mdash;to whom he bore the tale of
+      Valerie&rsquo;s request&mdash;tricked further into reposing the very fullest
+      trust in the watchful, incorruptible &ldquo;Battista.&rdquo; Realizing that this would
+      be so, Garnache now applied himself more unreservedly to putting into
+      effect the plans he had been maturing. And he went about it with a zest
+      that knew no flagging, with a relish that nothing could impair. Not that
+      it was other than usual for Garnache to fling himself whole-heartedly into
+      the conduct of any enterprise he might have upon his hands; but he had
+      come into this affair at Condillac against his will; stress of
+      circumstances it was had driven him on, step by step, to take a personal
+      hand in the actual deliverance of Valerie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was vanity and pride that had turned him back when already he was on
+      the road to Paris; not without yet a further struggle would he accept
+      defeat. To this end had he been driven, for the first time in his life, to
+      the indignity of his foul disguise; and he, whose methods had ever been
+      direct, had been forced to have recourse to the commonest of subterfuges.
+      It was with anger in his heart that he had proceeded to play the part he
+      had assumed. He felt it to be a thing unworthy of him, a thing that
+      derogated from his self-respect. Had he but had the justification of some
+      high political aim, he might have endured it with a better resignation;
+      the momentous end to be served might have sanctioned the ignoble means
+      adopted. But here was a task in itself almost as unworthy of him as the
+      methods by which he now set about accomplishing it. He was to black his
+      face and dye his beard and hair, stain his skin and garb himself in filthy
+      rags, for no better end than that he might compass the enlargement of a
+      girl from the captivity into which she had been forced by a designing lady
+      of Dauphiny. Was that a task to set a soldier, a man of his years and
+      birth and name? He had revolted at it; yet that stubborn pride of his that
+      would not brook his return to Paris to confess himself defeated by a woman
+      over this woman&rsquo;s business, held him relentlessly to his distasteful
+      course.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And gradually the distaste of it had melted. It had begun to fall away
+      five nights ago, when he had heard what passed between Madame de Condillac
+      and Valerie. A great pity for this girl, a great indignation against those
+      who would account no means too base to achieve their ends with her, a
+      proper realization of the indignities she was suffering, caused him to
+      shed some of his reluctance, some of his sense of injury to himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His innate chivalry, that fine spirit of his which had ever prompted him
+      to defend the weak against the oppressor, stirred him now, and stirred him
+      to such purpose that, in the end, from taking up the burden of his task
+      reluctantly, he came to bear it zestfully and almost gladly. He was
+      rejoiced to discover himself equipped with histrionic gifts of which he
+      had had no suspicion hitherto, and it delighted him to set them into
+      activity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now it happened that at Condillac there was a fellow countryman of
+      &ldquo;Battista&rsquo;s,&rdquo; a mercenary from Northern Italy, a rascal named Arsenio,
+      whom Fortunio had enlisted when first he began to increase the garrison a
+      month ago. Upon this fellow&rsquo;s honesty Garnache had formed designs. He had
+      closely observed him, and in Arsenio&rsquo;s countenance he thought he detected
+      a sufficiency of villainy to augur well for the prosperity of any scheme
+      of treachery that might be suggested to him provided the reward were
+      adequate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache went about sounding the man with a wiliness peculiarly his own.
+      Arsenio being his only compatriot at Condillac it was not wonderful that
+      in his few daily hours of relief from his gaoler&rsquo;s duty &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; should
+      seek out the fellow and sit in talk with him. The pair became intimate,
+      and intercourse between them grew more free and unrestrained. Garnache
+      waited, wishing to risk nothing by precipitancy, and watched for his
+      opportunity. It came on the morrow of All Saints. On that Day of the Dead,
+      Arsenio, whose rearing had been that of a true son of Mother Church, was
+      stirred by the memory of his earthly mother, who had died some three years
+      before. He was silent and moody, and showed little responsiveness to
+      Garnache&rsquo;s jesting humour. Garnache, wondering what might be toward in the
+      fellow&rsquo;s mind, watched him closely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly the little man&mdash;he was a short, bowlegged, sinewy fellow&mdash;heaved
+      a great sigh as he plucked idly at a weed that grew between two stones of
+      the inner courtyard, where they were seated on the chapel steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a dull comrade to-day, compatriot,&rdquo; said Garnache, clapping him
+      on the shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the Day of the Dead,&rdquo; the fellow answered him, as though that were
+      an ample explanation. Garnache laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To those that are dead it no doubt is; so was yesterday, so will
+      to-morrow be. But to us who sit here it is the day of the living.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a scoffer,&rdquo; the other reproached him, and his rascally face was
+      oddly grave. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t understand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enlighten me, then. Convert me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the day when our thoughts turn naturally to the dead, and mine are
+      with my mother, who has lain in her grave these three years. I am thinking
+      of what she reared me and of what I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache made a grimace which the other did not observe. He stared at the
+      little cut-throat, and there was some dismay in his glance. What ailed the
+      rogue? Was he about to repent him of his sins, and to have done with
+      villainy and treachery; was he minded to slit no more gullets in the
+      future, be faithful to the hand that paid him, and lead a godlier life?
+      Peste! That was a thing that would nowise suit Monsieur de Garnache&rsquo;s ends
+      just then. If Arsenio had a mind to reform, let him postpone that
+      reformation until Garnache should have done with him. So he opened his
+      lips and let out a deep guffaw of mockery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We shall have you turning monk,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;a candidate for canonization
+      going barefoot, with flagellated back and shaven head. No more wine, no
+      more dice, no more wenches, no more&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Peace!&rdquo; snapped the other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say &lsquo;Pax,&rdquo;&rsquo; suggested Garnache, &ldquo;&lsquo;Pax tecum,&rsquo; or &lsquo;vobiscum.&rsquo; It is thus
+      you will be saying it later.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If my conscience pricks me, is it aught to you? Have you no conscience of
+      your own?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None. Men wax lean on it in this vale of tears. It is a thing invented by
+      the great to enable them to pursue the grinding and oppression of the
+      small. If your master pays you ill for the dirty work you do for him and
+      another comes along to offer you some rich reward for an omission in that
+      same service, you are warned that if you let yourself be tempted, your
+      conscience will plague you afterwards. Pish! A clumsy, childish device
+      that, to keep you faithful.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Arsenio looked up. Words that defamed the great were ever welcome to him;
+      arguments that showed him he was oppressed and imposed upon sounded ever
+      gratefully in his ears. He nodded his approval of &ldquo;Battista&rsquo;s&rdquo; dictum.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Body of Bacchus!&rdquo; he swore, &ldquo;you are right in that, compatriot. But my
+      case is different. I am thinking of the curse that Mother Church has put
+      upon this house. Yesterday was All Saints, and never a Mass heard I.
+      To-day is All Souls, and never a prayer may I offer up in this place of
+      sin for the rest of my mother&rsquo;s soul.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How so?&rdquo; quoth Garnache, looking in wonder at this religiously minded
+      cut-throat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How so? Is not the House of Condillac under excommunication, and every
+      man who stays in it of his own free will? Prayers and Sacraments are alike
+      forbidden here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache received a sudden inspiration. He leapt to his feet, his face
+      convulsed as if at the horror of learning of a hitherto undreamt-of state
+      of things. He never paused to give a moment&rsquo;s consideration to the
+      cut-throat&rsquo;s mind, so wonderfully constituted as to enable him to break
+      with impunity every one of the commandments every day of the week for the
+      matter of a louis d&rsquo;or or two, and yet be afflicted by qualms of
+      conscience at living under a roof upon which the Church had hurled her
+      malediction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What are you saying, compatriot? What is it that you tell me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The truth,&rdquo; said Arsenio, with a shrug. &ldquo;Any man who wilfully abides in
+      the services of Condillac&rdquo;&mdash;and instinctively he lowered his voice
+      lest the Captain or the Marquise should be within earshot&mdash;, &ldquo;is
+      excommunicate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the Host!&rdquo; swore the false Piedmontese. &ldquo;I am a Christian man myself,
+      Arsenio, and I have lived in ignorance of this thing?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That ignorance may be your excuse. But now that you know&mdash;&rdquo; Arsenio
+      shrugged his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now that I know, I had best have a care of my soul and look about me for
+      other employment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; sighed Arsenio; &ldquo;it is none so easy to find.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache looked at him. Garnache began to have in his luck a still greater
+      faith than hitherto. He glanced stealthily around; then he sat down again,
+      so that his mouth was close to Arsenio&rsquo;s ear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The pay is beggarly here, yet I have refused a fortune offered me by
+      another that I might remain loyal to my masters at Condillac. But this
+      thing that you tell me alters everything. By the Host! yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A fortune?&rdquo; sneered Arsenio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, a fortune&mdash;at least, fifty pistoles. That is a fortune to some
+      of us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Arsenio whistled. &ldquo;Tell me more,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache rose with the air of one about to depart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must think of it,&rdquo; said he, and he made shift to go. But the other&rsquo;s
+      hand fell with a clenching grip upon his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of what must you think, fool?&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Tell me this service you have
+      been offered. I have a conscience that upbraids me. If you refuse these
+      fifty pistoles, why should not I profit by your folly?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There would not be the need. Two men are required for the thing I speak
+      of, and there are fifty pistoles for each. If I decide to undertake the
+      task, I&rsquo;ll speak of you as a likely second.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded gloomily to his companion, and shaking off his hold he set out
+      to cross the yard. But Arsenio was after him and had fastened again upon
+      his arm, detaining him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You fool!&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;you&rsquo;d not refuse this fortune?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It would mean treachery,&rdquo; whispered Garnache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is bad,&rdquo; the other agreed, and his face fell. But remembering what
+      Garnache had said, he was quick to brighten again. &ldquo;Is it to these folk
+      here at Condillac?&rdquo; he asked. Garnache nodded. &ldquo;And they would pay&mdash;these
+      people that seek our service would pay you fifty pistoles?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They seek my service only, as yet. They might seek yours were I to speak
+      for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you will, compatriot. You will, will you not? We are comrades, we are
+      friends, and we are fellow-countrymen in a strange land. There is nothing
+      I would not do for you, Battista. Look, I would die for you if there
+      should come the need! Body of Bacchus! I would. I am like that when I love
+      a man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache patted his shoulder. &ldquo;You are a good fellow, Arsenio.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you will speak for me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you do not know the nature of the service,&rdquo; said Garnache. &ldquo;You may
+      refuse it when it is definitely offered you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Refuse fifty pistoles? I should deserve to be the pauper that I am if
+      such had been my habits. Be the service what it may, my conscience pricks
+      me for serving Condillac. Tell me how the fifty pistoles are to be earned,
+      and you may count upon me to put my hand to anything.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache was satisfied. But he told Arsenio no more that day, beyond
+      assuring him he would speak for him and let him know upon the morrow. Nor
+      on the morrow, when they returned to the subject at Arsenio&rsquo;s eager
+      demand, did Garnache tell him all, or even that the service was
+      mademoiselle&rsquo;s. Instead he pretended that it was some one in Grenoble who
+      needed two such men as they.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Word has been brought me,&rdquo; he said mysteriously. &ldquo;You must not ask me
+      how.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But how the devil are we to reach Grenoble? The Captain will never let us
+      go,&rdquo; said Arsenio, in an ill-humour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On the night that you are of the watch, Arsenio, we will depart together
+      without asking the Captain&rsquo;s leave. You shall open the postern when I come
+      to join you here in the courtyard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what of the man at the door yonder?&rdquo; And he jerked his thumb towards
+      the tower where mademoiselle was a captive, and where at night &ldquo;Battista&rdquo;
+       was locked in with her. At the door leading to the courtyard a sentry was
+      always posted for greater security. That door and that sentry were
+      obstacles which Garnache saw the futility of attempting to overcome
+      without aid. That was why he had been forced to enlist Arsenio&rsquo;s
+      assistance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must account for him, Arsenio,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thus?&rdquo; inquired Arsenio coolly, and he passed the edge of his hand
+      significantly across his throat. Garnache shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;there will be no need for that. A blow over the head will
+      suffice. Besides, it may be quieter. You will find the key of the tower in
+      his belt. When you have felled him, get it and unlock the door; then
+      whistle for me. The rest will be easy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are sure he has the key?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have it from madame herself. They were forced to leave it with him to
+      provide for emergencies. Mademoiselle&rsquo;s attempted escape by the window
+      showed them the necessity for it.&rdquo; He did not add that it was the implicit
+      confidence they reposed in &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; himself that had overcome their
+      reluctance to leave the key with the sentry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To seal the bargain, and in earnest of all the gold to come, Garnache gave
+      Arsenio a couple of gold louis as a loan to be repaid him when their
+      nameless employer should pay him his fifty pistoles in Grenoble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sight and touch of the gold convinced Arsenio that the thing was no
+      dream. He told Garnache that he believed he would be on guard-duty on the
+      night of the following Wednesday&mdash;this was Friday&mdash;and so for
+      Wednesday next they left the execution of their plans unless, meantime, a
+      change should be effected in the disposition of the sentries.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIII. THE COURIER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Monsieur de Garnache was pleased with the issue of his little affair with
+      Arsenio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; he told Valerie that evening, &ldquo;I was right to have faith
+      in my luck, right to believe that the tide of it is flowing. All we need
+      now is a little patience; everything has become easy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the hour of supper. Valerie was at table in her anteroom, and
+      &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; was in attendance. It was an added duty they had imposed upon
+      him, for, since her attempt to escape, mademoiselle&rsquo;s imprisonment had
+      been rendered more rigorous than ever. No servant of the chateau was
+      allowed past the door of the outer anteroom, now commonly spoken of as the
+      guardroom of the tower. Valerie dined daily in the salon with Madame de
+      Condillac and Marius, but her other meals were served her in her own
+      apartments. The servants who brought the meals from the kitchen delivered
+      them to &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; in the guardroom, and he it was who laid the cloth and
+      waited upon mademoiselle. At first this added duty had irritated him more
+      than all that he had so far endured. Had he Martin Marie Rigobert de
+      Garnache lived to discharge the duties of a lackey, to bear dishes to a
+      lady&rsquo;s table and to remain at hand to serve her? The very thought had all
+      but set him in a rage. But presently he grew reconciled to it. It afforded
+      him particular opportunities of being in mademoiselle&rsquo;s presence and of
+      conferring with her; and for the sake of such an advantage he might well
+      belittle the unsavoury part of the affair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A half-dozen candles burned in two gleaming silver sconces on the table;
+      in her tall-backed leather chair mademoiselle sat, and ate and drank but
+      little, while Garnache told her of the preparations he had made.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If my luck but holds until Wednesday next,&rdquo; he concluded, &ldquo;you may count
+      upon being well out of Condillac. Arsenio does not dream that you come
+      with us, so that even should he change his mind, at least we have no cause
+      to fear a betrayal. But he will not change his mind. The prospect of fifty
+      pistoles has rendered it immutable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked up at him with eyes brightened by hope and by the encouragement
+      to count upon success which she gathered from his optimism.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have contrived it marvellously well,&rdquo; she praised him. &ldquo;If we succeed&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say when we succeed, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he laughingly corrected her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well, then&mdash;when we shall have succeeded in leaving Condillac,
+      whither am I to go?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, with me, to Paris, as was determined. My man awaits me at Voiron
+      with money and horses. No further obstacle shall rise to hamper us once
+      our backs are turned upon the ugly walls of Condillac. The Queen shall
+      make you welcome and keep you safe until Monsieur Florimond comes to claim
+      his bride.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sipped her wine, then set down the glass and leaned her elbow on the
+      table, taking her chin in her fine white hand. &ldquo;Madame tells me that he is
+      dead,&rdquo; said she, and Garnache was shocked at the comparative calmness with
+      which she said it. He looked at her sharply from under his sooted brows.
+      Was she, after all, he wondered, no different from other women? Was she
+      cold and calculating, and had she as little heart as he had come to
+      believe was usual with her sex, that she could contemplate so calmly the
+      possibility of her lover being dead? He had thought her better, more
+      natural, more large-hearted and more pure. That had encouraged him to
+      stand by her in these straits of hers, no matter at what loss of dignity
+      to himself. It began to seem that his conclusions had been wrong.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His silence caused her to look up, and in his face she read something of
+      what was passing in his thoughts. She smiled rather wanly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are thinking me heartless, Monsieur de Garnache?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am thinking you&mdash;womanly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The same thing, then, to your mind. Tell me, monsieur, do you know much
+      of women?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God forbid! I have found trouble enough in my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you pass judgment thus upon a sex with which you have no
+      acquaintance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not by acquaintance only is it that we come to knowledge. There are ways
+      of learning other than by the road of experience. One may learn of dangers
+      by watching others perish. It is the fool who will be satisfied alone with
+      the knowledge that comes to him from what he undergoes himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very wise, monsieur,&rdquo; said she demurely, so demurely that he
+      suspected her of laughing at him. &ldquo;You were never wed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he answered stiffly, &ldquo;nor ever in any danger of
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Must you, indeed, account it a danger?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A deadly peril, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said he; whereupon they both laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She pushed back her chair and rose slowly. Slowly she passed from the
+      table and stepped towards the window. Turning she set her back to it, and
+      faced him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Garnache,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;you are a good man, a true and noble
+      gentleman. I would that you thought a little better of us. All women are
+      not contemptible, believe me. I will pray that you may yet mate with one
+      who will prove to you the truth of what I say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled gently, and shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I am not half the noble fellow you account me. I
+      have a stubborn pride that stands me at times in the stead of virtue. It
+      was pride brought me back here, for instance. I could not brook the
+      laughter that would greet me in Paris did I confess that I was beaten by
+      the Dowager of Condillac. I tell you this to the end that, thinking less
+      well of me, you may spare me prayers which I should dread to see
+      fulfilled. I have told you before, mademoiselle, Heaven is likely to
+      answer the prayers of such a heart as yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet but a moment back you deemed me heartless,&rdquo; she reminded him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You seemed so indifferent to the fate of Florimond de Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must have seemed, then, what I am not,&rdquo; she told him, &ldquo;for I am far
+      from indifferent to Florimond&rsquo;s fate. The truth is, monsieur, I do not
+      believe Madame de Condillac. Knowing me to be under a promise that naught
+      can prevail upon me to break, she would have me believe that nature has
+      dissolved the obligation for me. She thinks that were I persuaded of
+      Florimond&rsquo;s death, I might turn an ear to the wooing of Marius. But she is
+      mistaken, utterly mistaken; and so I sought to convince her. My father
+      willed that I should wed Florimond. Florimond&rsquo;s father had been his
+      dearest friend. I promised him that I would do his will, and by that
+      promise I am bound. But were Florimond indeed dead, and were I free to
+      choose, I should not choose Marius were he the only man in all the world.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache moved nearer to her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You speak,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;as if you were indifferent in the matter of wedding
+      Florimond, whilst I understand that your letter to the Queen professed you
+      eager for the alliance. I may be impertinent, but, frankly, your attitude
+      puzzles me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not indifferent,&rdquo; she answered him, but calmly, without enthusiasm.
+      &ldquo;Florimond and I were playmates, and as a little child I loved him and
+      admired him as I might have loved and admired a brother perhaps. He is
+      comely, honourable, and true. I believe he would be the kindest husband
+      ever woman had, and so I am content to give my life into his keeping. What
+      more can be needed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never ask me, mademoiselle; I am by no means an authority,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;But
+      you appear to have been well schooled in a most excellent philosophy.&rdquo; And
+      he laughed outright. She reddened under his amusement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was thus my father taught me,&rdquo; said she, in quieter tones; &ldquo;and he was
+      the wisest man I ever knew, just as he was the noblest and the bravest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache bowed his head. &ldquo;God rest his soul!&rdquo; said he with respectful
+      fervour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amen,&rdquo; the girl replied, and they fell silent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently she returned to the subject of her betrothed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If Florimond is living, this prolonged absence, this lack of news is very
+      strange. It is three months since last we heard of him&mdash;four months,
+      indeed. Yet he must have been apprised of his father&rsquo;s death, and that
+      should have occasioned his return.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was he indeed apprised of it?&rdquo; inquired Garnache. &ldquo;Did you, yourself,
+      communicate the news to him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I?&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;But no, monsieur. We do not correspond.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is a pity,&rdquo; said Garnache, &ldquo;for I believe that the knowledge of the
+      Marquis&rsquo;s death was kept from him by his stepmother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mon Dieu!&rdquo; she exclaimed, in horror. &ldquo;Do you mean that he may still be in
+      ignorance of it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not that. A month ago a courier was dispatched to him by the
+      Queen-Mother. The last news of him some four months old, as you have said&mdash;reported
+      him at Milan in the service of Spain. Thither was the courier sent to find
+      him and to deliver him letters setting forth what was toward at
+      Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A month ago?&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;And still we have no word. I am full of fears
+      for him, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I,&rdquo; said Garnache, &ldquo;am full of hope that we shall have news of him at
+      any moment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      That he was well justified of his hope was to be proven before they were
+      many days older. Meanwhile Garnache continued to play his part of gaoler
+      to the entire satisfaction and increased confidence of the Condillacs,
+      what time he waited patiently for the appointed night when it should be
+      his friend Arsenio&rsquo;s turn to take the guard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On that fateful Wednesday &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; sought out&mdash;as had now become
+      his invariable custom&mdash;his compatriot as soon as the time of his
+      noontide rest was come, the hour at which they dined at Condillac. He
+      found Arsenio sunning himself in the outer courtyard, for it seemed that
+      year that as the winter approached the warmth increased. Never could man
+      remember such a Saint Martin&rsquo;s Summer as was this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In so far as the matter of their impending flight was concerned,
+      &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; was as brief as he could be.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is all well?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;Shall you be on guard to-night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes. It is my watch from sunset till dawn. At what hour shall we be
+      stirring?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache pondered a moment, stroking that firm chin of his, on which the
+      erstwhile stubble had now grown into a straggling, unkempt beard&mdash;and
+      it plagued him not a little, for a close observer might have discovered
+      that it was of a lighter colour at the roots. His hair, too, was beginning
+      to lose its glossy blackness. It was turning dull, and presently, no
+      doubt, it would begin to pale, so that it was high time he spread his
+      wings and took flight from Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We had best wait until midnight. It will give them time to be soundly in
+      their slumbers. Though, should there be signs of any one stirring even
+      then, you had better wait till later. It were foolish to risk having our
+      going prevented for the sake of leaving a half-hour earlier.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Depend upon me,&rdquo; Arsenio answered him. &ldquo;When I open the door of your
+      tower I shall whistle to you. The key of the postern hangs on the
+      guardroom wall. I shall possess myself of that before I come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good,&rdquo; said Garnache, &ldquo;we understand each other.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And on that they might have parted there and then, but that there happened
+      in that moment a commotion at the gate. Men hurried from the guardhouse,
+      and Fortunio&rsquo;s voice sounded loud in command. A horseman had galloped up
+      to Condillac, walked his horse across the bridge&mdash;which was raised
+      only at night&mdash;and was knocking with the butt of his whip an
+      imperative summons upon the timbers of the gate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By Fortunio&rsquo;s orders it was opened, and a man covered with dust, astride a
+      weary, foam-flecked horse, rode under the archway of the keep into the
+      first courtyard of the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache eyed him in surprise and inquiry, and he read in the man&rsquo;s
+      appearance that he was a courier. The horseman had halted within a few
+      paces of the spot where &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; and his companion stood, and seeing in
+      the vilely clad Garnache a member of the Condillac household, he flung him
+      his reins, then got down stiffly from his horse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio, bristling with importance, his left hand on the hilt of his
+      rapier, the fingers of his right twirling at his long fair mustachios, at
+      once confronted him and craved his business.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am the bearer of letters for Madame the Dowager Marquise de Condillac,&rdquo;
+       was the reply; whereupon, with an arrogant nod, Fortunio bade the fellow
+      go with him, and issued an order that his horse should be cared for.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Arsenio was speaking in Garnache&rsquo;s ear. The man&rsquo;s nature was inquisitive,
+      and he was indulging idle conjectures as to what might be the news this
+      courier brought. Garnache&rsquo;s mind, actuated by very different motives, was
+      engaged upon the same task, so much so that not a word heard he of what
+      his supposed compatriot was whispering. Whence came this courier? Why had
+      not that fool Fortunio asked him, so that Garnache might have overheard
+      his answer? Was he from Paris and the Queen, or was he, perchance, from
+      Italy and Florimond? These were questions to which it imported him to have
+      the answers. He must know what letters the fellow brought. The knowledge
+      might guide him now; might even cause him to alter the plans he had
+      formed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stood in thought whilst, unheeded by him, Arsenio prattled at his
+      elbow. He bethought him of the old minstrel&rsquo;s gallery at the end of the
+      hall in which the Condillacs were dining and whither the courier would be
+      conducted. He knew the way to that gallery, for he had made a very close
+      study of the chateau against the time when he might find himself in need
+      of the knowledge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a hurried excuse to Arsenio he moved away, and, looking round to see
+      that he was unobserved, he was on the point of making his way to the
+      gallery when suddenly he checked himself. What went he there to do? To
+      play the spy? To become fellow to the lackey who listens at keyholes? Ah,
+      no! That was something no service could demand of him. He might owe a duty
+      to the Queen, but there was also a duty that he owed himself, and this
+      duty forbade him from going to such extremes. Thus spake his Pride, and he
+      mistook its voice for that of Honour. Betide what might, it was not for
+      Garnache to play the eavesdropper. Not that, Pardieu!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And so he turned away, his desires in conflict with that pride of his, and
+      gloomily he paced the courtyard, Arsenio marvelling what might have come
+      to him. And well was it for him that pride should have detained him; well
+      would it seem as if his luck were indeed in the ascendant and had prompted
+      his pride to save him from a deadly peril. For suddenly some one called
+      &ldquo;Battista!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He heard, but for the moment, absorbed as he was in his own musings, he
+      overlooked the fact that it was the name to which he answered at
+      Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not until it was repeated more loudly, and imperatively, did he turn to
+      see Fortunio beckoning him. With a sudden dread anxiety, he stepped to the
+      captain&rsquo;s side. Was he discovered? But Fortunio&rsquo;s words set his doubts to
+      rest at once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are to re-conduct Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to her apartments at
+      once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache bowed and followed the captain up the steps and into the chateau
+      that he might carry out the order; and as he went he shrewdly guessed that
+      it was the arrival of that courier had occasioned the sudden removal of
+      mademoiselle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When they were alone together&mdash;he and she&mdash;in her anteroom in
+      the Northern Tower, she turned to him before he had time to question her
+      as he was intending.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A courier has arrived,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know; I saw him in the courtyard. Whence is he? Did you learn it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From Florimond.&rdquo; She was white with agitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From the Marquis de Condillac?&rdquo; he cried, and he knew not whether to hope
+      or fear. &ldquo;From Italy?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, monsieur. I do not think from Italy. From what was said I gathered
+      that Florimond is already on his way to Condillac. Oh, it made a fine
+      stir. It left them no more appetite for dinner, and they seem to have
+      thought it could have left me none for mine, for they ordered my instant
+      return to my apartments.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you know nothing&mdash;save that the courier is from the Marquis?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing; nor am I likely to,&rdquo; she answered, and her arms dropped limply
+      to her sides, her eyes looked entreatingly up into his gloomy face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache could do no more than rap out an oath. Then he stood still a
+      moment, his eyes on the window, his chin in his hand, brooding. His pride
+      and his desire to know more of that courier&rsquo;s message were fighting it out
+      again in his mind, just as they fought it out in the courtyard below.
+      Suddenly his glance fell on her, standing there, so sweet, so frail, and
+      so disconsolate. For her sake he must do the thing, repulsive though it
+      might be.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must know more,&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;I must learn Florimond&rsquo;s whereabouts,
+      if only that we may go to meet him when we leave Condillac to-night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have arranged definitely for that?&rdquo; she asked, her face lighting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All is in readiness,&rdquo; he assured her. Then, lowering his voice without
+      apparent reason, and speaking quickly and intently, &ldquo;I must go find out
+      what I can,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;There may be a risk, but it is as nothing to the
+      risk we run of blundering matters through ignorance of what may be afoot.
+      Should any one come&mdash;which is unlikely, for all those interested will
+      be in the hall until the courier is dealt with&mdash;and should they
+      inquire into my absence, you are to know nothing of it since you have no
+      Italian and I no French. All that you will know will be that you believe I
+      went but a moment since to fetch water. You understand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then lock yourself in your chamber till I return.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He caught up a large earthenware vessel in which water was kept for his
+      own and mademoiselle&rsquo;s use, emptied it through the guard-room window into
+      the moat below, then left the room and made his way down the steps to the
+      courtyard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He peered out. Not a soul was in sight. This inner courtyard was little
+      tenanted at that time of day, and the sentry at the door of the tower was
+      only placed there at nightfall. Alongside this there stood another door,
+      opening into a passage from which access might be gained to any part of
+      the chateau. Thrusting behind that door the earthenware vessel that he
+      carried, Garnache sped swiftly down the corridor on his eavesdropping
+      errand. Still his mind was in conflict. At times he cursed his slowness,
+      at times his haste and readiness to undertake so dirty a business, wishing
+      all women at the devil since by the work of women was he put to such a
+      shift as this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIV. FLORIMOND&rsquo;S LETTER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      In the great hall of Condillac, where the Marquise, her son, and
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye had been at dinner, a sudden confusion had
+      been spread by the arrival of that courier so soon as it was known that he
+      bore letters from Florimond, Marquis de Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame had risen hastily, fear and defiance blending in her face, and she
+      had at once commanded mademoiselle&rsquo;s withdrawal. Valerie had wondered
+      might there not be letters&mdash;or, leastways, messages&mdash;for herself
+      from her betrothed. But her pride had suppressed the eager question that
+      welled up to her lips. She would, too, have questioned the courier
+      concerning Florimond&rsquo;s health; she would have asked him how the Marquis
+      looked, and where the messenger had left him. But of all this that she
+      craved to know, nothing could she bring herself to ask before the
+      Marquise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She rose in silence upon hearing the Dowager order Fortunio to summon
+      Battista that he might re-conduct mademoiselle to her apartments, and she
+      moved a few paces down the hall, towards the door, in proud, submissive
+      readiness to depart. Yet she could not keep her eyes from the dust-stained
+      courier, who, having flung his hat and whip upon the floor, was now
+      opening his wallet, the Dowager standing before him to receive his papers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius, affecting an insouciance he did not feel, remained at table, his
+      page behind his chair, his hound stretched at his feet; and he now sipped
+      his wine, now held it to the light that he might observe the beauty of its
+      deep red colour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last Fortunio returned, and mademoiselle took her departure, head in
+      the air and outwardly seeming nowise concerned in what was taking place.
+      With her went Fortunio. And the Marquise, who now held the package she had
+      received from the courier, bade the page depart also.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When the three were at last alone, she paused before opening the letter
+      and turned again to the messenger. She made a brave figure in the flood of
+      sunlight that poured through the gules and azures of the long blazoned
+      windows, her tall, lissome figure clad in a close-fitting robe of black
+      velvet, her abundant glossy black hair rolled back under its white coif,
+      her black eyes and scarlet lips detaching from the ivory of her face, in
+      which no trace of emotion showed, for all the anxiety that consumed her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where left you the Marquis de Condillac?&rdquo; she asked the fellow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At La Rochette, madame,&rdquo; the courier answered,&rsquo; and his answer brought
+      Marius to his feet with an oath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So near?&rdquo; he cried out. But the Dowager&rsquo;s glance remained calm and
+      untroubled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How does it happen that he did not hasten himself, to Condillac?&rdquo; she
+      asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not know, madame. I did not see Monsieur le Marquis. It was his
+      servant brought me that letter with orders to ride hither.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius approached his mother, his brow clouded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us see what he says,&rdquo; he suggested anxiously. But his mother did not
+      heed him. She stood balancing the package in her hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you tell us, then, nothing of Monsieur le Marquis?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing more than I have told you, madame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She bade Marius call Fortunio, and then dismissed the courier, bidding her
+      captain see to his refreshment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, alone at last with her son, she hastily tore the covering from the
+      letter, unfolded it and read. And Marius, moved by anxiety, came to stand
+      beside and just behind her, where he too might read. The letter ran:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;MY VERY DEAR MARQUISE,&mdash;I do not doubt but that it will pleasure you
+      to hear that I am on my way home, and that but for a touch of fever that
+      has detained us here at La Rochette, I should be at Condillac as soon as
+      the messenger who is the bearer of these presents. A courier from Paris
+      found me a fortnight since in Milan, with letters setting forth that my
+      father had been dead six months, and that it was considered expedient at
+      Court that I should return home forthwith to assume the administration of
+      Condillac. I am lost in wonder that a communication of this nature should
+      have been addressed to me from Paris instead of from you, as surely it
+      must have been your duty to advise me of my father&rsquo;s decease at the time
+      of that untoward event. I am cast down by grief at this evil news, and the
+      summons from Court has brought me in all haste from Milan. The lack of
+      news from Condillac has been for months a matter of surprise to me. My
+      father&rsquo;s death may be some explanation of this, but scarcely explanation
+      enough. However, madame, I count upon it that you will be able to dispel
+      such doubts as I am fostering. I count too, upon being at Condillac by the
+      end of week, but I beg that neither you nor my dear Marius will allow this
+      circumstance to make any difference to yourselves, just as, although I am
+      returning to assume the government of Condillac as the Court has suggested
+      to me, I hope that yourself and my dear brother will continue to make it
+      your home for as long as it shall pleasure you. So long shall it pleasure
+      me.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am, my dear marquise, your very humble and very affectionate servant
+      and stepson,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;FLORIMOND&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When she had read to the end, the Dowager turned back and read aloud the
+      passage: &ldquo;However, madame, I count upon it that you will be able to dispel
+      such doubts as I am fostering.&rdquo; She looked at her son, who had shifted his
+      position, so that he was now confronting her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has his suspicions that all is not as it should be,&rdquo; sneered Marius.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet his tone is amiable throughout. It cannot be that they said too much
+      in that letter from Paris.&rdquo; A little trill of bitter laughter escaped her.
+      &ldquo;We are to continue to make this our home for as long as it shall pleasure
+      us. So long shall it pleasure him!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, with a sudden seriousness, she folded the letter and, putting her
+      hands behind her, looked up into her son&rsquo;s face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;What are you going to do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Strange that he makes no mention of Valerie&rdquo; said Marius pensively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pooh! A Condillac thinks lightly of his women. What are you going to do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His handsome countenance, so marvellously like her own, was overcast. He
+      looked gloomily at his mother for a moment; then with a slight twitch of
+      the shoulders he turned and moved past her slowly in the direction of the
+      hearth. He leaned his elbow on the overmantel and rested his brow against
+      his clenched right hand, and stood so awhile in moody thought. She watched
+      him, a frown between her arrogant eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, ponder it,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;He is at La Rochette, within a day&rsquo;s ride,
+      and only detained there by a touch of fever. In any case he promises to be
+      here by the end of the week. By Saturday, then, Condillac will have passed
+      out of our power; it will be lost to you irretrievably. Will you lose La
+      Vauvraye as well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He let his hand fall to his side, and turned, fully to face her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What can I do? What can we do?&rdquo; he asked, a shade of petulance in his
+      question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She stepped close up to him and rested her hand lightly upon his shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have had three months in which to woo that girl, and you have tarried
+      sadly over it, Marius. You have now at most three days in which to
+      accomplish it. What will you do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have been maladroit perhaps,&rdquo; he said, with bitterness. &ldquo;I have been
+      over-patient with her. I have counted too much upon the chance of
+      Florimond&rsquo;s being dead, as seemed from the utter lack of news of him. Yet
+      what could I do? Carry her off by force and compel at the dagger&rsquo;s point
+      some priest to marry us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She moved her hand from his shoulder and smiled, as if she derided him and
+      his heat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You want for invention, Marius,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;And yet I beg that you will
+      exert your mind, or Sunday next shall find us well-nigh homeless. I&rsquo;ll
+      take no charity from the Marquis de Condillac, nor, I think, will you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If all fails,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;we have still your house in Touraine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My house?&rdquo; she echoed, her voice shrill with scorn. &ldquo;My hovel, you would
+      say. Could you abide there&mdash;in such a sty?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;<i>Vertudieu</i>! If all else failed, we might be glad of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Glad of it? Not I, for one. Yet all else will fail unless you bestir
+      yourself in the next three days. Condillac is as good as lost to you
+      already, since Florimond is upon the threshold. La Vauvraye most certainly
+      will be lost to you as well unless you make haste to snatch it in the
+      little moment that is left you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can I achieve the impossible, madame?&rdquo; he cried, and his impatience waxed
+      beneath this unreasonable insistence of his mother&rsquo;s.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who asks it of you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not you, madame?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I? Pish! All that I urge is that you take Valerie across the border into
+      Savoy where you can find a priest to marry you, and get it done this side
+      of Saturday.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And is not that the impossible? She will not go with me, as you well
+      know, madame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a moment&rsquo;s silence. The Dowager shot him a glance; then her eyes
+      fell. Her bosom stirred as if some strange excitement moved her. Fear and
+      shame were her emotions; for a way she knew by which mademoiselle might be
+      induced to go with him&mdash;not only willingly, but eagerly, she thought&mdash;to
+      the altar. But she was his mother, and even her harsh nature shuddered
+      before the task of instructing him in this vile thing. Why had the fool
+      not wit enough to see it for himself?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Observing her silence Marius smiled sardonically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may well ponder it,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;It is an easy matter to tell me what I
+      should do. Tell me, rather, how it should be done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His blindness stirred her anger, and her anger whelmed her hesitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Were I in your place, Marius, I should find a way,&rdquo; said she, in a voice
+      utterly expressionless, her eyes averted ever from his own.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He scanned her curiously. Her agitation was plain to him, and it puzzled
+      him, as did the downcast glance of eyes usually so bold and insolent in
+      their gaze. Then he pondered her tone, so laden with expression by its
+      very expressionlessness, and suddenly a flood of light broke upon his
+      mind, revealing very clearly and hideously her meaning. He caught his
+      breath with a sudden gasp and blenched a little. Then his lips tightened
+      suddenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In that case, madame,&rdquo; he said, after a pause, and speaking as if he were
+      still without revelation of her meaning, &ldquo;I can but regret that you are
+      not in my place. For, as it is, I am thinking we shall have to make the
+      best of the hovel in Touraine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She bit her lip in the intensity of her chagrin and shame. She was no
+      fool, nor did she imagine from his words that her meaning had been lost
+      upon him. She knew that he had understood, and that he chose to pretend
+      that he had not. She looked up suddenly, her dark eyes blazing, a splash
+      of colour in either cheek.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fool!&rdquo; she snapped at him; &ldquo;you lily-livered fool! Are you indeed my son?
+      Are you&mdash;by God!&mdash;that you talk so lightly of yielding?&rdquo; She
+      advanced a step in his direction. &ldquo;Through your cowardice you may be
+      content to spend your days in beggary; not so am I; nor shall I be, so
+      long as I have an arm and a voice. You may go hence if your courage fails
+      you outright; but I&rsquo;ll throw up the bridge and entrench myself within
+      these walls. Florimond de Condillac sets no foot in here while I live; and
+      if he should come within range of musket-shot, it will be the worse for
+      him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think you are mad, madame&mdash;mad so to talk of resisting him, as you
+      are mad to call me coward. I&rsquo;ll leave you till you are come to a more
+      tranquil frame of mind.&rdquo; And turning upon his heel, his face on fire from
+      the lash of her contempt, he strode down the hall and passed out, leaving
+      her alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      White again, with heaving bosom and clenched hands, she stood a moment
+      where he had left her, then dropped into a chair, and taking her chin in
+      her hand she rested her elbow on her knee. Thus she remained, the
+      firelight tinting her perfect profile, on which little might be read of
+      the storm that was raging in her soul. Another woman in her place would
+      have sought relief in tears, but tears came rarely to the beautiful eyes
+      of the Marquise de Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat there until the sun had passed from the windows behind her and the
+      corners of the room were lost in the quickening shadows. At last she was
+      disturbed by the entrance of a lackey, who announced that Monsieur le
+      Comte de Tressan, Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny, was come to Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She bade the fellow call help to clear the board, where still was set
+      their interrupted noontide meal, and then to admit the Seneschal. With her
+      back to the stirring, bustling servants she stood, pensively regarding the
+      flames, and a smile that was mocking rather than aught else spread upon
+      her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      If all else failed her, she told herself, there would be no Touraine hovel
+      for her. She could always be Comtesse de Tressan. Let Marius work out
+      alone the punishment of his cowardice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Away in the Northern Tower, where mademoiselle was lodged, she sat in
+      eager talk with Garnache, who had returned unobserved and successful from
+      his journey of espionage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had told her what from the conversation of Marius and his mother he had
+      learned touching the contents of that letter. Florimond lay as near as La
+      Rochette, detained there by a touch of fever, but promising to be at
+      Condillac by the end of the week. Since that was so, Valerie opined there
+      was no longer the need to put themselves to the trouble of the escape they
+      had planned. Let them wait until Florimond came.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache shook his head. He had heard more; and for all that he
+      accounted her at present safe from Marius, yet he made no false estimate
+      of that supple gentleman&rsquo;s character, was not deluded by his momentary
+      show of niceness. As the time of Florimond&rsquo;s arrival grew nearer, he
+      thought it very possible that Marius might be rendered desperate. There
+      was grave danger in remaining. He said naught of this, yet he convinced
+      mademoiselle that it were best to go.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Though there will no longer be the need of a toilsome journey as far as
+      Paris,&rdquo; he concluded. &ldquo;A four hours&rsquo; ride to La Rochette, and you may
+      embrace your betrothed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did he speak of me in his letter, know you, monsieur?&rdquo; she inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I heard them say that he did not,&rdquo; Garnache replied. &ldquo;But it may well be
+      that he had good reason. He may suspect more than he has written.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In that case,&rdquo; she asked&mdash;and there was a wounded note in her voice&mdash;&ldquo;Why
+      should a touch of fever keep him at La Rochette? Would a touch of fever
+      keep you from the woman you loved, monsieur, if you knew, or even
+      suspected, that she was in durance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not know, mademoiselle. I am an old man who has never loved, and so
+      it would be unfair of me to pass judgment upon lovers. That they think not
+      as other folk is notorious; their minds are for the time disordered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nevertheless he looked at her where she sat by the window, so gentle, so
+      lissome, so sweet, and so frail, and he had a shrewd notion that were he
+      Florimond de Condillac, whether he feared her in durance or not, not the
+      fever, nor the plague itself should keep him for the best part of a week
+      at La Rochette within easy ride of her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled gently at his words, and turned the conversation to the matter
+      that imported most.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tonight then, it is determined that we are to go?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At midnight or a little after. Be in readiness, mademoiselle, and do not
+      keep me waiting when I rap upon your door. Haste may be of importance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may count upon me, my friend,&rdquo; she answered him, and stirred by a
+      sudden impulse she held out her hand. &ldquo;You have been very good to me,
+      Monsieur de Garnache. You have made life very different for me since your
+      coming. I had it in my mind to blame you once for your rashness in
+      returning alone. I was a little fool. You can never know the peace that
+      has come to me from having you at hand. The fears, the terrors that
+      possessed me before you came have all been dispelled in this last week
+      that you have been my sentry in two senses.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took the hand she held out to him, and looked down at her out of his
+      grimy, disfigured face, an odd tenderness stirring him. He felt as might
+      have felt a father towards his daughter&mdash;at least, so thought he
+      then.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Child,&rdquo; he answered her, &ldquo;you overrate it. I have done no less than I
+      could do, no more than any other would have done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet more than Florimond has done&mdash;and he my betrothed. A touch of
+      fever was excuse enough to keep him at La Rochette, whilst the peril of
+      death did not suffice to deter you from coming hither.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You forget, mademoiselle, that, maybe, he does not know your
+      circumstances.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Maybe he does not,&rdquo; said she, with a half-sigh. Then she looked up into
+      his face again. &ldquo;I am sad at the thought of going, monsieur,&rdquo; she
+      surprised him by saying.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sad?&rdquo; he cried. Then he laughed. &ldquo;But what can there be to sadden you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This, monsieur: that after to-night it is odds I shall never see you
+      more.&rdquo; She said it without hesitation and without coquetry, for her
+      upbringing had been simple and natural in an atmosphere different far from
+      that in which had been reared the courtly women he had known. &ldquo;You will
+      return to Paris and the great world, and I shall live out my life in this,
+      little corner of Dauphiny. You will forget me in the bustle of your
+      career, monsieur; but I shall always hold your memory very dear and very
+      gratefully. You are the only friend I have ever known since my father died
+      excepting Florimond, though it is so long since I have seen him, and he
+      never came to me in times of stress as you have done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; he answered, touched despite himself more touched than he
+      could have believed possible to his callous, world-worn nature&mdash;&ldquo;you
+      make me very proud; you make me feel a little better than I am, for if I
+      have earned your regard and friendship, there must be some good in old
+      Garnache. Believe me, mademoiselle, I too shall not forget.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And thereafter they remained a spell in silence, she sitting by the
+      window, gazing out into the bright October sky, he standing by her chair,
+      thoughtfully considering her brown head so gracefully set upon her little
+      shoulders. A feeling came to him that was odd and unusual; he sought to
+      interpret it, and he supposed it to mean that he wished that at some time
+      in the dim past he might have married some woman who would have borne him
+      for daughter such a one as this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XV. THE CONFERENCE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The matter that brought Monsieur de Tressan to Condillac&mdash;and brought
+      him in most fearful haste&mdash;was the matter of the courier who had that
+      day arrived at the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      News of it had reached the ears of my Lord Seneschal. His mind had been a
+      prey to uneasiness concerning this business of rebellion in which he had
+      so rashly lent a hand, and he was anxious to know whence came this courier
+      and what news he brought. But for all his haste he had paused&mdash;remembering
+      it was the Marquise he went to visit&mdash;to don the gorgeous yellow suit
+      with the hanging sleeves which he had had from Paris, and the crimson sash
+      he had bought at Taillemant&rsquo;s, all in the very latest mode.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus arrayed, his wig well curled and a clump of it caught in ribbon of
+      flame-coloured silk on the left side, his sword hanging from belt and
+      carriages richly wrought with gold, and the general courtier-like effect
+      rather marred by the heavy riding-boots which he would have liked to leave
+      behind yet was constrained to wear, he presented himself before the
+      Dowager, hiding his anxiety in a melting smile, and the latter in the
+      profoundest of bows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The graciousness of his reception overwhelmed him almost, for in his
+      supreme vanity he lacked the wit to see that this cordiality might be
+      dictated by no more than the need they had of him at Condillac. A lackey
+      placed a great chair for him by the fire that he might warm himself after
+      his evening ride, and the Dowager, having ordered lights, sat herself
+      opposite him with the hearth between them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He simpered awhile and toyed with trivialities of speech before he gave
+      utterance to the matter that absorbed him. Then, at last, when they were
+      alone, he loosed the question that was bubbling on his lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hear a courier came to Condillac to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For answer she told him what he sought to learn, whence came that courier,
+      and what the message that he brought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And so, Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; she ended, &ldquo;my days at Condillac are
+      numbered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why so?&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;since you say that Florimond has adopted towards you
+      a friendly tone. Surely he would not drive his father&rsquo;s widow hence?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled at the fire in a dreamy, pensive manner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;he would not drive me hence. He has offered me the
+      shelter of Condillac for as long as it may pleasure me to make it my
+      home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excellent!&rdquo; he exclaimed, rubbing his little fat hands and screwing the
+      little features of his huge red face into the grotesque semblance of a
+      smile. &ldquo;What need to talk of going, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What need?&rdquo; she echoed, in a voice dull and concentrated. &ldquo;Do you ask
+      that, Tressan? Do you think I should elect to live upon the charity of
+      this man?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For all that the Lord Seneschal may have been dull-witted, yet he had wit
+      enough to penetrate to the very marrow of her meaning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must hate Florimond very bitterly,&rdquo; said he. She shrugged her
+      shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I possess, I think, the faculty of feeling strongly. I can love well,
+      monsieur, and I can hate well. It is one or the other with me. And as
+      cordially as I love my own son Marius, as cordially do I detest this
+      coxcomb Florimond.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She expressed no reasons for her hatred of her late husband&rsquo;s elder son.
+      Hers were not reasons that could easily be put into words. They were
+      little reasons, trivial grains of offence which through long years had
+      accumulated into a mountain. They had their beginning in the foolish
+      grievance that had its birth with her own son, when she had realized that
+      but for that rosy-cheeked, well-grown boy borne to the Marquis by his
+      first wife, Marius would have been heir to Condillac. Her love of her own
+      child and her ambitions for him, her keen desire to see him fill an
+      exalted position in the world, caused her a thousand times a day to wish
+      his half-brother dead. Yet Florimond had flourished and grown, and as he
+      grew he manifested a character which, with all its imperfections, was more
+      lovable than the nature of her own offspring. And their common father had
+      never seen aught but the faults of Marius and the virtues of Florimond.
+      She had resented this, and Marius had resented it; and Marius, having
+      inherited with his mother&rsquo;s beauty his mother&rsquo;s arrogant, dominant spirit,
+      had returned with insolence such admonitions as from time to time his
+      father gave him, and thus the breach had grown. Later, since he could not
+      be heir to Condillac, the Marquise&rsquo;s eyes, greedy of advancement for him,
+      had fallen covetously upon the richer La Vauvraye, whose lord had then no
+      son, whose heiress was a little girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By an alliance easy to compass, since the lords of Condillac and La
+      Vauvraye were lifelong friends, Marius&rsquo;s fortunes might handsomely have
+      been mended. Yet when she herself bore the suggestion of it to the
+      Marquis, he had seized upon it, approved it, but adopted it for
+      Florimond&rsquo;s benefit instead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thereafter war had raged fiercely in the family of Condillac&mdash;a war
+      between the Marquis and Florimond on the one side, and the Marquise and
+      Marius on the other. And so bitterly was it waged that it was by the old
+      Marquis&rsquo;s suggestion that at last Florimond had gone upon his travels to
+      see the world and carry arms in foreign service.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hopes that he would take his death, as was a common thing when
+      warring, rose high&mdash;so high as to become almost assurance, a thing to
+      be reckoned with. Florimond would return no more, and her son should fill
+      the place to which he was entitled by his beauty of person and the high
+      mental gifts his doting mother saw in him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet the months grew into years, and at long intervals full of hope for the
+      Marquise news came of Florimond, and the news was ever that he was well
+      and thriving, gathering honours and drinking deep of life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now, at last, when matters seemed to have been tumbled into her lap
+      that she might dispose of them as she listed; now, when in her anxiety to
+      see her son supplant his step-brother in the possession of La Vauvraye&mdash;if
+      not, perhaps, in that of Condillac as well she had done a rashness which
+      might end in making her and Marius outlaws, news came that this hated
+      Florimond was at the door; tardily returned, yet returned in time to
+      overthrow her schemes and to make her son the pauper that her husband&rsquo;s
+      will had seemed to aim at rendering him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her mind skimmed lightly over all these matters, seeking somewhere some
+      wrong that should stand out stark and glaring, upon which she might seize,
+      and offer it to the Seneschal as an explanation of her hatred. But nowhere
+      could she find the thing she sought. Her hatred had for foundation a
+      material too impalpable to be fashioned into words. Tressan&rsquo;s voice
+      aroused her from her thoughts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you laid no plans, madame?&rdquo; he asked her. &ldquo;It were surely a madness
+      now to attempt to withstand the Marquis.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Marquis? Ah yes&mdash;Florimond.&rdquo; She sat forward out of the shadows
+      in which her great chair enveloped her, and let candle and firelight play
+      about the matchless beauty of her perfect face. There was a flush upon it,
+      the flush of battle; and she was about to tell the Seneschal that not
+      while one stone of Condillac should stand upon another, not while a gasp
+      of breath remained in her frail body, would she surrender. But she checked
+      her rashness. Well might it be that in the end she should abandon such a
+      purpose. Tressan was ugly as a toad, the most absurd, ridiculous
+      bridegroom that ever led woman to the altar. Yet rumour ran that he was
+      rich, and as a last resource, for the sake of his possessions she might
+      bring herself to endure his signal shortcomings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have taken no resolve as yet,&rdquo; said she, in a wistful voice. &ldquo;I founded
+      hopes upon Marius which Marius threatens to frustrate. I think I had best
+      resign myself to the poverty of my Touraine home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And then the Seneschal realized that the time was now. The opportunity he
+      might have sought in vain was almost thrust upon him. In the spirit he
+      blessed Florimond for returning so opportunely; in the flesh he rose from
+      the chair and, without more ado, he cast himself upon his knees before the
+      Dowager. He cast himself down, and the Dowager experienced a faint
+      stirring of surprise that she heard no flop such as must attend the
+      violent falling of so fat a body. But the next instant, realizing the
+      purpose of his absurd posture, she shrank back with a faint gasp, and her
+      face was mercifully blurred to his sight once more amid the shadows of her
+      chair. Thus was he spared the look of utter loathing, of unconquerable,
+      irrepressible disgust that leapt into her countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His voice quivered with ridiculous emotion, his little fat red fingers
+      trembled as he outheld them in a theatrical gesture of supplication.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never contemplate poverty, madame, until you have discarded me,&rdquo; he
+      implored her. &ldquo;Say but that you will, and you shall be lady of Tressan.
+      All that I have would prove but poor adornment to a beauty such as yours,
+      and I should shrink from offering it you, were it not that, with it all, I
+      can offer you the fondest heart in France. Marquise&mdash;Clotilde, I cast
+      myself humbly at your feet. Do with me as you will. I love you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      By an effort she crushed down her loathing of him&mdash;a loathing that
+      grew a hundredfold as she beheld him now transformed by his amorousness
+      into the semblance almost of a satyr&mdash;and listened to his foolish
+      rantings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As Marquise de Condillac it hurt her pride to listen and not have him
+      whipped for his audacity; as a woman it insulted her. Yet the Marquise and
+      the woman she alike repressed. She would give him no answer&mdash;she
+      could not, so near was she to fainting with disdain of him&mdash;yet must
+      she give him hope against the time when, should all else fail, she might
+      have to swallow the bitter draught he was now holding to her lips. So she
+      temporized.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She controlled her voice into a tone of gentle sadness; she set a mask of
+      sorrow upon her insolent face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, monsieur,&rdquo; she sighed, and so far overcame her nausea as for an
+      instant to touch his hand in a little gesture of caress, &ldquo;you must not
+      speak so to a widow of six months, nor must I listen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The quivering grew in his hands and voice; but no longer did they shake
+      through fear of a rebuff: they trembled now in the eager strength of the
+      hope he gathered from her words. She was so beautiful, so peerless, so
+      noble, so proud&mdash;and he so utterly unworthy&mdash;that naught but her
+      plight had given him courage to utter his proposal. And she answered him
+      in such terms!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You give me hope, Marquise? If I come again&mdash;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed, and her face, which was once more within the light, showed a
+      look of sad inquiry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I thought that what you have said, you have said out of pity, because
+      you fear lest my necessities should hurt me, I could give you no hope at
+      all. I have my pride, mon ami. But if what you have said you would still
+      have said though I had continued mistress of Condillac, then, Tressan, you
+      may repeat it to me hereafter, at a season when I may listen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His joy welled up and overflowed in him as overflows a river in time of
+      spate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bent forward, caught her hand, and bore it to his lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Clotilde!&rdquo; he cried, in a smothered voice; then the door opened, and
+      Marius stepped into the long chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the creaking sound of the opening door the Seneschal bestirred himself
+      to rise. Even the very young care not so to be surprised, how much less,
+      then, a man well past the prime of life? He came up laboriously&mdash;the
+      more laboriously by virtue of his very efforts to show himself still
+      nimble in his mistress&rsquo;s eyes. Upon the intruder he turned a crimson,
+      furious face, perspiration gleaming like varnish on brow and nose. At
+      sight of Marius, who stood arrested, scowling villainously upon the pair,
+      the fire died suddenly from his glance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my dear Marius,&rdquo; said he, with a flourish and an air of being
+      mightily at his ease. But the young man&rsquo;s eyes went over and beyond him to
+      rest in a look of scrutiny upon his mother. She had risen too, and he had
+      been in time to see the startled manner of her rising. In her cheeks there
+      was a guilty flush, but her eyes boldly met and threw back her son&rsquo;s
+      regard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius came slowly down the room, and no word was spoken. The Seneschal
+      cleared his throat with noisy nervousness. Madame stood hand on hip, the
+      flush fading slowly, her glance resuming its habitual lazy insolence. By
+      the fire Marius paused and kicked the logs into a blaze, regardless of the
+      delicate fabric of his rosetted shoes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Seneschal,&rdquo; said madame calmly, &ldquo;came to see us in the matter
+      of the courier.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Marius, with an insolent lifting of his brows and a sidelong
+      look at Tressan; and Tressan registered in his heart a vow that when he
+      should have come to wed the mother, he would not forget to take payment
+      for that glance from her pert son.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Comte will remain and sup with us before riding back to
+      Grenoble,&rdquo; she added.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said he again, in the same tone. And that for the moment was all he
+      said. He remained by the fire, standing between them where he had planted
+      himself in the flesh, as if to symbolize the attitude he intended in the
+      spirit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But one chance he had, before supper was laid, of a word alone with his
+      mother, in her own closet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; he said, his sternness mingling with alarm, &ldquo;are you mad that
+      you encourage the suit of this hedgehog Tressan?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked him up and down with a deliberate eye, her lip curling a
+      little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely, Marius, it is my own concern.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so,&rdquo; he answered her, and his grasp fastened almost viciously on her
+      wrist. &ldquo;I think that it is mine as well. Mother, bethink you,&rdquo; and his
+      tone changed to an imploring key, &ldquo;bethink you what you would do! Would
+      you&mdash;you&mdash;mate with such a thing as that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His emphasis of the pronoun was very eloquent. Not in all the words of the
+      French language could he have told her better how high he placed her in
+      his thoughts, how utterly she must fall, how unutterably be soiled by an
+      alliance with Tressan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had hoped you would have saved me from it, Marius,&rdquo; she answered him,
+      her eyes seeming to gaze down into the depths of his. &ldquo;At La Vauvraye I
+      had hoped to live out my widowhood in tranquil dignity. But&mdash;&rdquo; She
+      let her arms fall sharply to her sides, and uttered a little sneering
+      laugh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, mother,&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;between the dignity of La Vauvraye and the
+      indignity of Tressan, surely there is some middle course?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye,&rdquo; she answered scornfully, &ldquo;starvation on a dunghill in Touraine&mdash;or
+      something near akin to it, for which I have no stomach.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He released her wrist and stood with bent head, clenching and unclenching
+      his long white hands, and she watched him, watching in him the working of
+      his proud and stubborn spirit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother,&rdquo; he cried at last, and the word sounded absurd between them, by
+      so little did he seem the younger of the twain, &ldquo;mother, you shall not do
+      it you must not!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You leave me little alternative&mdash;alas!&rdquo; sighed she. &ldquo;Had you been
+      more adroit you had been wed by now, Marius, and the future would give us
+      no concern. As it is, Florimond comes home, and we&mdash;&rdquo; She spread her
+      hands and thrust out her nether lip in a grimace that was almost ugly.
+      Then: &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; she said briskly. &ldquo;Supper is laid, and my Lord Seneschal
+      will be awaiting us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And before he could reply she had swept past him and taken her way below.
+      He followed gloomily, and in gloom sat he at table, never heeding the
+      reckless gaiety of the Seneschal and the forced mirth of the Marquise. He
+      well understood the sort of tacit bargain that his mother had made with
+      him. She had seen her advantage in his loathing of the proposed union with
+      Tressan, and she had used it to the full. Either he must compel Valerie to
+      wed him this side of Saturday or resign himself to see his mother&mdash;his
+      beautiful, peerless mother&mdash;married to this skin of lard that called
+      itself a man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Living, he had never entertained for his father a son&rsquo;s respect, nor,
+      dead, did he now reverence his memory as becomes a son. But in that hour,
+      as he sat at table, facing this gross wooer of his mother&rsquo;s, his eyes were
+      raised to the portrait of the florid-visaged haughty Marquis de Condillac,
+      where it looked down upon them from the panelled wall, and from his soul
+      he offered up to that portrait of his dead sire an apology for the
+      successor whom his widow destined him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He ate little, but drank great draughts, as men will when their mood is
+      sullen and dejected, and the heat of the wine, warming his veins and
+      lifting from him some of the gloom that had settled over him, lent him
+      anon a certain recklessness very different from the manner of his sober
+      moments.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Chancing suddenly to raise his eyes from the cup into which he had been
+      gazing, absorbed as gazes a seer into his crystal, he caught on the
+      Seneschal&rsquo;s lips so odious a smile, in the man&rsquo;s eyes so greedy, hateful a
+      leer as he bent them on the Marquise, that he had much ado not to alter
+      the expression of that flabby face by hurling at it the cup he held.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He curbed himself; he smiled sardonically upon the pair; and in that
+      moment he swore that be the cost what it might, he would frustrate the
+      union of those two. His thoughts flew to Valerie, and the road they took
+      was fouled with the mud of ugly deeds. A despair, grim at first, then
+      mocking, took possession of him. He loved Valerie to distraction. Loved
+      her for herself, apart from all worldly advantages that must accrue to him
+      from an alliance with her. His mother saw in that projected marriage no
+      more than the acquisition of the lands of La Vauvraye, and she may even
+      have thought that he himself saw no more. In that she was wrong; but
+      because of it she may have been justified of her impatience with him at
+      the tardiness, the very clumsiness with which he urged his suit. How was
+      she to know that it was just the sincerity of his passion made him clumsy?
+      For like many another, normally glib, self-assured, and graceful, Marius
+      grew halting, shy, and clumsy only where he loved.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But in the despair that took him now the quality of his passion seemed to
+      change. Partly it was the wine, partly the sight of this other lover&mdash;of
+      whom there must be an end&mdash;whose very glance seemed to him an insult
+      to his mother. His imagination had taken fire that night, and it had
+      ripened him for any villainy. The Seneschal and the wine, between them,
+      had opened the floodgates of all that was evil in his nature, and that
+      evil thundered out in a great torrent that bid fair to sweep all before
+      it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And suddenly, unexpectedly for the others, who were by now resigned to his
+      moody silence, the evil found expression. The Marquise had spoken of
+      something&mdash;something of slight importance&mdash;that must be done
+      before Florimond returned. Abruptly Marius swung round in his seat to face
+      his mother. &ldquo;Must this Florimond return?&rdquo; he asked, and for all that he
+      uttered no more words, so ample in their expression were those four that
+      he had uttered and the tone of them, that his meaning left little work to
+      the imagination.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame turned to stare at him, surprise ineffable in her glance&mdash;not
+      at the thing that he suggested, but at the abruptness with which the
+      suggestion came. The cynical, sneering tone rang in her ears after the
+      words were spoken, and she looked in his face for a confirmation of their
+      full purport.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She observed the wine-flush on his cheek, the wine-glitter in his eye, and
+      she remarked the slight smile on his lips and the cynical assumption of
+      nonchalance with which he fingered the jewel in his ear as he returned her
+      gaze. She beheld now in her son a man more purposeful than she had ever
+      known before.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A tense silence had followed his words, and the Lord Seneschal gaped at
+      him, some of the colour fading from his plethoric countenance, suspecting
+      as he did the true drift of Marius&rsquo;s suggestion. At last it was madame who
+      spoke&mdash;very softly, with a narrowing of the eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Call Fortunio,&rdquo; was all she said, but Marius understood full well the
+      purpose for which she would have Fortunio called.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a half-smile he rose, and going to the door he bade his page who was
+      idling in the anteroom go summon the captain. Then he paced slowly back,
+      not to the place he had lately occupied at table, but to the hearth, where
+      he took his stand with his shoulders squared to the overmantel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio came, fair-haired and fresh-complexioned as a babe, his supple,
+      not ungraceful figure tawdrily clad in showy clothes of poor material the
+      worse for hard usage and spilt wine. The Countess bade him sit, and with
+      her own hands she poured a cup of Anjou for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In some wonder, and, for all his ordinary self-possession, with a little
+      awkwardness, the captain did her bidding, and with an apologetic air he
+      took the seat she offered him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He drank this wine, and here was a spell of silence till Marius, grown
+      impatient, brutally put the thing for which the Marquise sought delicate
+      words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have sent for you, Fortunio,&rdquo; said he, in a blustering tone, &ldquo;to
+      inquire of you what price you&rsquo;d ask to cut the throat of my brother, the
+      Marquis de Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal sank back in his chair with a gasp. The captain, a frown
+      between his frank-seeming, wide-set eyes, started round to look at the
+      boy. The business was by no means too strong for the ruffler&rsquo;s stomach,
+      but the words in which it was conveyed to him most emphatically were.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Condillac,&rdquo; said he, with an odd assumption of dignity, &ldquo;I
+      think you have mistaken your man. I am a soldier, not a cut-throat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But yes,&rdquo; the Marquise soothed him, throwing herself instantly into the
+      breach, and laying a long, slender hand upon the frayed green velvet of
+      the captain&rsquo;s sleeve. &ldquo;What my son means and what he says are vastly
+      different things.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It will sorely tax your wits, madame,&rdquo; laughed Marius brutally, &ldquo;to make
+      clear that difference.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And then the Seneschal nervously cleared his throat and muttering that it
+      waxed late and he must be riding home, made shift to rise. Him, too, the
+      Marquise at once subdued. She was not minded that he should go just yet.
+      It might be useful to her hereafter to have had him present at this
+      conference, into which she meant to draw him until she should have made
+      him one with them, a party to their guilt. For the task she needed not
+      over many words: just one or two and a melting glance or so, and the
+      rebellion in his bosom was quelled at once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But with the captain her wiles were not so readily successful. He had no
+      hopes of winning her to wife&mdash;haply no desire, since he was not a man
+      of very great ambitions. On the other hand, he had against him the very
+      worst record in France, and for all that he might embark upon this
+      business under the auspices of the Lord Seneschal himself, he knew not how
+      far the Lord Seneschal might dare to go thereafter to save him from a
+      hanging, should it come to that.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He said as much in words. In a business of this kind, he knew from
+      experience, the more difficulties he advanced, the better a bargain he
+      drove in the end; and if he was to be persuaded to risk his neck in this,
+      he should want good payment. But even for good payment on this occasion he
+      was none too sure as yet that he would let himself be persuaded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur Fortunio,&rdquo; the Marquise said, very softly, &ldquo;heed not Monsieur
+      Marius&rsquo;s words. Attend to me. The Marquis de Condillac, as no doubt you
+      will have learned for yourself, is lying at La Rochette. Now it happens
+      that he is noxious to us&mdash;let the reasons be what they may. We need a
+      friend to put him out of our way. Will you be that friend?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will observe,&rdquo; sneered Marius, &ldquo;how wide a difference there is
+      between what the Marquise suggests and my own frank question of what price
+      you would take to cut my brother&rsquo;s throat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I observe no difference, which is what you would say,&rdquo; Fortunio answered
+      truculently, his head well back, his brown eyes resentful of offence&mdash;for
+      none can be so resentful of imputed villainy as your villain who is
+      thorough-paced. &ldquo;And,&rdquo; he concluded, &ldquo;I return you the same answer, madame&mdash;that
+      I am no cut-throat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She repressed her anger at Marius&rsquo;s sneering interference, and made a
+      little gesture of dismay with her eloquent white hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But we do not ask you to cut a throat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have heard amiss, then,&rdquo; said he, his insolence abating nothing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have heard aright, but you have understood amiss. There are other
+      ways of doing these things. If it were but the cutting of a throat, should
+      we have sent for you? There are a dozen in the garrison would have
+      sufficed for our purpose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it, then, you need?&rdquo; quoth he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We want an affair contrived with all decency. The Marquis is at the
+      Sanglier Noir at La Rochette. You can have no difficulty in finding him,
+      and having found him, less difficulty still in giving or provoking
+      insult.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excellent,&rdquo; murmured Marius from the background. &ldquo;It is such an
+      enterprise as should please a ready swordsman of your calibre, Fortunio.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A duel?&rdquo; quoth the fellow, and his insolence went out of him, thrust out
+      by sheer dismay; his mouth fell open. A duel was another affair
+      altogether. &ldquo;But, Sangdieu! what if he should slay me? Have you thought of
+      that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Slay you?&rdquo; cried the Marquise, her eyes resting on his face with an
+      expression as of wonder at such a question. &ldquo;You jest, Fortunio.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And he with the fever,&rdquo; put in Marius, sneering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; muttered Fortunio. &ldquo;He has the fever? The fever is something. But&mdash;but&mdash;accidents
+      will happen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Florimond was ever an indifferent swordsman,&rdquo; murmured Marius dreamily,
+      as if communing with himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain wheeled upon him once more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, then, Monsieur Marius,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;since that is so and you are
+      skilled&mdash;as skilled as am I, or more&mdash;and he has a fever, where
+      is the need to hire me to the task?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where?&rdquo; echoed Marius. &ldquo;What affair may that be of yours? We ask you to
+      name a price on which you will do this thing. Have done with
+      counter-questions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius was skilled with the foils, as Fortunio said, but he cared not for
+      unbaited steel, and he was conscious of it, so that the captain&rsquo;s
+      half-sneer had touched him on the raw. But he was foolish to take that
+      tone in answer. There was a truculent, Southern pride in the ruffler which
+      sprang immediately into life and which naught that they could say
+      thereafter would stamp out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Must I say again that you mistake your man?&rdquo; was his retort, and as he
+      spoke he rose, as though to signify that the subject wearied him and that
+      his remaining to pursue it must be idle. &ldquo;I am not of those to whom you
+      can say: &lsquo;I need such a one killed, name me the price at which you&rsquo;ll be
+      his butcher&rsquo;.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise wrung her hands in pretty mimicry of despair, and poured out
+      soothing words, as one might pour oil upon stormy waters. The Seneschal
+      sat in stolid silence, a half-scared spectator of this odd scene, what
+      time the Marquise talked and talked until she had brought Fortunio back to
+      some measure of subjection.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such reasoning as she made use of she climaxed by an offer of no less a
+      sum than a hundred pistoles. The captain licked his lips and pulled at his
+      mustachios. For all his vaunted scorn of being a butcher at a price, now
+      that he heard the price he seemed not half so scornful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me again the thing that you need doing and the manner of it,&rdquo; said
+      he, as one who was moved to reconsider. She told him, and when she had
+      done he made a compromise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I go upon this business, madame, I go not alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, as for that,&rdquo; said Marius, &ldquo;it shall be as you will. Take what men
+      you want with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And hang with them afterwards, maybe,&rdquo; he sneered, his insolence
+      returning. &ldquo;The hundred pistoles would avail me little then. Look you,
+      Monsieur de Condillac, and you, madame, if I go, I&rsquo;ll need to take with me
+      a better hostage than the whole garrison of this place. I&rsquo;ll need for
+      shield some one who will see to it that he is not hurt himself, just as I
+      shall see to it that he is hurt before I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean? Speak out, Fortunio,&rdquo; the Marquise bade him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I mean, madame, that I will go, not to do this thing, but to stand by and
+      render help if help be needed. Let Monsieur de Condillac go, and I will go
+      with him, and I will undertake to see to it that he returns unhurt and
+      that we leave the other stark.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Both started, and the Seneschal leaned heavily upon the table. He was not,
+      with all his faults, a man of blood, and this talk of butchery turned him
+      sick and faint.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Vainly now did the Marquise seek to alter the captain&rsquo;s resolution; but in
+      this she received a sudden check from Marius himself. He cut in upon her
+      arguments to ask the captain:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How can you promise so much? Do you mean that you and I must fall upon
+      him? You forget that he will have men about him. A duel is one thing, a
+      rough-and-tumble another, and we shall fare none so well in this, I&rsquo;m
+      thinking.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain closed one eye, and a leer of subtle cunning overspread his
+      face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve thought of that,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Neither a duel nor a rough-and-tumble do
+      I propose, but something between the two; something that shall seem a duel
+      yet be a rough-and-tumble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Explain yourself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What further explanation does it ask? We come upon Monsieur le Marquis
+      where his men are not. We penetrate, let us say, into his chamber. I turn
+      the key in the door. We are alone with him and you provoke him. He is
+      angry, and must fight you there and then. I am your friend; I must fill
+      the office of second for both sides. You engage, and I stand aside and let
+      you fight it out. You say he is indifferently skilled with the sword, and,
+      in addition, that he has a fever. Thus you should contrive to put your
+      steel through him, and a duel it will have been. But if by luck or skill
+      he should have you in danger, I shall be at hand to flick in my sword at
+      the right moment and make an opening through which you may send yours
+      home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Believe me it were better&mdash;&rdquo; began the Dowager. But Marius, who of a
+      sudden was much taken with the notion, again broke in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you to be depended upon to make no mistake, Fortunio?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Per Bacco!&rdquo; swore the ruffler. &ldquo;A mistake must cost me a hundred
+      pistoles. I think you may depend upon me there. If I err at all, it will
+      be on the side of eagerness to see you make short work of him. You have my
+      answer now, monsieur. If we talk all night, you shall not move me further.
+      But if my proposal suits you, I am your man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I yours, Fortunio,&rdquo; answered Marius, and there was a ring almost of
+      exultation in his voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager looked from one to the other, as if she were weighing the men
+      and satisfying herself that Marius ran no risk. She put a question or two
+      to her son, another to the captain; then, seeming satisfied with what had
+      been agreed, she nodded her head and told them they had best be stirring
+      with the dawn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will have light enough by half-past six. Do not delay later in taking
+      the road. And see that you are back here by nightfall; I shall be anxious
+      till you are returned.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She poured wine again for the captain, and Marius coming up to the table
+      filled himself a glass, which he tossed off. The Marquise was speaking to
+      Tressan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you not drink to the success of the venture?&rdquo; she asked him, in a
+      coaxing tone, her eyes upon his own. &ldquo;I think we are like to see the end
+      of our troubles now, monsieur, and Marius shall be lord both of Condillac
+      and La Vauvraye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And the gross, foolish Seneschal, under the spell of her magnificent eyes,
+      slowly raised his cup to his lips and drank to the success of that
+      murderous business. Marius stood still, a frown between his eyes haled
+      thither by the mention of La Vauvraye. He might be winning it, as his
+      mother said, but he would have preferred to have won it differently. Then
+      the frown was smoothed away; a sardonic smile replaced it; another cup of
+      wine he poured himself. Then, without word to any there, he turned on his
+      heel and went from the room, a trifle unsteady in his gait, yet with such
+      lines of purposefulness in the way he bore himself that the three of them
+      stared after him in dull surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVI. THE UNEXPECTED
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      In her apartments in the Northern Tower Valerie had supped, and&mdash;to
+      spare Monsieur de Garnache the full indignity of that part of the offices
+      he was charged with&mdash;she had herself removed the cloth and set the
+      things in the guard-room, where they might lie till morning. When that was
+      done&mdash;and despite her protests, Garnache had insisted upon lending a
+      hand&mdash;the Parisian reminded her that it was already after nine, and urged
+      her to make such preparations as incumbed her for their journey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My preparations are soon made,&rdquo; she assured him with a smile. &ldquo;I need but
+      what I may carry in a cloak.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They fell to talking of their impending flight, and they laughed together
+      at the discomfiture that would be the Dowager&rsquo;s and her son&rsquo;s when, in the
+      morning, they came to discover the empty cage. From that they passed on to
+      talk of Valerie herself, of her earlier life at La Vauvraye, and later the
+      conversation shifted to Garnache, and she questioned him touching the
+      warring he had seen in early youth, and afterwards asked him for
+      particulars of Paris&mdash;that wonderful city which to her mind was the
+      only earthly parallel of Paradise&mdash;and of the life at Court.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus in intimate talk did they while away the time of waiting, and in the
+      hour that sped they came, perhaps, to know more of each other than they
+      had done hitherto. Intimate, indeed, had they unconsciously become
+      already. Their singular position, locked together in that tower&mdash;a
+      position utterly impossible under any but the conditions that attended it&mdash;had
+      conduced to that good-fellowship, whilst the girl&rsquo;s trust and dependence
+      upon the man, the man&rsquo;s observance of that trust, and his determination to
+      show her that it had not been misplaced, had done the rest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But to-night they seemed to have drawn nearer in spirit to each other, and
+      that, maybe, it was that prompted Valerie to sigh, and in her sweet,
+      unthinking innocence to say again:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am truly sorry, Monsieur de Garnache, that our sojourn here is coming
+      to an end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was no coxcomb, and he set no false value on the words. He laughed for
+      answer, as he rejoined:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so am I, mademoiselle. Nor shall I know peace of mind again until
+      this ill-omened chateau is a good three leagues or so behind us. Sh! What
+      was that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He came instantly to his feet, his face intent and serious. He had been
+      sitting at his ease in an armchair, over the back of which he had tossed
+      the baldric from which his sword depended. The clang of the heavy door
+      below, striking the wall as it was pushed open, had reached his ears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can it be time already?&rdquo; asked mademoiselle; yet a panic took her, and
+      she blenched a little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Impossible,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;it is not more than ten o&rsquo;clock. Unless that fool
+      Arsenio has blundered&mdash;&rdquo; He stopped. &ldquo;Sh!&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;Some one is
+      coming here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And suddenly he realized the peril that might lie in being found thus in
+      her company. It alarmed him more than did the visit itself, so unusual at
+      this hour. He saw that he had not time to reach the guard-room; he would
+      be caught in the act of coming forth, and that might be interpreted by the
+      Dowager or her son&mdash;if it should happen to be one or the other of
+      them&mdash;as a hurried act of flight such as guilt might prompt. Perhaps
+      he exaggerated the risk; but their fortunes at Condillac had reached a
+      point where they must not be jeopardized by any chance however slight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To your chamber, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he whispered fearfully, and he pointed to
+      the door of the inner room. &ldquo;Lock yourself in. Quick! Sh!&rdquo; And he signed
+      frantically to her to go silently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Swift and quietly as a mouse she glided from the room and softly closed
+      the door of her chamber and turned the key in a lock, which Garnache had
+      had the foresight to keep well oiled. He breathed more freely when it was
+      done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A step sounded in the guard-room. He sank without a rustle into the chair
+      from which he had risen, rested his head against the back of it, closed
+      his eyes, opened his mouth, and dissembled sleep.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The steps came swiftly across the guard-room floor, soft, as of one
+      lightly shod; and Garnache wondered was it the mother or the son, just as
+      he wondered what this ill-come visitor might be seeking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The door of the antechamber was pushed gently open&mdash;it had stood ajar&mdash;and
+      under the lintel appeared the slender figure of Marius, still in his brown
+      velvet suit as Garnache last had seen him. He paused a moment to peer into
+      the chamber. Then he stepped forward, frowning to behold &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; so
+      cosily ensconced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ola there!&rdquo; he cried, and kicked the sentry&rsquo;s outstretched legs, the more
+      speedily to wake him. &ldquo;Is this the watch you keep?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache opened his eyes and stared a second dully at the disturber of his
+      feigned slumbers. Then, as if being more fully awakened he recognized his
+      master, he heaved himself suddenly to his feet and bowed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is this the watch you keep?&rdquo; quoth Marius again, and Garnache, scanning
+      the youth&rsquo;s face with foolishly smiling eyes, noted the flush on his
+      cheek, the odd glitter in his handsome eyes, and even caught a whiff of
+      wine upon his breath. Alarm grew in Garnache&rsquo;s mind, but his face
+      maintained its foolish vacancy, its inane smile. He bowed again and, with
+      a wave of the hands towards the inner chamber,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;La damigella a la,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For all that Marius had no Italian he understood the drift of the words,
+      assisted as they were by the man&rsquo;s expressive gesture. He sneered cruelly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It would be an ugly thing for you, my ugly friend, if she were not,&rdquo; he
+      answered. &ldquo;Away with you. I shall call you when I need you.&rdquo; And he
+      pointed to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache experienced some dismay, some fear even. He plied his wits, and
+      he determined that he had best seem to apprehend from his gestures
+      Marius&rsquo;s meaning; but apprehend it in part only, and go no further than
+      the other side of that door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed, therefore, for the third time, and with another of his foolish
+      grins he shuffled out of the chamber, pulling the door after him, so that
+      Marius should not see how near at hand he stayed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius, without further heeding him, stepped to mademoiselle&rsquo;s door and
+      rapped on a panel with brisk knuckles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is there?&rdquo; she inquired from within.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is I&mdash;Marius. Open, I have something I must say to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will it not keep till morning?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall be gone by then,&rdquo; he answered impatiently, &ldquo;and much depends upon
+      my seeing you ere I go. So open. Come!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There followed a pause, and Garnache in the outer room set his teeth and
+      prayed she might not anger Marius. He must be handled skillfully, lest
+      their flight should be frustrated at the last moment. He prayed, too, that
+      there might be no need for his intervention. That would indeed be the end
+      of all&mdash;a shipwreck within sight of harbour. He promised himself that
+      he would not lightly intervene. For the rest this news of Marius&rsquo;s
+      intended departure filled him with a desire to know something of the
+      journey on which he was bound:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Slowly mademoiselle&rsquo;s door opened. White and timid she appeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you want, Marius?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now and always and above all things the sight of you, Valerie,&rdquo; said he,
+      and the flushed cheek, the glittering eye, and wine-laden breath were as
+      plain to her as they had been to Garnache, and they filled her with a
+      deeper terror. Nevertheless she came forth at his bidding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see that you were not yet abed,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;It is as well. We must have
+      a talk.&rdquo; He set a chair for her and begged her to be seated; then he
+      perched himself on the table, his hands gripping the edges of it on either
+      side of him, and he turned his eyes upon her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Valerie,&rdquo; he said slowly, &ldquo;the Marquis de Condillac, my brother, is at La
+      Rochette.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is coming home!&rdquo; she cried, clasping her hands and feigning surprise
+      in word and glance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius shook his head and smiled grimly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;He is not coming home. That is&mdash;not unless you wish
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not unless I wish it? But naturally I wish it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, Valerie, if you would have what you wish, so must I. If Florimond
+      is ever to come to Condillac again, you must be my wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He leaned towards her now, supported by his elbow, so that his face was
+      close to hers, a deeper flush upon it, a brighter glitter in his black
+      eyes, his vinous breath enveloping and suffocating her. She shrank back,
+      her hands locking themselves one in the other till the knuckles showed
+      white.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What&mdash;what is it you mean?&rdquo; she faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No more than I have said; no less. If you love him well enough to
+      sacrifice yourself,&rdquo; and his lips curled sardonically at the word, &ldquo;then
+      marry me and save him from his doom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What doom?&rdquo; Her voice came mechanically, her lips seeming scarce to move.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He swung down from the table and stood before her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will tell you,&rdquo; he said, in a voice very full of promise. &ldquo;I love you,
+      Valerie, above all else on earth or, I think, in heaven; and I&rsquo;ll not
+      yield you to him. Say &lsquo;No&rsquo; to me now, and at daybreak I start for La
+      Rochette to win you from him at point of sword.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Despite her fears she could not repress a little smile of scorn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is that all?&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;Why, if you are so rash, it is yourself,
+      assuredly, will be slain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled tranquilly at that reflection upon his courage and his skill.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So might it befall if I went alone,&rdquo; said he. She understood. Her eyes
+      dilated with horror, with loathing of him. The angry words that sprang to
+      her lips were not to be denied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You cur, you cowardly assassin!&rdquo; she blazed at him. &ldquo;I might have guessed
+      that in some such cutthroat manner would your vaunt of winning me at the
+      sword-point be accomplished.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She watched the colour fade from his cheeks, and the ugly, livid hue that
+      spread in its room to his very lips. Yet it did not daunt her. She was on
+      her feet, confronting him ere he had time to speak again. Her eyes
+      flashed, and her arm pointed quivering to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go!&rdquo; she bade him, her voice harsh for once. &ldquo;Out of my sight! Go! Do
+      your worst, so that you leave me. I&rsquo;ll hold no traffic with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you not?&rdquo; said he, through setting teeth, and suddenly he caught the
+      wrist of that outstretched arm. But she saw nothing of immediate danger.
+      The only danger that she knew was the danger that threatened Florimond,
+      and little did that matter since at midnight she was to leave Condillac to
+      reach La Rochette in time to warn her betrothed. The knowledge gave her
+      confidence and an added courage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have offered me your bargain,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;You have named your
+      price and you have heard my refusal. Now go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not yet awhile,&rdquo; said he, in a voice so odiously sweet that Garnache
+      caught his breath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He drew her towards him. Despite her wild struggles he held her fast
+      against his breast. Do what she would, he rained his hot kisses on her
+      face and hair, till at last, freeing a hand, she smote him with all her
+      might across the face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He let her go then. He fell back with an oath, a patch of fingermarks
+      showing red on his white countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That blow has killed Florimond de Condillac,&rdquo; he told her viciously. &ldquo;He
+      dies at noon to-morrow. Ponder it, my pretty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I care not what you do so that you leave me,&rdquo; she answered defiantly,
+      restraining by a brave effort the tears of angry distress that welled up
+      from her stricken heart. And no less stricken, no less angry was Garnache
+      where he listened. It was by an effort that he had restrained himself from
+      bursting in upon them when Marius had seized her. The reflection that were
+      he to do so all would irretrievably be ruined alone had stayed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius eyed the girl a moment, his face distorted by the rage that was in
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By God!&rdquo; he swore, &ldquo;if I cannot have your love, I&rsquo;ll give you cause
+      enough to hate me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Already have you done that most thoroughly,&rdquo; said she. And Garnache
+      cursed this pertness of hers which was serving to dare him on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next moment there broke from her a startled cry. Marius had seized her
+      again and was crushing her frail body in his arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall kiss your lips before I go, ma mie,&rdquo; said he, his voice thick now
+      with a passion that was not all of anger. And then, while he still
+      struggled to have his way with her, a pair of arms took him about the
+      waist like hoops of steel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In his surprise he let her free, and in that moment he was swung back and
+      round and cast a good six paces down the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He came to a standstill by the table, at which he clutched to save himself
+      from falling, and turned bewildered, furious eyes upon &ldquo;Battista,&rdquo; by whom
+      he now dimly realized that he had been assailed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache&rsquo;s senses had all left him in that moment when Valerie had cried
+      out. He cast discretion to the winds; reason went out of him, and only
+      blind anger remained to drive him into immediate action. And as suddenly
+      as that flood of rage had leaped, as suddenly did it ebb now that he found
+      himself face to face with the outraged Condillac and began to understand
+      the magnitude of the folly he had committed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Everything was lost now, utterly and irretrievably&mdash;lost as a dozen
+      other fine emprises had been by his sudden and ungoverned frenzy. God!
+      What a fool he was! What a cursed, drivelling fool! What, after all, was a
+      kiss or two, compared with all the evil that might now result from his
+      interference? Haply Marius would have taken them and departed, and at
+      midnight they would have been free to go from Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The future would not have been lacking in opportunities to seek out and
+      kill Marius for that insult.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Why could he not have left the matter to the future? But now, with
+      Florimond to be murdered on the morrow at La Rochette, himself likely to
+      be murdered within the hour at Condillac, Valerie was at their mercy
+      utterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Wildly and vainly did he strive even then to cover up the foolish thing
+      that he had done. He bowed apologetically to Marius; he waved his hands
+      and filled the air with Italian phrases, frenziedly uttered, as if by the
+      very vigour of them he sought to drive explanation into his master&rsquo;s
+      brain. Marius watched and listened, but his rage nowise abated; it grew,
+      instead, as if that farrago of a language he did not understand were but
+      an added insult. An oath was all he uttered. Then he swung round and
+      caught Garnache&rsquo;s sword from the chair beside him, where it still rested,
+      and Garnache in that moment cursed the oversight. Whipping the long, keen
+      blade from its sheath, Marius bore down upon the rash meddler.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Par Dieu!&rdquo; he swore between his teeth. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll see the colour of your
+      dirty blood, you that lay hands upon a gentleman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But before he could send home the weapon, before Garnache could move to
+      defend himself, Valerie had slipped between them. Marius looked into her
+      white, determined face, and was smitten with surprise. What was this hind
+      to her that she should interfere at the risk of taking the sword herself?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then a slow smile spread upon his face. He was smarting still under her
+      disdain and resistance, as well as under a certain sense of the
+      discomfiture this fellow had put upon him. He saw a way to hurt her, to
+      abase her pride, and cut her to the very soul with shame.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are singularly concerned in this man&rsquo;s life,&rdquo; said he, an odious
+      undercurrent of meaning in his voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would not have you murder him,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;for doing no more than
+      madame your mother bade him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I make no doubt he has proved a very excellent guard,&rdquo; he sneered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Even now all might have been well. With that insult Marius might consider
+      that he had taken payment for the discomfiture he had suffered. He might
+      have bethought him that, perhaps, as she said, &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; had done no more
+      than observe the orders he had received&mdash;a trifle excessively, maybe,
+      yet faithfully nevertheless. Thinking thus, he might even have been
+      content to go his ways and take his fill of vengeance by slaying Florimond
+      upon the morrow. But Garnache&rsquo;s rash temper, rising anew, tore that last
+      flimsy chance to shreds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The insult that mademoiselle might overlook might even not have fully
+      understood&mdash;set him afire with indignation for her sake. He forgot
+      his role, forgot even that he had no French.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; he cried, and she gasped in her affright at this ruinous
+      indiscretion, &ldquo;I beg that you will stand aside.&rdquo; His voice was low and
+      threatening, but his words were woefully distinct.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Par la mort Dieu!&rdquo; swore Marius, taken utterly aback. &ldquo;What may your name
+      be&mdash;you who hitherto have had no French?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Almost thrusting mademoiselle aside, Garnache stood out to face him, the
+      flush of hot anger showing through the dye on his cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My name,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache, and my business
+      now to make an end of one at least of this obscene brood of Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And, without more ado, he caught up a chair and held it before him in
+      readiness to receive the other&rsquo;s onslaught.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Marius hung back an instant&mdash;at first in sheer surprise, later in
+      fear. He had some knowledge of the fellow&rsquo;s methods. Even the sword he
+      wielded gave him little confidence opposed to Garnache with a chair. He
+      must have help. His eyes sought the door, measuring the distance. Ere he
+      could reach it Garnache would cut him off. There was nothing for it but to
+      attempt to drive the Parisian back. And so with a sudden rush he advanced
+      to the attack. Garnache fell back and raised his chair, and in that
+      instant mademoiselle once more intervened between them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stand aside, mademoiselle,&rdquo; cried Garnache, who now, grown cool, as was
+      his way when once he was engaged, saw clearly through the purpose formed
+      by Marius. &ldquo;Stand aside, or we shall have him giving the alarm.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He leapt clear of her to stop Marius&rsquo;s sudden rush for the door. On the
+      very threshold the young man was forced to turn and defend himself, lest
+      his brains be dashed out by that ponderous weapon Garnache was handling
+      with a rare facility. But the mischief was done, in that he had reached
+      the threshold. Backing, he defended himself and gained the anteroom.
+      Garnache followed, but the clumsy chair was defensive rather than
+      offensive, and Marius&rsquo;s sword meanwhile darted above it and below it,
+      forcing him to keep a certain distance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now Marius raised his voice and shouted with all the power of his
+      lungs:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To me! To me! Fortunio! Abdon! To me, you dogs! I am beset.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      From the courtyard below rose an echo of his words, repeated in a shout by
+      the sentinel, who had overheard them, and they caught the swift fall of
+      the fellow&rsquo;s feet as he ran for help. Furious, picturing to himself how
+      the alarm would spread like a conflagration through the chateau, cursing
+      his headstrong folly yet determined that Marius at least should not escape
+      him, Garnache put forth his energies to hinder him from gaining the door
+      that opened on to the stairs. From the doorway of the antechamber
+      mademoiselle, with a white face and terrified eyes, watched the unequal
+      combat and heard the shouts for help. Anon despair might whelm her at the
+      thought of how they had lost their opportunity of escaping; but for the
+      present she had no thought save for the life of that brave man who was
+      defending himself with an unwieldy chair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache leapt suddenly aside to take his opponent in the flank and thus
+      turn him from his backward progress towards the outer door. The manoeuvre
+      succeeded, and gradually, always defending himself, Garnache circled
+      farther round him until he was between Marius and the threshold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now there came a sound of running feet on the uneven stones of the
+      courtyard. Light gleamed on the staircase, and breathless voices were
+      wafted up to the two men. Garnache bethought him that his last hour was
+      assuredly at hand. Well, if he must take his death, he might as well take
+      it here upon Marius&rsquo;s sword as upon another&rsquo;s. So he would risk it for the
+      sake of leaving upon Marius some token by which he might remember him. He
+      swung his chair aloft, uncovering himself for a second. The young man&rsquo;s
+      sword darted in like a shaft of light. Nimbly Garnache stepped aside to
+      avoid it, and moved nearer his opponent. Down crashed the chair, and down
+      went Marius, stunned and bleeding, under its terrific blow. The sword
+      clattered from his hand and rolled, with a pendulum-like movement, to the
+      feet of Garnache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Parisian flung aside his chair and stooped to seize that very welcome
+      blade. He rose, grasping the hilt and gathering confidence from the touch
+      of that excellently balanced weapon, and he swung round even as Fortunio
+      and two of his braves appeared in the doorway.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVII. HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Never was there a man with a better stomach for a fight than Martin de
+      Garnache, nor did he stop to consider that here his appetite in that
+      direction was likely to be indulged to a surfeit. The sight of those three
+      men opposing him, swords drawn and Fortunio armed in addition with a
+      dagger, drove from his mind every other thought, every other consideration
+      but that of the impending battle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He fell on guard to receive their onslaught, his eyes alert, his lips
+      tight set, his knees like springs of steel, slightly flexed to support his
+      well-poised body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But they paused a moment in the extremity of their surprise, and Fortunio
+      called to him in Italian to know the meaning of this attitude of his as
+      well as that of Marius, who lay huddled where he had fallen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache, reckless now, disdaining further subterfuge nor seeking to have
+      recourse to subtleties that could avail him nothing, retorted in French
+      with the announcement of his true name. At that, perceiving that here was
+      some deep treachery at work, they hesitated no longer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Led by Fortunio they attacked him, and the din they made in the next few
+      minutes with their heavy breathing, their frequent oaths, their stamping
+      and springing this way and that, and, ringing above all, the clash and
+      clatter of sword on sword, filled the chamber and could be heard in the
+      courtyard below.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Minutes sped, yet they gained no advantage on this single man; not one,
+      but a dozen swords did he appear to wield, so rapid were his passes, so
+      ubiquitous his point. Had he but stood his ground there might have been a
+      speedy end to him, but he retreated slowly towards the door of the
+      antechamber. Valerie still stood there, watching with fearful eyes and
+      bated breath that tremendous struggle which at any moment she expected to
+      see terminate in the death of her only friend.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In her way she was helping Garnache, though she little realized it. The
+      six tapers in the candle-branch she held aloft afforded the only light for
+      that stormy scene, and that light was in the eyes of Garnache&rsquo;s
+      assailants, showing him their faces yet leaving his own in shadow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He fell back steadily towards that door. He could not see it; but there
+      was not the need. He knew that it was in a direct line with the one that
+      opened upon the stairs, and by the latter he steered his backward course.
+      His aim was to gain the antechamber, although they guessed it not,
+      thinking that he did but retreat through inability to stand his ground.
+      His reasons were that here in this guardroom the best he could do would be
+      to put his back to the wall, where he might pick off one or two before
+      they made an end of him. The place was too bare to suit his urgent,
+      fearful need. Within the inner room there was furniture to spare, with
+      which he might contrive to hamper his opponents and give them such a lusty
+      fight as would live in the memory of those who might survive it for as
+      long as they should chance to live thereafter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had no thought of perishing himself, although, to any less concerned,
+      his death, sooner or later, must seem inevitable&mdash;the only possible
+      conclusion to this affray, taken as he was. His mind was concerned only
+      with this fight; his business to kill, and not himself to be slain. He
+      knew that presently others would come to support these three. Already,
+      perhaps, they were on their way, and he husbanded his strength against
+      their coming. He was proudly conscious of his own superior skill, for he
+      had studied the art of fence in Italy&mdash;its home&mdash;during his
+      earlier years, and there was no trick of sword-play with which he was not
+      acquainted, no ruse of service in a rough-and-tumble in which he was
+      unversed. He was proudly conscious, too, of his supple strength, his
+      endurance, and his great length of reach, and upon all these he counted to
+      help him make a decent fight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie, watching him, guessed his purpose to be the gaining of the inner
+      chamber, the crossing of the threshold on which she was standing. She drew
+      back a pace or two, almost mechanically, to give him room. The movement
+      went near to costing him his life. The light no longer falling so
+      pitilessly upon Fortunio&rsquo;s eyes, the captain saw more clearly than
+      hitherto, and shot a swift, deadly stroke straight at the region of
+      Garnache&rsquo;s heart. The Parisian leapt back when it was within an inch of
+      his breast; one of the bravoes followed up, springing a pace in advance of
+      his companions and lengthening his arm in a powerful lunge. Garnache
+      caught the blade almost on his hilt, and by the slightest turn of the
+      wrist made a simultaneous presentment of his point at the other&rsquo;s
+      outstretched throat. It took the fellow just above the Adam&rsquo;s apple, and
+      with a horrid, gurgling cry he sank, stretched as he still was in the
+      attitude of that murderous lunge that had proved fatal only to himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache had come on guard again upon the instant. Yet in the briefest of
+      seconds during which his sword had been about its work of death,
+      Fortunio&rsquo;s rapier came at him a second time. He beat the blade aside with
+      his bare left hand and stopped with his point the rush of the other bravo.
+      Then he leapt back again, and his leap brought him to the threshold of the
+      anteroom. He retreated quickly a pace, and then another. He was a sword&rsquo;s
+      length within the chamber, and now he stood, firm as a rock and engaged
+      Fortunio&rsquo;s blade which had followed him through the doorway. But he was
+      more at his ease. The doorway was narrow. Two men abreast could not beset
+      him, since one must cumber the movements of the other. If they came at him
+      one at a time, he felt that he could continue that fight till morning,
+      should there still by then be any left to face him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A wild exultation took him, an insane desire to laugh. Surely was
+      sword-play the merriest game that was ever devised for man&rsquo;s
+      entertainment. He straightened his arm, and his steel went out like a
+      streak of lightning. But for the dagger on which he caught its edge, the
+      blade had assuredly pierced the captain&rsquo;s heart. And now, fighting still,
+      Garnache called to Valerie. He had need of her assistance to make his
+      preparations ere others came.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Set down your tapers, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he bade her, &ldquo;on the mantel shelf at
+      my back. Place the other candle branch there too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Swiftly, yet with half-swimming senses, everything dim to her as to one in
+      a nightmare, she ran to do his bidding; and now the light placed so at his
+      back, gave him over his opponents the same slight advantage that he had
+      enjoyed before. In brisk tones he issued his fresh orders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you move the table, mademoiselle?&rdquo; he asked her. &ldquo;Try to drag it
+      here, to the wall on my left, as close to the door as you can bring it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will try, monsieur,&rdquo; she panted through dry lips; and again she moved
+      to do his bidding. Quickened by the need there was, her limbs, which
+      awhile ago had seemed on the point of refusing their office, appeared to
+      gather more than ordinary strength. She was unconsciously sobbing in her
+      passionate anxiety to render him what help was possible. Frenziedly she
+      caught at the heavy oaken table, and began to drag it across the room as
+      Garnache had begged her. And now, Fortunio seeing what was toward, and
+      guessing Garnache&rsquo;s intentions, sought by a rush to force his way into the
+      Chamber. But Garnache was ready for him. There was a harsh grind of steel
+      on steel, culminating in a resounding rush, and Fortunio was back in the
+      guard-room, whither he had leapt to save his skin. A pause fell at that,
+      and Garnache lowered his point to rest his arm until they should again
+      come at him. From beyond the doorway the captain called upon him to yield.
+      He took the summons as an insult, and flew into a momentary passion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yield?&rdquo; he roared. &ldquo;Yield to you, you cut-throat scum? You shall have my
+      sword if you will come for it, but you shall have it in your throat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Angered in his turn, Fortunio inclined his head to his companion&rsquo;s ear,
+      issuing an order. In obedience to it, it was the bravo now who advanced
+      and engaged Garnache. Suddenly he dropped on to his knees, and over his
+      head Garnache found his blade suddenly opposed by Fortunio&rsquo;s. It was a
+      clever trick, and it all but did Garnache&rsquo;s business then. Yet together
+      with the surprise of it there came to him the understanding of what was
+      intended. Under his guard the kneeling man&rsquo;s sword was to be thrust up
+      into his vitals. As a cry of alarm broke from mademoiselle, he leapt aside
+      and towards the wall, where he was covered from Fortunio&rsquo;s weapon, and
+      turning suddenly he passed his sword from side to side through the body of
+      the kneeling mercenary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The whole thing he had performed mechanically, more by instinct than by
+      reason; and when it was done, and the tables were thus effectively turned
+      upon his assailants, he scarcely realized how he had accomplished it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man&rsquo;s body cumbered now the doorway, and behind him Fortunio stood,
+      never daring to advance lest a thrust of that sword which he could not see&mdash;Garnache
+      still standing close against the wall&mdash;should serve him likewise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache leaned there, in that friendly shelter, to breathe, and he smiled
+      grimly under cover of his mustache. So long as he had to deal with a
+      single assailant he saw no need to move from so excellent a position.
+      Close beside him, leaning heavily against the table she had dragged thus
+      far, stood Valerie, her face livid as death, her heart sick within her at
+      the horror inspired her by that thing lying on the threshold. She could
+      not take her eyes from the crimson stain that spread slowly on the floor,
+      coming from under that limply huddled mass of arms and legs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not look, mademoiselle,&rdquo; Garnache implored her softly. &ldquo;Be brave,
+      child; try to be brave.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sought to brace her flagging courage, and by an effort she averted her
+      eyes from that horrid heap and fixed them upon Garnache&rsquo;s calm, intrepid
+      face. The sight of his quietly watchful eyes, his grimly smiling lips,
+      seemed to infuse courage into her anew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have the table, monsieur,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;I can bring it no nearer to
+      the wall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He understood that this was not because her courage or her strength might
+      be exhausted, but because he now occupied the spot where he had bidden her
+      place it. He motioned her away, and when she had moved he darted suddenly
+      and swiftly aside and caught the table, his sword still fast in his two
+      first fingers, which he had locked over the quillons. He had pushed its
+      massive weight halfway across the door before Fortunio grasped the
+      situation. Instantly the captain sought to take advantage of it, thinking
+      to catch Garnache unawares. But no sooner did he show his nose inside the
+      doorpost than Garnache&rsquo;s sword flashed before his eyes, driving him back
+      with a bloody furrow in his cheek.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have a care, Monsieur le Capitaine,&rdquo; Garnache mocked him. &ldquo;Had you come
+      an inch farther it might have been the death of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A clatter of steps sounded upon the stairs, and the Parisian bent once
+      more to his task, and thrust the table across the open doorway. He had a
+      moment&rsquo;s respite now, for Fortunio stung&mdash;though lightly&mdash;was not
+      likely to come again until he had others to support him. And while the
+      others came, while the hum of their voices rose higher, and finally their
+      steps clattered over the bare boards of the guard-room floor, Garnache had
+      caught up and flung a chair under the table to protect him from an attack
+      from below, while he had piled another on top to increase and further
+      strengthen the barricade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie watched him agonizedly, leaning now against the wall, her hands
+      pressed across her bosom, as if to keep down its tempestuous heaving. Yet
+      her anguish was tempered by a great wonder and a great admiration of this
+      man who could keep such calm eyes and such smiling lips in the face of the
+      dreadful odds by which he was beset, in the face of the certain death that
+      must ultimately reach him before he was many minutes older. And in her
+      imagination she conjured up a picture of him lying there torn by their
+      angry swords and drenched in blood, his life gone out of him, his brave
+      spirit, quenched for ever&mdash;and all for her unworthy sake. Because
+      she&mdash; little, worthless thing that she was&mdash;would not marry as
+      they listed, this fine, chivalrous soul was to be driven from its stalwart body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An agony of grief took her now, and she fell once more to those awful sobs
+      that awhile ago had shaken her. She had refused to marry Marius that
+      Florimond&rsquo;s life should be spared, knowing that before Marius could reach
+      him she herself would have warned her betrothed. Yet even had that
+      circumstance not existed, she was sure that still she would have refused
+      to do the will of Marius. But equally sure was she that she would not so
+      refuse him were he now to offer as the price of her compliance the life of
+      Garnache, which she accounted irrevocably doomed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly his steady, soothing voice penetrated her anguished musings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Calm yourself, mademoiselle; all is far from lost as yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She thought that he but spoke so to comfort her; she did not follow the
+      working of his warlike mind, concentrated entirely upon the business of
+      the moment, with little thought&mdash;or care, for that matter&mdash;for
+      what might betide anon. Yet she made an effort to repress her sobs. She
+      would be brave, if only to show herself worthy of the companionship and
+      friendship of so brave a man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Across his barricade he peered into the outer room to ascertain with what
+      fresh opponents he might have to reckon, and he was surprised to see but
+      four men standing by Fortunio, whilst behind them among the thicker
+      shadows, he dimly made out a woman&rsquo;s figure and, beside her, another man
+      who was short and squat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bethought him that the hour, and the circumstance that most of the
+      mercenaries would be in their beds, accounted for the reinforcement not
+      being greater.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman moved forward, and he saw as he had suspected, that it was the
+      Dowager herself. The squat figure beside her, moving with her into the
+      shaft of light that fell from the doorway Garnache defended, revealed to
+      him the features of Monsieur de Tressan. If any doubt he had still
+      entertained concerning the Seneschal&rsquo;s loyalty, that doubt was now
+      dispelled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now the Dowager uttered a sudden cry of fear. She had caught sight of
+      the fallen Marius, and she hurried to his side. Tressan sped after her and
+      between them they raised the boy and helped him to a chair, where he now
+      sat, passing a heavy hand across his no doubt aching brow. Clearly he was
+      recovering, from which Garnache opined with regret that his blow had been
+      too light. The Dowager turned to Fortunio, who had approached her, and her
+      eyes seemed to take fire at something that he told her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Garnache?&rdquo; the Parisian heard her say, and he saw Fortunio jerk his thumb
+      in the direction of the barricade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She appeared to forget her son; she stepped suddenly from his side, and
+      peered through the doorway at the stalwart figure of Garnache, dimly to be
+      seen through the pile of furniture that protected him to the height of his
+      breast. No word said she to the Parisian. She stood regarding him a moment
+      with lips compressed and a white, startled, angry face. Then:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was by Marius&rsquo;s contrivance that he was placed sentry over the girl,&rdquo;
+       he heard her tell Fortunio, and he thought she sneered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at the two bodies on the floor, one almost at her feet, the
+      other just inside the doorway, now almost hidden in the shadows of the
+      table. Then she issued her commands to the men, and fiercely she bade them
+      pull down that barricade and take the dog alive.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But before they could move to do her bidding, Garnache&rsquo;s voice rang
+      imperatively through the chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A word with you ere they begin, Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; he shouted, and
+      such was the note of command he assumed that the men stood arrested,
+      looking to the Dowager for fresh orders. Tressan changed colour, for all
+      that there was surely naught to fear, and he fingered his beard
+      perplexedly, looking to the Marquise for direction. She flashed him a
+      glance, lifted one shoulder disdainfully, and to the men:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fetch him out,&rdquo; said she, and she pointed to Garnache. But again Garnache
+      stayed them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; he called impressively, &ldquo;to your dying day&mdash;and
+      that will be none so distant&mdash;shall you regret it if you do not hear
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal was stirred by those words and the half-threat,
+      half-warning; they seemed to cover. He paused a moment, and this time his
+      eyes avoided the Marquise&rsquo;s. At last, taking a step forward,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Knave,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I do not know you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know me well enough. You have heard my name. I am Martin Marie
+      Rigobert de Garnache, Her Majesty&rsquo;s emissary into Dauphiny to procure the
+      enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the Chateau de Condillac,
+      where she is detained by force and for the serving of unscrupulous ends.
+      Now you know me and my quality.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager stamped her foot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fetch him out!&rdquo; she commanded harshly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear me first, Monsieur le Seneschal, or it will be the worse for you.&rdquo;
+       And the Seneschal, moved by that confident promise of evil, threw himself
+      before the men-at-arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A moment, I beseech you, Marquise,&rdquo; he cried, and the men, seeing his
+      earnestness and knowing his quality, stood undecided, buffeted as they
+      were between his will and the Marquise&rsquo;s. &ldquo;What have you to say to me?&rdquo;
+       Tressan demanded, seeking to render arrogant his tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This: That my servant knows where I am, and that should I fail within a
+      very few days to come forth safe and sound from Condillac to rejoin him,
+      he is to ride to Paris with certain letters I have given him. Those
+      letters incriminate you to the full in this infamous matter here at
+      Condillac. I have set forth in them how you refused me help, how you
+      ignored the Queen&rsquo;s commands of which I was the bearer; and should it be
+      proved, in addition, that through your treachery and insubordination my
+      life has been lost, I promise you that nothing in all this world will save
+      you from a hanging.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never listen, monsieur,&rdquo; cried the Dowager, seeing Tressan start back
+      like a man in sudden fear. &ldquo;It is no more than the ruse of a desperate
+      man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heed me or not, at your choice,&rdquo; Garnache retorted, addressing himself
+      ever to Tressan. &ldquo;You have had your warning. I little thought to see you
+      here to-night. But seeing you confirms my worst suspicions, and if I am to
+      die, I can die easy in my conscience at the thought that in sacrificing
+      you to Her Majesty&rsquo;s wrath I have certainly not sacrificed an innocent
+      man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame&mdash;&rdquo; the Seneschal began, turning to the Dowager. But she broke
+      in impatiently upon his intended words, upon the prayer that bubbled to
+      his lips that she should pause a while ere she made an end of this
+      Parisian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;you may bargain with him when he is taken. We will
+      have him alive. Go in,&rdquo; she bade her men, her voice so resolute now that
+      none dared tarry longer. &ldquo;Fetch the knave out&mdash;alive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache smiled at mademoiselle as the words were uttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They want me alive,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;That is a hopeful state of things. Bear
+      up, child; I may need your help ere we are through.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall find me ready, monsieur,&rdquo; she assured him for all her tremors.
+      He looked at the pale face, composed now by an effort of her will, and at
+      the beautiful hazel eyes which strove to meet his with calm and to reflect
+      his smile, and he marvelled at her courage as much as did she at his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the assault began, and he could have laughed at the way in which a
+      couple of those cut-throats&mdash;neither wishing to have the honour of
+      meeting him singly&mdash;hindered each other by seeking to attack him at
+      once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last the Dowager commanded one of them to go in. The fellow came, and
+      he was driven back by the sword that darted at him from above the
+      barricade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There matters might have come to a deadlock, but that Fortunio came
+      forward with one of his men to repeat the tactics which had cost him a
+      life already. His fellow went down on his knees, and drove his sword under
+      the table and through the frame of the chair, seeking to prick Garnache in
+      the legs. Simultaneously the captain laid hold of an arm of the chair
+      above and sought to engage Garnache across it. The ruse succeeded to the
+      extent of compelling the Parisian to retreat. The table seemed likely to
+      be his undoing instead of helping him. He dropped like lightning to one
+      knee, seeking to force the fellow out from underneath. But the obstacles
+      which should have hindered his assailants hindered Garnache even more at
+      this juncture. In that instant Fortunio whipped the chair from the
+      table-top, and flung it forward. One of its legs caught Garnache on the
+      sword arm, deadening it for a second. The sword fell from his hand, and
+      Valerie shrieked aloud, thinking the battle at an end. But the next moment
+      he was on his feet, his rapier firmly gripped once more, for all that his
+      arm still felt a trifle numbed. As seconds passed the numbness wore away,
+      but before that had taken place the table had been thrust forward, and the
+      man beneath it had made it impossible for Garnache to hinder this.
+      Suddenly he called to Valerie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A cloak, mademoiselle! Get me a cloak!&rdquo; he begged. And she, stemming her
+      fears once more, ran to do his bidding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She caught up a cloak that lay on a chair by the door of her bed-chamber,
+      and brought it to him. He twisted it twice round his left arm, letting its
+      folds hang loose, and advanced again to try conclusions with the gentleman
+      underneath. He cast the garment so that it enmeshed the sword when next it
+      was advanced. Stepping briskly aside, he was up to the table, and his busy
+      blade drove back the man who assailed him across it. He threw his weight
+      against it, and thrust it back till it was jammed hard once more against
+      the doorposts, leaving the chair at his very feet. The man beneath had
+      recovered his sword by this, and again he sought to use it. That was the
+      end of him. Again Garnache enmeshed it, kicked away the chair, or, rather,
+      thrust it aside with his foot, stooped suddenly, and driving his blade
+      under the table felt it sink into the body of his tormentor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a groan and a spluttering cough, and then before Garnache could
+      recover he heard mademoiselle crying out to him to beware. The table was
+      thrust suddenly forward almost on top of him; its edge caught his left
+      shoulder, and sent him back a full yard, sprawling upon the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To rise again, gasping for air&mdash;for the fall had shaken him&mdash;was
+      the work of an instant. But in that instant Fortunio had thrust the table
+      clear of the doorway, and his men were pouring into the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They came at Garnache in a body, with wild shouts and fierce mockery, and
+      he hurriedly fell on guard and gave way before them until his shoulders
+      were against the wainscot and he had at least the assurance that none
+      could take him in the rear. Three blades engaged his own. Fortunio had
+      come no farther than the doorway, where he stood his torn cheek drenched
+      in blood, watching the scene the Marquise beside him, and Tressan standing
+      just behind them, very pale and scared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet Garnache&rsquo;s first thought even in that moment of dire peril was for
+      Valerie. He would spare her the sight that must before many moments be
+      spread to view within that shambles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To your chamber, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he cried to her. &ldquo;You hinder me,&rdquo; he
+      added by way of compelling her obedience. She did his bidding, but only in
+      part. No farther went she than the doorway of her room, where she remained
+      standing, watching the fray as earlier she had stood and watched it from
+      the door of the antechamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly she was moved by inspiration. He had gained an advantage before,
+      by retreating through a doorway into an inner room. Might he not do the
+      same again, and be in better case if he were to retreat now to her own
+      chamber? Impulsively she called to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In here, Monsieur de Garnache. In here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise looked across at her, and smiled in mockery. Garnache was too
+      well occupied, she thought, to attempt any such rashness. If he but dared
+      remove his shoulders from the wall there would be a speedier end to him
+      than as things were.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not so, however, thought Garnache. The cloak twisted about his left arm
+      gave him some advantage, and he used it to the full. He flicked the slack
+      of it in the face of one, and followed it up by stabbing the fellow in the
+      stomach before he could recover guard, whilst with another wave of that
+      cloak he enmeshed the sword that shot readily into the opening he had
+      left.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame cursed, and Fortunio echoed her imprecations. The Seneschal gasped,
+      his fears lost in amazement at so much valour and dexterity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache swung away from the wall now, and set his back to mademoiselle,
+      determined to act upon her advice. But even in that moment he asked
+      himself for the first time since the commencement of that carnage&mdash;to
+      what purpose? His arms were growing heavy with fatigue, his mouth was
+      parched, and great beads of perspiration stood upon his brow. Soon he
+      would be spent, and they would not fail to take a very full advantage of
+      it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Hitherto his mind had been taken up with the battle only, and if he had
+      thought of retreating, it was but to the end that he might gain a position
+      of some vantage. Now, conscious of his growing fatigue, his thoughts
+      turned them at last to the consideration of flight. Was there no way out
+      of it? Must he kill every man in Condillac before he could hope to escape?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Whimsically, and almost mechanically, he set himself, in his mind, to
+      count the men. There were twenty mercenaries all told, excluding Fortunio
+      and himself. On Arsenio he might rely not to attack him, perhaps even to
+      come to his assistance at the finish. That left nineteen. Four he had
+      already either killed outright or effectively disabled; so that fifteen
+      remained him. The task of dealing with those other fifteen was utterly
+      beyond him. Presently, no doubt, the two now opposing him would be
+      reinforced by others. So that if any possible way out existed, he had best
+      set about finding it at once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He wondered could he cut down these two, make an end of Fortunio, and,
+      running for it, attempt to escape through the postern before the rest of
+      the garrison had time to come up with him or guess his purpose. But the
+      notion was too wild, its accomplishment too impossible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was fighting now with his back to mademoiselle and his face to the tall
+      window, through the leaded panes of which he caught the distorted shape of
+      a crescent moon. Suddenly the idea came to him. Through that window must
+      lie his way. It was a good fifty feet above the moat, he knew, and if he
+      essayed to leap it, it must be an even chance that he would be killed in
+      leaping. But the chance of death was a certain one if he tarried where he
+      was until others came to support his present opponents. And so he briskly
+      determined upon the lesser risk.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He remembered that the window was nailed down, as it had remained since
+      mademoiselle&rsquo;s pretended attempt at flight. But surely that should prove
+      no formidable obstacle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now that his resolve was taken his tactics abruptly changed. Hitherto
+      he had been sparing of his movements, husbanding his strength against the
+      long battle that seemed promised him. Suddenly he assumed the offensive
+      where hitherto he had but acted in self-defence, and a most deadly
+      offensive was it. He plied his cloak, untwisting it from his arm and
+      flinging it over the head and body of one of his assailants, so that he
+      was enmeshed and blinded by it. Leaping to the fellow&rsquo;s flank, Garnache,
+      with a terrific kick, knocked his legs from under him so that he fell
+      heavily. Then, stooping suddenly, the Parisian ran his blade under the
+      other brave&rsquo;s guard and through the fellow&rsquo;s thigh. The man cried out,
+      staggered, and then went down utterly disabled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One swift downward thrust Garnache made at the mass that wriggled under
+      his cloak. The activity of its wriggles increased in the next few seconds,
+      then ceased altogether.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan felt wet from head to foot with a sweat provoked by horror of what
+      he saw. The Dowager&rsquo;s lips were pouring forth a horrid litany of
+      guard-room oaths, and meanwhile Garnache had swung round to meet Fortunio,
+      the last of all who had stood with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain came on boldly, armed with sword and dagger, and in that
+      moment, feeling himself spent, Garnache bitterly repented having
+      relinquished his cloak. Yet he made a stubborn fight, and whilst they
+      fenced and stamped about that room, Marius came to watch them, staggering
+      to his mother&rsquo;s side and leaning heavily upon Tressan&rsquo;s shoulder. The
+      Marquise turned to him, her face livid to the lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That man must be the very fiend,&rdquo; Garnache heard her tell her son. &ldquo;Run
+      for help, Tressan, or, God knows, he may escape us yet. Go for men, or we
+      shall have Fortunio killed as well. Bid them bring muskets.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan, moving like one bereft of wits, went her errand, while the two
+      men fought on, stamping and panting, circling and lunging, their breath
+      coming in gasps, their swords grinding and clashing till sparks leapt from
+      them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The dust rose up to envelop and almost choke them, and more than once they
+      slipped in the blood with which the floor was spattered, whilst presently
+      Garnache barely recovered and saved himself from stumbling over the body
+      of one of his victims against which his swiftly moving feet had hurtled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And the Dowager, who watched the conflict and who knew something of
+      sword-play, realized that, tired though Garnache might be, unless help
+      came soon or some strange chance gave the captain the advantage, Fortunio
+      would be laid low with the others.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His circling had brought the Parisian round, so that his back was now to
+      the window, his face to the door of the bedchamber, where mademoiselle
+      still watched in ever-growing horror. His right shoulder was in line with
+      the door of the antechamber, which madame occupied, and he never saw her
+      quit Marius&rsquo;s side and creep slyly into the room to speed swiftly round
+      behind him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The only one from whom he thought that he might have cause to fear
+      treachery was the man whom he had dropped with a thigh wound, and he was
+      careful to keep beyond the reach of any sudden sword-thrust from that
+      fellow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But if he did not see the woman&rsquo;s movements, mademoiselle saw them, and
+      the sight set her eyes dilating with a new fear. She guessed the Dowager&rsquo;s
+      treacherous purpose. And no sooner had she guessed it than, with a choking
+      sob, she told herself that what madame could do that could she also.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly Garnache saw an opening; Fortunio&rsquo;s eyes, caught by the Dowager&rsquo;s
+      movements, strayed for a moment past his opponent, and the thing would
+      have been fatal to the captain but that in that moment, as Garnache was on
+      the point of lunging, he felt himself caught from behind, his arms
+      pinioned to his sides by a pair of slender ones that twined themselves
+      about him, and over his shoulder, the breath of it fanning his hot cheek,
+      came a vicious voice&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stab now, Fortunio!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain asked nothing better. He raised his weary sword-arm and
+      brought his point to the level of Garnache&rsquo;s breast, but in that instant
+      its weight became leaden. Imitating the Marquise, Valerie had been in
+      time. She seized Fortunio&rsquo;s half-lifted arm and flung all her weight upon
+      it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain cursed her horridly in a frenzy of fear, for he saw that did
+      Garnache shake off the Marquise there would be an end of himself. He
+      sought to wrench himself free of her detaining grasp, and the exertion
+      brought him down, weary as he was, and with her weight hanging to him. He
+      sank to his knees, and the girl, still clinging valiantly, sank with him,
+      calling to Garnache that she held the captain fast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Putting forth all his remaining strength, the Parisian twisted from the
+      Dowager&rsquo;s encircling grasp and hurled her from him with a violence he
+      nowise intended.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yours, madame, are the first woman&rsquo;s arms that ever Martin de Garnache
+      has known,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;And never could embrace of beauty have been less
+      welcome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Panting, he caught up one of the overturned chairs. Holding it by the back
+      he made for the window. He had dropped his sword, and he called to
+      mademoiselle to hold the captain yet an instant longer. He swung his chair
+      aloft and dashed it against the window. There was a thundering crash of
+      shivered glass and a cool draught of that November night came to sweeten
+      the air that had been fouled by the stamping of the fighters.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again he swung up his chair and dashed it at the window, and yet again,
+      until no window remained, but a great, gaping opening with a fringe of
+      ragged glass and twisted leadwork.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In that moment Fortunio struggled to his feet, free of the girl, who sank,
+      almost in a swoon. He sprang towards Garnache. The Parisian turned and
+      flung his now shattered chair toward the advancing captain. It dropped at
+      his feet, and his flying shins struck against an edge of it, bringing him,
+      hurt and sprawling, to the ground. Before he could recover, a figure was
+      flying through the open gap that lately had been a window.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mademoiselle sat up and screamed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will be killed, Monsieur de Garnache! Dear God, you will be killed!&rdquo;
+       and the anguish in her voice was awful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the last thing that reached the ears of Monsieur de Garnache as he
+      tumbled headlong through the darkness of the chill November night.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVIII. IN THE MOAT
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio and the Marquise reached the window side by side, and they were
+      in time to hear a dull splash in the waters fifty feet below them. There
+      was a cloud over the little sickle of moon, and to their eyes, fresh from
+      the blaze of candle-light, the darkness was impenetrable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is in the moat,&rdquo; cried the Marquise excitedly, and Valerie, who sat on
+      the floor whither she had slipped when Fortunio shook her off, rocked
+      herself in an agony of fear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To the horrors about her&mdash;the huddled bodies lying so still upon the
+      floor, the bloody footprints everywhere, the shattered furniture, and the
+      groans of the man with the wounded thigh&mdash;to all this she was
+      insensible. Garnache was dead, she told herself; he was surely dead; and
+      it seemed as if the very thought of it were killing, too, a part of her
+      own self.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Unconsciously she sobbed her fears aloud. &ldquo;He is dead,&rdquo; she moaned; &ldquo;he is
+      dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise overheard that piteous cry, and turned to survey the girl,
+      her brows lifting, her lips parting in an astonishment that for a second
+      effaced the horrors of that night. Suspicion spread like an oil stain in
+      her evil mind. She stepped forward and caught the girl by one of her limp
+      arms. Marius, paler than his stunning had left him, leaned more heavily
+      against the door-post, and looked on with bloodshot eyes. If ever maiden
+      avowed the secret of her heart, it seemed to him that Valerie avowed it
+      then.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise shook her angrily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What was he to you, girl? What was he to you?&rdquo; she demanded shrilly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And the girl, no more than half conscious of what she was saying, made
+      answer:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The bravest gentleman, the noblest friend I have ever known.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pah! The Dowager dropped her arm and turned to issue a command to
+      Fortunio. But already the fellow had departed. His concern was not with
+      women, but with the man who had escaped him. He must make certain that the
+      fall had killed Garnache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Breathless and worn as he was, all spattered now with blood from the
+      scratch in his cheek, which lent him a terrific aspect, he dashed from
+      that shambles and across the guard-room. He snatched up a lighted lantern
+      that had been left in the doorway and leapt down the stairs and into the
+      courtyard. Here he came upon Monsieur de Tressan with a half-dozen fellows
+      at his heels, all more or less half clad, but all very fully armed with
+      swords and knives, and one or two with muskets.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Roughly, with little thought for the dignity of his high office, he thrust
+      the Lord Seneschal aside and turned the men. Some he ordered off to the
+      stables to get horses, for if Garnache had survived his leap and swum the
+      moat, they must give chase. Whatever betide, the Parisian must not get
+      away. He feared the consequences of that as much for himself as for
+      Condillac. Some five or six of the men he bade follow him, and never
+      pausing to answer any of Tressan&rsquo;s fearful questions, he sped across the
+      courtyard, through the kitchens&mdash;which was the nearest way&mdash;into
+      the outer quadrangle. Never pausing to draw breath, spent though he was,
+      he pursued his flight under the great archway of the keep and across the
+      drawbridge, the raising of which had been that night postponed to await
+      the Lord Seneschal&rsquo;s departure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Here on the bridge he paused and turned in a frenzy to scream to his
+      followers that they should fetch more torches. Meanwhile he snatched the
+      only one at hand from the man-at-arms that carried it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His men sprang into the guard-room of the keep, realizing from his almost
+      hysterical manner the urgent need for haste. And while he waited for them,
+      standing there on the bridge, his torch held high, he scanned by its lurid
+      red light the water as far as eye could reach on either side of him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a faint movement on the dark, oily surface for all that no wind
+      stirred. Not more than four or five minutes could have elapsed since
+      Garnache&rsquo;s leap, and it would seem as if the last ripple from the
+      disturbance of his plunge had not yet rolled itself out. But otherwise
+      there was nothing here, nor did Fortunio expect aught. The window of the
+      Northern Tower abutted on to the other side of the chateau, and it was
+      there he must look for traces of the fugitive or for his body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hasten!&rdquo; he shouted over his shoulder. &ldquo;Follow me!&rdquo; And without waiting
+      for them he ran across the bridge and darted round the building, his torch
+      scattering a shower of sparks behind him on the night, and sending little
+      rills of blood-red light down the sword which he still carried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He gained the spot where Garnache must have fallen, and he stood below the
+      radiance that clove the night from the shattered window fifty feet above,
+      casting the light of his torch this way and that over the black bosom of
+      the moat. Not a ripple moved now upon that even, steely surface. Voices
+      sounded behind him, and with them a great glare of ruddy light came to
+      herald the arrival of his men. He turned to them and pointed with his
+      sword away from the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Spread yourselves!&rdquo; he shouted. &ldquo;Make search yonder. He cannot have gone
+      far.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And they, but dimly realizing whom they sought, yet realizing that they
+      sought a man, dashed off and spread themselves as he had bidden them, to
+      search the stretch of meadowland, where ill must betide any fugitive,
+      since no cover offered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio remained where he was at the edge of the moat. He stooped, and
+      waving his torch along the ground he moved to the far angle of the
+      chateau, examining the soft, oozy clay. It was impossible that a man could
+      have clambered out over that without leaving some impression. He reached
+      the corner and found the clay intact; at least, nowhere could he discover
+      a mark of hands or a footprint set as would be that of a man emerging from
+      the water.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He retraced his steps and went back until he had reached the eastern angle
+      of the chateau, yet always with the same result. He straightened himself
+      at last, and his manner was more calm; his frenzied haste was gone, and
+      deliberately he now raised his torch and let its light shine again over
+      the waters. He pondered them a moment, his dark eyes musing almost
+      regretfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Drowned!&rdquo; he said aloud, and sheathed his sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From the window overhead a voice hailed him. He looked up and saw the
+      Dowager, and, behind her, the figure of her son. Away in the meadows the
+      lights of his men&rsquo;s torches darted hither and thither like playful
+      jack-o&rsquo;-lanterns.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you got him, Fortunio?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, madame,&rdquo; he answered with assurance. &ldquo;You may have his body when you
+      will. He is underneath here.&rdquo; And he pointed to the water.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They appeared to take his word for it, for they questioned him no further.
+      The Marquise turned to mademoiselle, who was still sitting on the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is drowned, Valerie,&rdquo; she said slowly, watching the girl&rsquo;s face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie looked up. Her eyes were very wide, and her lips moved for a
+      second. Then she fell forward without a word. This last horror, treading
+      on the heels of all those that already had assailed her, proved too great
+      a strain for her brave spirit. She had swooned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan entered at that moment, full of questions as to what might be
+      toward, for he had understood nothing in the courtyard. The Marquise
+      called to him to help her with the girl, Marius being still too faint, and
+      between them they bore her to her chamber, laid her on the bed, and,
+      withdrawing, closed the door upon her. Then she signed to Marius and the
+      Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;let us go. The sight and smell of the place are turning
+      me sick, although my stomach is strong enough to endure most horrors.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She took up one of the candle-branches to light them, and they went below
+      and made their way to the hall, where they found Marius&rsquo;s page, Gaston,
+      looking very pale and scared at the din that had filled the chateau during
+      the past half-hour or so. With him was Marius&rsquo;s hound, which the poor boy
+      had kept by him for company and protection in that dreadful time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquise spoke to him kindly, and she stooped to pat the dog&rsquo;s glossy
+      head. Then she bade Gaston set wine for them, and when it was fetched the
+      three of them drank in brooding, gloomy silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The draught invigorated Marius, it cheered Tressan&rsquo;s drooping spirits, and
+      it quenched the Dowager&rsquo;s thirst. The Seneschal turned to her again with
+      his unanswered questions touching the end of that butchery above-stairs.
+      She told him what Fortunio had said that Garnache was drowned as a
+      consequence of his mad leap from the window.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Into Tressan&rsquo;s mind there sprang the memory of the thing Garnache had
+      promised should befall him in such a case. It drove the colour from his
+      cheeks and brought great lines of fearful care into sharp relief about his
+      mouth and eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame, we are ruined!&rdquo; he groaned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tressan,&rdquo; she answered him contemptuously, &ldquo;you are chicken-hearted.
+      Listen to me. Did he not say that he had left his man behind him when he
+      came to Condillac? Where think you that he left his man?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Maybe in Grenoble,&rdquo; answered the Seneschal, staring.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Find out,&rdquo; she told him impressively, her eyes on his, and calm as though
+      they had never looked upon such sights as that very night had offered
+      them. &ldquo;If not in Grenoble, certainly, at least, somewhere in this Dauphiny
+      of which you are the King&rsquo;s Lord Seneschal. Turn the whole province inside
+      out, man, but find the fellow. Yours is the power to do it. Do it, then,
+      and you will have no consequences to fear. You have seen the man?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, I have seen him. I remember him; and his name, I bethink me, is
+      Rabecque.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took courage; his face looked less dejected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You overlook nothing, madame,&rdquo; he murmured. &ldquo;You are truly wonderful. I
+      will start the search this very night. My men are almost all at Montelimar
+      awaiting my commands. I&rsquo;ll dispatch a messenger with orders that they are
+      to spread themselves throughout Dauphiny upon this quest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The door opened, and Fortunio entered. He was still unwashed and terrible
+      to look upon, all blood-bespattered. The sight of him drove a shudder
+      through Tressan. The Marquise grew solicitous.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How is your wound, Fortunio?&rdquo; was her first question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He made a gesture that dismissed the matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is nothing. I am over full-blooded, and if I am scratched, I bleed,
+      without perceiving it, enough to drain another man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Here, drink, mon capitaine,&rdquo; she urged him, very friendly, filling him a
+      cup with her own hands. &ldquo;And you, Marius?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;Are you recovering
+      strength?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am well,&rdquo; answered Marius sullenly. His defeat that evening had left
+      him glum and morose. He felt that he had cut a sorry figure in the affair,
+      and his vanity was wounded. &ldquo;I deplore I had so little share in the
+      fight,&rdquo; he muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The lustiest fight ever I or any man beheld,&rdquo; swore Fortunio. &ldquo;Dieu! But
+      he was a fighter, that Monsieur de Garnache, and he deserved a better end
+      than drowning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are quite sure that he is drowned?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunio replied by giving his reasons for that conclusion, and they
+      convinced both the Marquise and her son indeed they had never deemed it
+      possible that the Parisian could have survived that awful leap. The
+      Dowager looked at Marius, and from him to the captain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you think, you two, that you will be fit for tomorrow&rsquo;s business?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For myself,&rdquo; laughed Fortunio, &ldquo;I am ready for it now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I shall be when I have rested,&rdquo; answered Marius grimly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then get you both to rest, you will be needing it,&rdquo; she bade them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I, too, madame,&rdquo; said the Seneschal, bending over the hand she held
+      out to him. &ldquo;Good-night to you all.&rdquo; He would have added a word to wish
+      them luck in the morrow&rsquo;s venture; but for the life of him he dared not.
+      He turned, made another of his bows, and rolled out of the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Five minutes later the drawbridge was being raised after his departure,
+      and Fortunio was issuing orders to the men he had recalled from their
+      futile search to go clear the guard-room and antechamber of the Northern
+      Tower, and to bear the dead to the chapel, which must serve as a mortuary
+      for the time. That done he went off to bed, and soon after the lights were
+      extinguished in Condillac; and save for Arsenio, who was, on guard, sorely
+      perturbed by all that had befallen and marvelling at the rashness of his
+      friend &ldquo;Battista&rdquo;&mdash;for he had no full particulars of the business&mdash;the
+      place was wrapped in sleep.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Had they been less sure that Garnache was drowned, maybe they had
+      slumbered less tranquilly that night at Condillac. Fortunio had been
+      shrewd in his conclusions, yet a trifle hasty; for whilst, as a matter of
+      fact, he was correct in assuming that the Parisian had not crawled out of
+      the moat&mdash;neither at the point he had searched, nor elsewhere&mdash;yet
+      was he utterly wrong to assume him at the bottom of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache had gone through that window prepared to leap into another&mdash;and,
+      he hoped, a better world. He had spun round twice in the air and shot feet
+      foremost through the chill waters of the moat, and down until his toes
+      came in contact with a less yielding substance, yet yielding nevertheless.
+      Marvelling that he should have retained until now his senses, he realized
+      betimes that he was touching mud&mdash;that he was really ankle deep in
+      it. A vigorous, frantic kick with both legs at once released him, and he
+      felt himself slowly re-ascending to the surface.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It has been often said that a drowning man in his struggles sees his whole
+      life mirrored before him. In the instants of Garnache&rsquo;s ascent through the
+      half stagnant waters of that moat he had reviewed the entire situation and
+      determined upon the course he should pursue. When he reached the surface,
+      he must see to it that he broke it gently, for at the window above were
+      sure to be watchers, looking to see how he had fared. Madame, he
+      remembered, had sent Tressan for muskets. If he had returned with them and
+      they should perceive him from above, a bullet would be sent to dispose of
+      him, and it were a pity to be shot now after having come through so much.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His head broke the surface and emerged into the chill darkness of the
+      night. He took a deep breath of cold but very welcome air, and moving his
+      arms gently under water, he swam quietly, not to the edge of the moat but
+      to the chateau wall, close under which he thought he would be secure from
+      observation. He found by good fortune a crevice between two stones; he did
+      not see it, his fingers found it for him as they groped along that granite
+      surface. He clung there a moment and pondered the situation. He heard
+      voices above, and looking up he saw the glare of light through the opening
+      he had battered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now he was surprised to feel new vigour running through him. He had
+      hurled himself from that window with scarce the power to leap, bathed in
+      perspiration and deeming his strength utterly spent. The ice-cold waters
+      of the moat had served, it would seem, to brace him, to wash away his
+      fatigue, and to renew his energies. His mind was singularly clear and his
+      senses rendered superacute, and he set himself to consider what he had
+      best do.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Swim to the edge of the moat and, clambering out, take to his legs was
+      naturally the first impulse. But, reflecting upon the open nature of the
+      ground, he realized that that must mean his ruin. Presently they would
+      come to see how he had fared, and failing to find him in the water they
+      would search the country round about. He set himself in their place. He
+      tried to think as they would think, the better that he might realize how
+      they would act, and then an idea came to him that might be worth heeding.
+      In any case his situation was still very desperate; on that score he
+      allowed himself no illusions. That they would take his drowning for
+      granted, and never come to satisfy themselves, he was not optimist enough
+      to assume.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He abandoned his grip of the wall and began to swim gently toward the
+      eastern angle. If they came out, they must lower the bridge; he would
+      place himself so that in falling it should cover him and screen him from
+      their sight. He rounded the angle of the building, and now the friendly
+      cloud that had hung across the moon moved by, and a faint, silver radiance
+      was upon the water under his eyes. But yonder, ahead of him, something
+      black lay athwart the moat. At once he knew it for the bridge. It was
+      down. And he had the explanation in that he remembered that the Lord
+      Seneschal had not yet left Condillac. It mattered little to him one way or
+      the other. The bridge was there, and he made the best of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A few swift, silent strokes brought him to it. He hesitated a moment
+      before venturing into the darkness underneath; then, bethinking him that
+      it was that or discovery, he passed under. He made for the wall, and as he
+      groped along he found a chain depending and reaching down into the water.
+      He caught at it with both hands and hung by it to await events.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now, for the first time that night, his pulses really quickened. There
+      in the dark he waited, and the moments that sped seemed very long to him,
+      and they were very anxious. He had no good sword wherewith to defend
+      himself were he attacked, no good, solid ground on which to take his
+      stand. If he were discovered, he was helpless, at their mercy, to shoot,
+      or take, or beat to death as best they listed. And so he waited, his
+      pulses throbbing, his breath coming short and fast. The cold water that
+      had invigorated him some minutes ago was numbing him now, and seemed to be
+      freezing his courage as it froze the blood in his veins, the very marrow
+      in his bones.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently his ears caught a rush of feet, a sound of voices, and
+      Fortunio&rsquo;s raised above the others. Heavy steps rang on the bridge over
+      his head, and the thud of their fall was like thunder to the man beneath.
+      A crimson splash of light fell on the moat on either side of him. The
+      fellow on the bridge had halted. Then the steps went on. The light flared
+      this way and that, and Garnache almost trembled, expecting at every moment
+      that its rays would penetrate the spot where he was hanging and reveal him
+      cowering there like a frightened water-rat. But the man moved on, and his
+      light flared no longer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then others followed him. Garnache heard the sounds of their search. So
+      overwrought was he that there was a moment when he thought of swimming to
+      the edge and making across the country to the north while they were
+      hunting the meadows to the east; but he repressed the impulse and stayed
+      on. An eternity did it seem before those men returned and marched once
+      more over his head. A further eternity was it until the clatter of hoofs
+      on the courtyard stones and their thunder on the planks above him brought
+      him the news that Tressan was riding home. He heard the hoofs quicken, and
+      their loud rattle on the road that led down to the Isere, a half-mile
+      away; and then, when the hoof-beats grew more distant, there came again
+      the echo of voices up above.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Was it not over yet? Dear God! would it never end? He felt that a few
+      moments more of this immersion and he should be done for utterly; his
+      numbness must rob him of the power to cross the moat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly the first welcome sound he had heard that night came to his ears.
+      Chains creaked, hinges groaned, and the great black pall above him began
+      gradually to rise. Faster it went, till, at last, it fell back into
+      position, flat with the wall of the chateau, and such little light as
+      there was from the moon was beating down upon his frozen face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He let the chain go, and, with strokes swift and silent as he could
+      contrive, he crossed the water. He clambered up the bank, almost bereft of
+      strength. A moment he crouched there listening. Had he moved too soon? Had
+      he been incautious?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nothing stirred behind him to confirm his fears. He crept softly across
+      the hard ground of the road where he had landed. Then, when the yielding,
+      silent turf was under his feet, he gave not another thought for his
+      numbness, but started to run as a man runs in a nightmare, so little did
+      the speed of his movements match the pace of his desire to set a distance
+      between himself and Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIX. THROUGH THE NIGHT
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It wanted something over an hour to midnight when Monsieur de Garnache
+      started out in his sodden clothes to run from Condillac. He bore away to
+      the north, and continued running until he had covered a mile or so, when
+      perforce he must slacken his pace lest presently he should have to give
+      way to utter exhaustion. He trudged on bravely thereafter, at a good,
+      swinging pace, realizing that in moving briskly lay his salvation from
+      such ill effects as might otherwise attend his too long immersion. His run
+      had set a pleasant glow upon his skin and seemed to have thawed the frozen
+      condition of his joints. Yet he could not disguise from himself that he
+      was sorely worn by that night&rsquo;s happenings, and that, if he would reach
+      his goal, he must carefully husband such strength as yet remained him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That goal of his was Voiron, some four leagues distant to the north,
+      where, at the inn of the Beau Paon, his man, Rabecque, should be lodged,
+      ready for his coming at any time. Once already, when repairing to
+      Condillac, he had travelled by that road, and it was so direct that there
+      seemed scant fear of his mistaking it. On he plodded through the night,
+      his way lighted for him by the crescent moon, the air so still that,
+      despite his wet garments, being warmed as he was by his brisk movements,
+      he never felt the cold of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had overheard enough of what had been said by Marius to Valerie to
+      understand the business that was afoot for the morrow, and he doubted him
+      that he had not sufficiently injured the Dowager&rsquo;s son to make him refrain
+      from or adjourn his murderous ride across the border into Savoy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache&rsquo;s purpose now was to reach Voiron, there to snatch a brief rest,
+      and then, equipped anew to set out with his man for La Rochette and
+      anticipate the fell plans of Marius and Fortunio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He might have experienced elation at his almost miraculous escape and at
+      the circumstance that he was still at large to carry this duel with the
+      Condillacs to a fitting finish, were it not for the reflection that but
+      for his besetting sin of hastiness he might now be travelling in dry
+      garments toward La Rochette, with mademoiselle beside him. Once again that
+      rash temper of his had marred an enterprise that was on the point of
+      succeeding. And yet, even as he regretted his rashness, rage stirred him
+      again at the thought of Marius crushing that slender shape against him and
+      seeking to force his odious kisses upon her pure, immaculate lips. And
+      then the thought of her, left behind at Condillac at the mercy of Marius
+      and that she-devil the Marquise, and the fears that of a sudden leapt up
+      in his mind, brought him to a standstill, as though he were contemplating
+      the incomparable folly of a return. He beat his hands together for a
+      moment in a frenzy of anguish; he threw back his head and raised his eyes
+      to the sky above with a burst of imprecations on his lips. And then
+      reflection brought him peace. No, no; they dare offer her no hurt. To do
+      so must irrevocably lose them La Vauvraye; and it was their covetousness
+      had made them villains. Upon that covetousness did their villainy rest,
+      and he need fear from them no wanton ruthlessness that should endanger
+      their chance of profit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He trudged on, reassured. He had been a fool so to give way to fear; as
+      great a fool as he had been when he had laid hands on Marius to quell his
+      excessive amorousness. Dieu! Was he bewitched? What ailed him? Again he
+      paused there in the night to think the situation out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A dozen thoughts, all centering about Valerie, came crowding in upon his
+      brain, till in the end a great burst of laughter&mdash;the laughter of a
+      madman almost, eerie and terrific as it rang upon the silent night broke
+      from his parted lips. That brief moment of introspection had revealed him
+      to himself, and the revelation had fetched that peal of mocking laughter
+      from him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He realized now, at last, that not because the Queen had ordered him to
+      procure Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye&rsquo;s enlargement had he submitted to
+      assume a filthy travesty, to set his neck in jeopardy, to play the lackey
+      and the spy. It was because something in Valerie&rsquo;s eyes, something in her
+      pure, lily face had moved him to it; and simultaneously had come the
+      thought of the relation in which she stood to that man at La Rochette
+      whose life he now sought to save for her, and it had stabbed him with a
+      bitterness no misfortune, no failure yet had brought him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He trudged on, knowing himself for what he was a fool who, after close
+      upon forty years of a strenuous life in which no petticoat had played a
+      part, was come under the spell of a pair of innocent eyes belonging to a
+      child almost young enough to have been his daughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He despised himself a little for his weakness; he despised himself for his
+      apostasy from the faith that had governed his life&mdash;the faith to keep
+      himself immune from the folly to which womanhood had driven so many a
+      stout man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And yet, mock himself, despise himself as he would, a great tenderness, a
+      great desire grew strong in his soul that night as he trudged on toward
+      distant Voiron. Mile after mile her image kept him company, and once, when
+      he had left Voreppe behind him, the greater portion of his journey done,
+      some devil whispered in his ear that he was weary; that he would be
+      over-weary on the morrow for any ride to La Rochette. He had done all that
+      mortal man could do; let him rest to-morrow whilst Marius and Fortunio
+      accomplished by Florimond what the fever had begun.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A cold perspiration broke on him as he wrestled with that grim temptation.
+      Valerie was his; she belonged to him by the right of dangers shared; never
+      had mother in her labours been nearer death for the offspring&rsquo;s sake than
+      had he for Valerie during the days that were sped and the hours that were
+      but gone. She belonged to him by the title of those dangers he had been
+      through. What had Florimond done to establish his claim to her? He had
+      remained absent during long years, a-warring in a foreign land. With how
+      many banal loves might not the fellow in that time have strewn his
+      soldier&rsquo;s path! Garnache knew well how close does Cupid stalk in the wake
+      of Mars, knew well the way of these gay soldiers and the lightness of
+      their loves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Was, then, this fellow to come now and claim her, when perils were past,
+      when there was naught left to do but lead her to the altar? Could he be
+      worthy of such a pearl of womanhood, this laggard who, because a fever
+      touched him, sat him down in an inn within a few hours&rsquo; ride of her to
+      rest him, as though the world held no such woman as Valerie?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And she, herself, by what ties was she bound to him? By the ties of an old
+      promise, given at an age when she knew not what love meant. He had talked
+      of it with her, and he knew how dispassionately she awaited Florimond&rsquo;s
+      return. Florimond might be betrothed to her&mdash;her father and his had
+      encompassed that between them&mdash;but no lover of hers was he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus far did his thoughts journey, and temptation gripped him ever more
+      and more strongly. And then his manhood and his honour awoke with a
+      shudder, as awakens a man from an ugly dream. What manner of fool was he?
+      he asked himself again. Upon what presumptions did he base his silly
+      musings? Did he suppose that even were there no Florimond, it would be
+      left for a harsh, war-worn old greybeard such as he to awaken tenderness
+      in the bosom of that child? The tenderness of friendship perhaps&mdash;she
+      had confessed to that; but the tenderness of her sweet love must be won by
+      a younger, comelier man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      If love had indeed touched him at last, let him be worthy of it and of her
+      who inspired it. Let him strain every sinew in her service, asking no
+      guerdon; let him save the life of the man to whom she was affianced; let
+      him save her from the clutches of the Marquise de Condillac and her
+      beautiful, unscrupulous son.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He put his folly from him and-went on, seeking to hold his mind to the
+      planning of his to-morrow&rsquo;s journey and its business. He had no means to
+      know that at that very hour Valerie was on her knees by her little white
+      bed, in the Northern Tower of Condillac, praying for the repose of the
+      soul of Monsieur de Garnache&mdash;the bravest gentleman, the noblest
+      friend she had ever known. For she accounted him dead, and she thought
+      with horror of his body lying in the slime under the cold waters of the
+      moat beneath the window of her antechamber. A change seemed to have come
+      upon her. Her soul was numb, her courage seemed dead, and little care had
+      she in that hour of what might betide her now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond was coming, she remembered: coming to wed her. Ah, well! It
+      mattered little, since Monsieur de Garnache was dead&mdash;as though it
+      could have mattered had he been living!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Three hours of his long striding brought Garnache at last to Voiron, and
+      the echo of his footsteps rang through the silent streets and scared a
+      stray cat or two that were preying out of doors. There was no watch in the
+      little township and no lights, but by the moon&rsquo;s faint glimmer Garnache
+      sought the inn of the Beau Paon, and found it at the end of a little
+      wandering. A gaudy peacock, with tail spread wide, was the sign above the
+      door on which he thumped and kicked as if he would have beaten it down.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It opened after some delay, and a man, half clad, candle in hand, a
+      night-cap on his hoary locks, showed an angry face at the opening.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At sight of the gaunt, bedraggled figure that craved admittance, the
+      landlord would have shut the door again, fearing that he had to do with
+      some wild bandit from the hills. But Garnache thrust his foot in the way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a man named Rabecque, from Paris, lodging here. I must have
+      instant speech with him,&rdquo; said he; and his words, together with the crisp,
+      commanding tones in which they were uttered, had their effect upon the
+      host.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rabecque had been playing the great lord during the week he had spent at
+      Voiron, and had known how to command a certain deference and regard. That
+      this tatterdemalion, with the haughty voice, should demand to see him at
+      that hour of the night, with such scant unconcern of how far he might
+      incommode the great Monsieur Rabecque, earned for him too a certain
+      measure of regard, though still alloyed with some suspicion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The landlord bade him enter. He did not know whether Monsieur Rabecque
+      would forgive him for being disturbed; he could not say whether Monsieur
+      Rabecque would consent to see this visitor at such an hour; very probably
+      he would not. Still, monsieur might enter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache cut him short before he had half done, announced his name and
+      bade him convey it to Rabecque. The alacrity with which the lackey stirred
+      from his bed upon hearing who it was that had arrived impressed the host
+      not a little, but not half so much as it impressed him presently to
+      observe the deference with which this great Monsieur Rabecque of Paris
+      confronted the scarecrow below stairs when he was brought into its
+      presence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are safe and sound, monsieur?&rdquo; he cried, in deferential joy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, by a miracle, mon fils,&rdquo; Garnache answered him, with a short laugh.
+      &ldquo;Help me to bed; then bring me a cup of spiced wine. I have swum a moat
+      and done other wonders in these clothes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The host and Rabecque bustled now to minister to his wants between them,
+      and when, jaded and worn, Garnache lay at last between good-smelling
+      sheets with the feeling in him that he was like to sleep until the day of
+      judgment, he issued his final orders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Awake me at daybreak, Rabecque,&rdquo; said he drowsily. &ldquo;We must be stirring
+      then. Have horse ready and clothes for me. I shall need you to wash me
+      clean and shave me and make me what I was before your tricks and dyes
+      turned me into what I have been this week and more. Take away the light.
+      At daybreak! Don&rsquo;t let me sleep beyond that as you value your place with
+      me. We shall have brisk work to-morrow. At&mdash;daybreak&mdash;Rabecque!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XX. FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was noon of the next day when two horsemen gained the heights above La
+      Rochette and paused to breathe their nags and take a survey of the little
+      township in the plain at their feet. One of these was Monsieur de
+      Garnache, the other was his man Rabecque. But it was no longer the
+      travestied Garnache that Condillac had known as &ldquo;Battista&rdquo; during the past
+      days, it was that gentleman as he had been when first he presented himself
+      at the chateau. Rabecque had shaved him, and by means of certain unguents
+      had cleansed his skin and hair of the dyes with which he had earlier
+      overlaid them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That metamorphosis, of itself, was enough to set Garnache in a good
+      humour; he felt himself again, and the feeling gave him confidence. His
+      mustachios bristled as fiercely as of old, his skin was clear and healthy,
+      and his dark brown hair showed ashen at the temples. He was becomingly
+      arrayed in a suit of dark brown camlet, with rows of close-set gold
+      buttons running up his hanging sleeves; a leather jerkin hid much of his
+      finery, and his great boots encased his legs. He wore a brown hat, with a
+      tallish crown and a red feather, and Rabecque carried his cloak for him,
+      for the persistent Saint Martin&rsquo;s summer rendered that day of November
+      rather as one of early autumn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A flood of sunshine descended from a cloudless sky to drench the country
+      at their feet, and all about them the trees preserved a green that was but
+      little touched by autumnal browning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Awhile he paused there on the heights; then he gave his horse a touch of
+      the spur, and they started down the winding road that led into La
+      Rochette. A half-hour later they were riding under the porte cochere of
+      the inn of the Black Boar. Of the ostler who hastened forward to take
+      their reins Monsieur de Garnache inquired if the Marquis de Condillac were
+      lodged there. He was answered in the affirmative, and he got down at once
+      from his horse. Indeed, but for the formality of the thing, he might have
+      spared himself the question, for lounging about the courtyard were a score
+      of stalwart weather-tanned fellows, whose air and accoutrements proclaimed
+      them soldiers. It required little shrewdness to guess in them the personal
+      followers of the Marquis, the remainder of the little troop that had
+      followed the young seigneur to the wars when, some three years ago, he had
+      set out from Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache gave orders for the horses to be cared for, and bade Rabecque get
+      himself fed in the common room. Heralded by the host, the Parisian then
+      mounted the stairs to Monsieur de Condillac&rsquo;s apartments.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The landlord led the way to the inn&rsquo;s best room, turned the handle, and,
+      throwing wide the door, stood aside for Monsieur de Garnache to enter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From within the chamber came the sounds of a scuffle, a man&rsquo;s soft laugh,
+      and a girl&rsquo;s softer intercession.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me go, monsieur. Of your pity, let me go. Some one is coming.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what care I who comes?&rdquo; answered a voice that seemed oppressed by
+      laughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache strode into the chamber&mdash;spacious and handsomely furnished
+      as became the best room of the Auberge du Sanglier Noir&mdash;to find a
+      meal spread on the table, steaming with an odour promising of good things,
+      but neglected by the guest for the charms of the serving-wench, whose
+      waist he had imprisoned. As Garnache&rsquo;s tall figure loomed before him he
+      let the girl go and turned a half-laughing, half-startled face upon the
+      intruder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who the devil may you be?&rdquo; he inquired, and a brown eye, rakish and
+      roving in its glance, played briskly over the Parisian, whilst Garnache
+      himself returned the compliment, and calmly surveyed this florid gentleman
+      of middle height with the fair hair and regular features.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl scurried by and darted from the room, dodging the smiting hand
+      which the host raised as she flew past him. The Parisian felt his gorge
+      rising. Was this the sort of fever that had kept Monsieur le Marquis at La
+      Rochette, whilst mademoiselle was suffering in durance at Condillac? His
+      last night&rsquo;s jealous speculations touching a man he did not know had
+      leastways led him into no exaggeration. He found just such a man as he had
+      pictured&mdash;a lightly-loving, pleasure-taking roysterer, with never a
+      thought beyond the amusement which the hour afforded him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With curling lip Garnache bowed stiffly, and in a cold, formal voice he
+      announced himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My name is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache. I am an emissary dispatched
+      from Paris by her Majesty the Queen-mother to procure the enlargement of
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the durance in which she is held by
+      madame your stepmother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The pleasant gentleman&rsquo;s eyebrows went up; a smile that was almost
+      insolent broke on his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That being so, monsieur, why the devil are you here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am here, monsieur,&rdquo; answered him Garnache, throwing back his head, his
+      nostrils quivering, &ldquo;because you are not at Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The tone was truculent to the point of defiance, for despite the firm
+      resolve he had taken last night never again to let his temper overmaster
+      him, already Garnache&rsquo;s self-control was slipping away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquis noted the tone, and observed the man. In their way he liked
+      both; in their way he disliked both. But he clearly saw that this peppery
+      gentleman must be treated less cavalierly, or trouble would come of it. So
+      he waved him gracefully to the table, where a brace of flagons stood amid
+      the steaming viands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will dine with me, monsieur,&rdquo; said he, the utmost politeness marking
+      his utterance now. &ldquo;I take it that since you have come here in quest of me
+      you have something to tell me. Shall we talk as we eat? I detest a lonely
+      meal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The florid gentleman&rsquo;s tone and manner were mollifying in the extreme.
+      Garnache had risen early and ridden far; the smell of the viands had
+      quickened an appetite already very keen; moreover, since he and this
+      gentleman were to be allies, it was as well they should not begin by
+      quarrelling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed less stiffly, expressed his willingness and his thanks, laid hat
+      and whip and cloak aside, unbuckled and set down his sword, and, that
+      done, took at table the place which his host himself prepared him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache took more careful stock of the Marquis now. He found much to like
+      in his countenance. It was frank and jovial; obviously that of a
+      sensualist, but, leastways, an honest sensualist. He was dressed in black,
+      as became a man who mourned his father, yet with a striking richness of
+      material, whilst his broad collar of fine point and the lace cuffs of his
+      doublet were worth a fortune.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      What time they ate Monsieur de Garnache told of his journey from Paris and
+      of his dealings with Tressan and his subsequent adventures at Condillac.
+      He dwelt passingly upon the manner in which they had treated him, and
+      found it difficult to choose words to express the reason for his returning
+      in disguise to play the knight-errant to Valerie. He passed on to speak of
+      last night&rsquo;s happenings and of his escape. Throughout, the Marquis heard
+      him with a grave countenance and a sober, attentive glance, yet, when he
+      had finished a smile crept round the sensual lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The letter that I had at Milan prepared me for some such trouble as
+      this,&rdquo; said he, and Garnache was amazed at the lightness of his tone, just
+      as he had been amazed to see the fellow keep his countenance at the
+      narrative of mademoiselle&rsquo;s position. &ldquo;I guessed that my beautiful
+      stepmother intended me some such scurviness from the circumstance of her
+      having kept me in ignorance of my father&rsquo;s death. But frankly, sir, your
+      tale by far outstrips my wildest imaginings. You have behaved very&mdash;very
+      bravely in this affair. You seem, in fact, to have taken a greater
+      interest in Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye&rsquo;s enlargement than the Queen could
+      have a right to expect of you.&rdquo; And he smiled, a world of suggestion in
+      his eyes. Garnache sat back in his chair and stared at the man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This levity, monsieur, on such a subject, leaves me thunderstruck,&rdquo; he
+      said at last.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Diable!&rdquo; laughed the other. &ldquo;You are too prone, after your trials; to
+      view its tragic rather than its comic side. Forgive me if I am smitten
+      only with the humour of the thing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The humour of the thing!&rdquo; gurgled Garnache, his eyes starting from his
+      head. Then out leapt that temper of his like an eager hound that has been
+      suddenly unleashed. He brought down his clenched hand upon the table,
+      caught in passing a flagon, and sent it crashing to the floor. If there
+      was a table near at hand when his temper went, he never failed to treat it
+      so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Par la mort Dieu! monsieur, you see but the humour of it, do you? And
+      what of that poor child who is lying there, suffering this incarceration
+      because of her fidelity to a promise given you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The statement was hardly fully accurate. But it served its purpose. The
+      other&rsquo;s face became instantly, grave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Calm yourself, I beg, monsieur,&rdquo; he cried, raising a soothing hand. &ldquo;I
+      have offended you somewhere; that is plain. There is something here that I
+      do not altogether understand. You say that Valerie has suffered on account
+      of a promise given me? To what are you referring?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They hold her a prisoner, monsieur, because they wish to wed her to
+      Marius,&rdquo; answered Garnache, striving hard to cool his anger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Parfaitement! That much I understood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, monsieur, is the rest not plain? Because she is betrothed to
+      you&mdash;&rdquo; He paused. He saw, at last, that he was stating something not
+      altogether accurate. But the other took his meaning there and then, lay
+      back in his chair, and burst out laughing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The blood hummed through Garnache&rsquo;s head as he tightened his lips and
+      watched this gentleman indulge his inexplicable mirth. Surely Monsieur de
+      Condillac was possessed of the keenest sense of humour in all France. He
+      laughed with a will, and Garnache sent up a devout prayer that the laugh
+      might choke him. The noise of it filled the hostelry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said Garnache, with an ever-increasing tartness, &ldquo;there is a
+      by-word has it &lsquo;Much laughter, little wit.&rsquo; In confidence won, is that
+      your case, monsieur?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The other looked at him soberly a moment, then went off again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, monsieur!&rdquo; he gasped, &ldquo;you&rsquo;ll be the death of me. For the love
+      of Heaven look less fierce. Is it my fault that I must laugh? The folly of
+      it all is so colossal. Three years from home, yet there is a woman keeps
+      faithful and holds to a promise given for her. Come, monsieur, you who
+      have seen the world, you must agree that there is in this something that
+      is passing singular, extravagantly amusing. My poor little Valerie!&rdquo; he
+      spluttered through his half-checked mirth, &ldquo;does she wait for me still?
+      does she count me still betrothed to her? And because of that, says &lsquo;No&rsquo; 
+      to brother Marius! Death of my life! I shall die of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have a notion that you may, monsieur,&rdquo; rasped Garnache&rsquo;s voice, and
+      with it rasped Garnache&rsquo;s chair upon the boards. He had risen, and he was
+      confronting his merry host very fiercely, white to the lips, his eyes
+      aflame. There was no mistaking his attitude, no mistaking his words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Eh?&rdquo; gasped the other, recovering himself at last to envisage what
+      appeared to develop into a serious situation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said Garnache, his voice very cold, &ldquo;do I understand that you
+      no longer intend to carry out your engagement and wed Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A dull flush spread upon the Marquis&rsquo;s face. He rose too, and across the
+      table he confronted his guest, his mien haughty, his eyes imperious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought, monsieur,&rdquo; said he, with a great dignity, &ldquo;I thought when I
+      invited you to sit at my table that your business was to serve me, however
+      little I might be conscious of having merited the honour. It seems instead
+      that you are come hither to affront me. You are my guest, monsieur. Let me
+      beg that you will depart before I resent a question on a matter which
+      concerns myself alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man was right, and Garnache was wrong. He had no title to take up the
+      affairs of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But he was past reason now, and he
+      was not the man to brook haughtiness, however courteously it might be
+      cloaked. He eyed the Marquis&rsquo;s flushed ace across the board, and his lip
+      curled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I take your meaning very fully. Half a word with me
+      is as good as a whole sentence with another. You have dubbed me in polite
+      phrases an impertinent. That I am not; and I resent the imputation.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, that!&rdquo; said the Marquis, with a half-laugh and a shrug. &ldquo;If you
+      resent it&mdash;&rdquo; His smile and his gesture made the rest plain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Exactly, monsieur,&rdquo; was Garnache&rsquo;s answer. &ldquo;But I do not fight sick men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond&rsquo;s brows grew wrinkled, his eyes puzzled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sick men!&rdquo; he echoed. &ldquo;Awhile ago, monsieur, you appeared to cast a doubt
+      upon my sanity. Is it a case of the drunkard who thinks all the world
+      drunk but himself?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache gazed at him. That doubt he had entertained grew now into
+      something like assurance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know not whether it is the fever makes your tongue run so&mdash;&rdquo; he
+      began, when the other broke in, a sudden light of understanding in his
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are at fault,&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;I have no fever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But then your letter to Condillac?&rdquo; demanded Garnache, lost now in utter
+      amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What of it? I&rsquo;ll swear I never said I had a fever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll swear you did.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You give me the lie, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache waved his hands as if he implored the other, to have done
+      with giving and taking offence. There was some misunderstanding somewhere,
+      he realized, and sheer astonishment had cooled his anger. His only aim now
+      was to have this obscure thing made clear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;I am seeking enlightenment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I may have said that we were detained by a fever; but I never said the
+      patient was myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who then? Who else?&rdquo; cried Garnache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, now I understand, monsieur. But it is my wife who has the fever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your&mdash;!&rdquo; Garnache dared not trust himself to utter the word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My wife, monsieur,&rdquo; the Marquis repeated. &ldquo;The journey proved too much
+      for her, travelling at the rate she did.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A silence fell. Garnache&rsquo;s long chin sank on to his breast, and he stood
+      there, his eyes upon the tablecloth, his thoughts with the poor innocent
+      child who waited at Condillac, so full of trust and faith and loyalty to
+      this betrothed of hers who had come home with a wife out of Italy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And then, while he stood so and Florimond was regarding him curiously, the
+      door opened, and the host appeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Marquis,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;there are two gentlemen below asking to
+      see you. One of them is Monsieur Marius de Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marius?&rdquo; cried the Marquis, and he started round with a frown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marius?&rdquo; breathed Garnache, and then, realizing that the assassins had
+      followed so close upon his heels, he put all thoughts from his mind other
+      than that of the immediate business. He had, himself, a score to settle
+      with them. The time was now. He swung round on his heel, and before he
+      knew what he had said the words were out:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bring them up, Monsieur l&rsquo;Hote.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond looked at him in surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, by all means, if monsieur wishes it,&rdquo; said he, with a fine irony.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache looked at him, then back at the hesitating host.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have heard,&rdquo; said he coolly. &ldquo;Bring them up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bien, monsieur,&rdquo; replied the host, withdrawing and closing the door after
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your interference in my affairs grows really droll, monsieur,&rdquo; said the
+      Marquis tartly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When you shall have learned to what purpose I am interfering, you&rsquo;ll find
+      it, possibly, not quite so droll,&rdquo; was the answer, no less tart. &ldquo;We have
+      but a moment, monsieur. Listen while I tell you the nature of their
+      errand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXI. THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Garnache had but a few minutes in which to unfold his story, and he
+      needed, in addition, a second or two in which to ponder the situation as
+      he now found it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His first reflection was that Florimond, since he was now married, might
+      perhaps, instead of proving Valerie&rsquo;s saviour from Marius, join forces
+      with his brother in coercing her into this alliance with him. But from
+      what Valerie herself had told him he was inclined to think more favourably
+      of Florimond and to suppress such doubts as these. Still he could incur no
+      risks; his business was to serve Valerie and Valerie only; to procure at
+      all costs her permanent liberation from the power of the Condillacs. To
+      make sure of this he must play upon Florimond&rsquo;s anger, letting him know
+      that Marius had journeyed to La Rochette for the purpose of murdering his
+      half-brother. That he but sought to murder him to the end that he might be
+      removed from his path to Valerie, was a circumstance that need not too
+      prominently be presented. Still, presented it must be, for Florimond would
+      require to know by what motive his brother was impelled ere he could
+      credit him capable of such villainy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Succinctly, but tellingly, Garnache brought out the story of the plot that
+      had been laid for Florimond&rsquo;s assassination, and it joyed him to see the
+      anger rising in the Marquis&rsquo;s face and flashing from his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What reason have they for so damnable a deed?&rdquo; he cried, between
+      incredulity and indignation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Their overweening ambition. Marius covets Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye&rsquo;s
+      estates.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And to gain his ends he would not stop at murdering me? Is it, indeed,
+      the truth you tell me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I pledge my honour for the truth of it,&rdquo; answered Garnache, watching him
+      closely. Florimond looked at him a moment. The steady glance of those blue
+      eyes and the steady tone of that crisp voice scattered his last doubt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The villains!&rdquo; cried the Marquis. &ldquo;The fools!&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;For me, Marius
+      had been welcome to Valerie. He might have found in me an ally to aid him
+      in the urging of his suit. But now&mdash;&rdquo; He raised his clenched hand and
+      shook it in the air, as if in promise of the battle he would deliver.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good,&rdquo; said Garnache, reassured. &ldquo;I hear their steps upon the stairs.
+      They must not find me with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A moment later the door opened, and Marius, very bravely arrayed, entered
+      the room, followed closely by Fortunio. Neither showed much ill effects of
+      last night&rsquo;s happenings, save for a long dark-brown scar that ran athwart
+      the captain&rsquo;s cheek, where Garnache&rsquo;s sword had ploughed it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They found Florimond seated quietly at table, and as they entered he rose
+      and came forward with a friendly smile to greet his brother. His sense of
+      humour was being excited; he was something of an actor, and the role he
+      had adopted in the comedy to be played gave him a certain grim
+      satisfaction. He would test for himself the truth of what Monsieur de
+      Garnache had told him concerning his brother&rsquo;s intentions. Marius received
+      his advances very coolly. He took his brother&rsquo;s hand, submitted to his
+      brother&rsquo;s kiss; but neither kiss nor hand-pressure did he return.
+      Florimond affected not to notice this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are well, my dear Marius, I hope,&rdquo; said he, and thrusting him out at
+      arms&rsquo; length, he held him by the shoulders and regarded him critically.
+      &ldquo;Ma foi, but you are changed into a comely well-grown man. And your mother&mdash;she
+      is well, too, I trust.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thank you, Florimond, she is well,&rdquo; said Marius stiffly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquis took his hands from his brother&rsquo;s shoulders; his florid,
+      good-natured face smiling ever, as if this were the happiest moment of his
+      life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is good to see France again, my dear Marius,&rdquo; he told his brother. &ldquo;I
+      was a fool to have remained away so long. I am pining to be at Condillac
+      once more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius eyeing him, looked in vain for signs of the fever. He had expected
+      to find a debilitated, emaciated man; instead, he saw a very lusty,
+      healthy, hearty fellow, full of good humour, and seemingly full of
+      strength. He began to like his purpose less, despite such encouragement as
+      he gathered from the support of Fortunio. Still, it must be gone through
+      with.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You wrote us that you had the fever,&rdquo; he said, half inquiringly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pooh! That is naught.&rdquo; And Florimond snapped a strong finger against a
+      stronger thumb. &ldquo;But whom have you with you?&rdquo; he asked, and his eyes took
+      the measure of Fortunio, standing a pace or two behind his master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius presented his bravo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is Captain Fortunio, the commander of our garrison of Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquis nodded good-humouredly towards the captain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Captain Fortunio? He is well named for a soldier of fortune. My brother,
+      no doubt, will have family matters to tell me of. If you will step below,
+      Monsieur le Capitaine, and drink a health or so while you wait, I shall be
+      honoured.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain, nonplussed, looked at Marius, and Florimond surprised the
+      look. But Marius&rsquo;s manner became still chillier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fortunio here,&rdquo; said he, and he half turned and let his hand fall on the
+      captain&rsquo;s shoulder, &ldquo;is my very good friend. I have no secrets from him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The instant lift of Florimond&rsquo;s eyebrows was full of insolent,
+      supercilious disdain. Yet Marius did not fasten his quarrel upon that. He
+      had come to La Rochette resolved that any pretext would serve his turn.
+      But the sight of his brother so inflamed his jealousy that he had now
+      determined that the quarrel should be picked on the actual ground in which
+      it had its roots.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, as you will,&rdquo; said the Marquis coolly. &ldquo;Perhaps your friend will be
+      seated, and you, too, my dear Marius.&rdquo; And he played the host to them with
+      a brisk charm. Setting chairs, he forced them to sit, and pressed wine
+      upon them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius cast his hat and cloak on the chair where Garnache&rsquo;s had been left.
+      The Parisian&rsquo;s hat and cloak, he naturally assumed to belong to his
+      brother. The smashed flagon and the mess of wine upon the floor he scarce
+      observed, setting it down to some clumsiness, either his brother&rsquo;s or a
+      servant&rsquo;s. They both drank, Marius in silence, the captain with a toast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your good return, Monsieur le Marquis,&rdquo; said he, and Florimond thanked
+      him by an inclination of the head. Then, turning to Marius:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And so,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you have a garrison at Condillac. What the devil has
+      been taking place there? I have had some odd news of you. It would almost
+      seem as if you were setting up as rebels in our quiet little corner of
+      Dauphiny.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius shrugged his shoulders; his face suggested that he was
+      ill-humoured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame the Queen-Regent has seen fit to interfere in our concerns. We
+      Condillacs do not lightly brook interference.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond showed his teeth in a pleasant smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is true, that is very true, Pardieu! But what warranted this action
+      of Her Majesty&rsquo;s?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius felt that the time for deeds was come. This fatuous conversation
+      was but a futile waste of time. He set down his glass, and sitting back in
+      his chair he fixed his sullen black eyes full upon his half-brother&rsquo;s
+      smiling brown ones.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think we have exchanged compliments enough,&rdquo; said he, and Fortunio
+      wagged his head approvingly. There were too many men in the courtyard for
+      his liking, and the more time they waited, the more likely were they to
+      suffer interruption. Their aim must be to get the thing done quickly, and
+      then quickly to depart before an alarm could be raised. &ldquo;Our trouble at
+      Condillac concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond started forward, with a ready assumption of lover-like
+      solicitude.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No harm has come to her?&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Tell me that no harm has come to
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Reassure yourself,&rdquo; answered Marius, with a sneer, a greyness that was of
+      jealous rage overspreading his face. &ldquo;No harm has come to her whatever.
+      The trouble was that I sought to wed her, and she, because she is
+      betrothed to you, would have none of me. So we brought her to Condillac,
+      hoping always to persuade her. You will remember that she was under my
+      mother&rsquo;s tutelage. The girl, however, could not be constrained. She
+      suborned one of our men to bear a letter to Paris for her, and in answer
+      to it the Queen sent a hot-headed, rash blunderer down to Dauphiny to
+      procure her liberation. He lies now at the bottom of the moat of
+      Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond&rsquo;s face had assumed a look of horror and indignation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you dare tell me this?&rdquo; he cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dare?&rdquo; answered Marius, with an ugly laugh. &ldquo;Men enough have died over
+      this affair already. That fellow Garnache left some bodies on our hands
+      last night before he set out for another world himself. You little dream
+      how far my daring goes in this matter. I&rsquo;ll add as many more as need be to
+      the death roll that we have already, before you set foot in Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Florimond, as one upon whose mind a light breaks suddenly. &ldquo;So,
+      that is the business on which you come to me. I doubted your
+      brotherliness, I must confess, my dear Marius. But tell me, brother mine,
+      what of our father&rsquo;s wishes in this matter? Have you no respect for
+      those?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What respect had you?&rdquo; flashed back Marius, his voice now raised in
+      anger. &ldquo;Was it like a lover to remain away for three years&mdash;to let
+      all that time go by without ever a word from you to your betrothed? What
+      have you done to make good your claim to her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing, I confess; yet&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, you shall do something now,&rdquo; exclaimed Marius, rising. &ldquo;I am here
+      to afford you the opportunity. If you would still win Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye, you shall win her from me&mdash;at point of sword. Fortunio, see
+      to the door.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wait, Marius!&rdquo; cried Florimond, and he looked genuinely aghast. &ldquo;Do not
+      forget that we are brothers, men of the same blood; that my father was
+      your father.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I choose to remember rather that we are rivals,&rdquo; answered Marius, and he
+      drew his rapier. Fortunio turned the key in the lock. Florimond gave his
+      brother a long searching look, then with a sigh he picked up his sword
+      where it lay ready to his hand and thoughtfully unsheathed it. Holding the
+      hilt in one hand and the blade in the other he stood, bending the weapon
+      like a whip, whilst again he searchingly regarded his brother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear me a moment,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;If you will force this unnatural quarrel
+      upon me, at least let the thing be decently done. Not here, not in these
+      cramped quarters, but out in the open let our meeting take place. If the
+      captain, there, will act for you, I&rsquo;ll find a friend to do me the like
+      service.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We settle this matter here and now,&rdquo; Marius answered him, in a tone of
+      calm finality.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But if I were to kill you&mdash;&rdquo; Florimond began.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Reassure yourself,&rdquo; said Marius with an ugly smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well, then; either alternative will suit the case I wish to put. If
+      you were to kill me&mdash;it may be ranked as murder. The irregularity of
+      it could not be overlooked.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The captain, here, will act for both of us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am entirely at your service, gentlemen,&rdquo; replied Fortunio pleasantly,
+      bowing to each in turn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond considered him. &ldquo;I do not like his looks,&rdquo; he objected. &ldquo;He may
+      be the friend of your bosom, Marius; you may have no secrets from him; but
+      for my part, frankly, I should prefer the presence of some friend of my
+      own to keep his blade engaged.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Marquis&rsquo;s manner was affable in the extreme. Now that it was settled
+      that they must fight, he appeared to have cast aside all scruples based
+      upon their consanguinity, and he discussed the affair with the greatest
+      bonhomie, as though he were disposing of a matter of how they should sit
+      down to table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It gave them pause. The change was too abrupt. They did not like it. It
+      was as the calm that screens some surprise. Yet it was impossible he
+      should have been forewarned; impossible he could have had word of how they
+      proposed to deal with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius shrugged his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is reason in what you say,&rdquo; he acknowledged; &ldquo;but I am in haste. I
+      cannot wait while you go in search of a friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why then,&rdquo; he answered, with a careless laugh, &ldquo;I must raise one from the
+      dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Both stared at him. Was he mad? Had the fever touched his brain? Was that
+      healthy colour but the brand of a malady that rendered him delirious?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dieu! How you stare!&rdquo; he continued, laughing in their faces. &ldquo;You shall
+      see something to compensate you for your journey, messieurs. I have learnt
+      some odd tricks in Italy; they are a curious people beyond the Alps. What
+      did you say was the name of the man the Queen had sent from Paris?&mdash;he
+      who lies at the bottom of the moat of Condillac?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let there be an end to this jesting,&rdquo; growled Marius. &ldquo;On guard, Monsieur
+      le Marquis!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Patience! patience!&rdquo; Florimond implored him. &ldquo;You shall have your way
+      with me, I promise you. But of your charity, messieurs, tell me first the
+      name of that man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was Garnache,&rdquo; said Fortunio, &ldquo;and if the information will serve you,
+      it was I who slew him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You?&rdquo; cried Florimond. &ldquo;Tell me of it, I beg you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you fool us?&rdquo; questioned Marius in a rage that overmastered his
+      astonishment, his growing suspicion that here all was not quite as it
+      seemed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fool you? But no. I do but wish to show you something that I learned in
+      Italy. Tell me how you slew him, Monsieur le Capitaine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think we are wasting time,&rdquo; said the captain, angry too. He felt that
+      this smiling gentleman was deriding the pair of them; it crossed his mind
+      that for some purpose of his own the Marquis was seeking to gain time. He
+      drew his sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Florimond saw the act, watched it, and his eyes twinkled. Suddenly
+      Marius&rsquo;s sword shot out at him. He leapt back beyond the table, and threw
+      himself on guard, his lips still wreathed in their mysterious smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The time has come, messieurs,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I should have preferred to know
+      more of how you slew that Monsieur de Garnache; but since you deny me the
+      information, I shall do my best without it. I&rsquo;ll try to conjure up his
+      ghost, to keep you entertained, Monsieur le Capitaine.&rdquo; And then, raising
+      his voice, his sword, engaging now his brother&rsquo;s:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ola, Monsieur de Garnache!&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;To me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And then it seemed to those assassins that the Marquis had been neither
+      mad nor boastful when he had spoken of strange things he had learned
+      beyond the Alps, or else it was they themselves were turned light-headed,
+      for the doors of a cupboard at the far end of the room flew open suddenly,
+      and from between them stepped the stalwart figure of Martin de Garnache, a
+      grim smile lifting the corners of his mustachios, a naked sword in his
+      hand flashing back the sunlight that flooded through the window.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They paused, aghast, and they turned ashen; and then in the mind of each
+      arose the same explanation of this phenomenon. This Garnache wore the
+      appearance of the man who had announced himself by that name when he came
+      to Condillac a fortnight ago. Then, the sallow, black-haired knave who had
+      last night proclaimed himself as Garnache in disguise was some impostor.
+      That was the conclusion they promptly arrived at, and however greatly they
+      might be dismayed by the appearance of this ally of Florimond&rsquo;s, yet the
+      conclusion heartened them anew. But scarce had they arrived at it when
+      Monsieur de Garnache&rsquo;s crisp voice came swiftly to dispel it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur le Capitaine,&rdquo; it said, and Fortunio shivered at the sound, for
+      it was the voice he had heard but a few hours ago, &ldquo;I welcome the
+      opportunity of resuming our last night&rsquo;s interrupted sword-play.&rdquo; And he
+      advanced deliberately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Marius&rsquo;s sword had fallen away from his brother&rsquo;s, and the two combatants
+      stood pausing. Fortunio without more ado made for the door. But Garnache
+      crossed the intervening space in a bound.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Turn!&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Turn, or I&rsquo;ll put my sword through your back. The door
+      shall serve you presently, but it is odds that it will need a couple of
+      men to bear you through it. Look to your dirty skin!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXII. THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      A couple of hours after the engagement in the Marquis de Condillac&rsquo;s
+      apartments at the Sanglier Noir at La Rochette, Monsieur de Garnache,
+      attended only by Rabecque, rode briskly into France once more and made for
+      the little town of Cheylas, which is on the road that leads down to the
+      valley of the Isere and to Condillac. But not as far as the township did
+      he journey. On a hill, the slopes all cultivated into an opulent vineyard,
+      some two miles east of Cheylas, stood the low, square grey building of the
+      Convent of Saint Francis. Thither did Monsieur de Garnache bend his
+      horse&rsquo;s steps. Up the long white road that crept zigzag through the
+      Franciscans&rsquo; vineyards rode the Parisian and his servant under the welcome
+      sunshine of that November afternoon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache&rsquo;s face was gloomy and his eyes sad, for his thoughts were all of
+      Valerie, and he was prey to a hundred anxieties regarding her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They gained the heights at last, and Rabecque got down to beat with his
+      whip upon the convent gates.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A lay-brother came to open, and in reply to Garnache&rsquo;s request that he
+      might have a word with the Father Abbot, invited him to enter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Through the cloisters about the great quadrangle, where a couple of monks,
+      their habits girt high as their knees, were busy at gardeners&rsquo; work,
+      Garnache followed his conductor, and up the steps to the Abbot&rsquo;s chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The master of the Convent of Saint Francis of Cheylas a tall, lean man
+      with an ascetic face, prominent cheekbones, and a nose not unlike
+      Garnache&rsquo;s own&mdash;the nose of a man of action rather than of prayer&mdash;bowed
+      gravely to this stalwart stranger, and in courteous accents begged to be
+      informed in what he might serve him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Hat in hand, Garnache took a step forward in that bare, scantily furnished
+      little room, permeated by the faint, waxlike odour that is peculiar to the
+      abode of conventuals. Without hesitation he stated the reason of his
+      visit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;a son of the house of Condillac met his end this
+      morning at La Rochette.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The monk&rsquo;s eyes seemed to quicken, as though his interest in the outer
+      world had suddenly revived.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the Hand of God,&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Their evil ways have provoked at last
+      the anger of Heaven. How did this unfortunate meet his death?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;De mortuis nil nisi bonum,&rdquo; said he. His air was grave, his blue eyes
+      solemn, and the Abbot had little cause to suspect the closeness with which
+      that pair of eyes was watching him. He coloured faintly at the implied
+      rebuke, but he inclined his head as if submissive to the correction, and
+      waited for the other to proceed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is the need, Father, to give his body burial,&rdquo; said Garnache
+      gently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But at that the monk raised his head, and a deeper flush the flush of
+      anger&mdash;spread now upon his sallow cheeks. Garnache observed it, and
+      was glad.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you come to me?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; echoed Garnache, and there was hesitancy now in his voice. &ldquo;Is not
+      the burial of the dead enjoined by Mother Church? Is it not a part of your
+      sacred office?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You ask me this as you would challenge my reply,&rdquo; said the monk, shaking
+      his head. &ldquo;It is as you say, but it is not within our office to bury the
+      impious dead, nor those who in life were excommunicate and died without
+      repentance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How can you assume he died without repentance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not; but I assume he died without absolution, for there is no priest
+      who, knowing his name, would dare to shrive him, and if one should do it
+      in ignorance of his name and excommunication, why then it is not done at
+      all. Bid others bury this son of the house of Condillac; it matters no
+      more by what hands or in what ground he be buried than if he were the
+      horse he rode or the hound that followed him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Church is very harsh, Father,&rdquo; said Garnache sternly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Church is very just,&rdquo; the priest answered him, more sternly still, a
+      holy wrath kindling his sombre eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He was in life a powerful noble,&rdquo; said Garnache thoughtfully. &ldquo;It is but
+      fitting that, being dead, honour and reverence should be shown his body.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then let those who have themselves been honoured by the Condillacs honour
+      this dead Condillac now. The Church is not of that number, monsieur. Since
+      the late Marquis&rsquo;s death the house of Condillac has been in rebellion
+      against us; our priests have been maltreated, our authority flouted; they
+      paid no tithes, approached no sacraments. Weary of their ungodliness the
+      Church placed its ban upon them; under this ban it seems they die. My heart
+      grieves for them; but&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He spread his hands, long and almost transparent in their leanness, and on
+      his face a cloud of sorrow rested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nevertheless, Father,&rdquo; said Garnache, &ldquo;twenty brothers of Saint Francis
+      shall bear the body home to Condillac, and you yourself shall head this
+      grim procession.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I?&rdquo; The monk shrank back before him, and his figure seemed to grow
+      taller. &ldquo;Who are you, sir, that say to me what I shall do, the Church&rsquo;s
+      law despite?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Garnache took the Abbot by the sleeve of his rough habit and drew him
+      gently towards the window. There was a persuasive smile on his lips and in
+      his keen eyes which the monk, almost unconsciously, obeyed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will tell you,&rdquo; said Garnache, &ldquo;and at the same time I shall seek to
+      turn you from your harsh purpose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At the hour at which Monsieur de Garnache was seeking to persuade the
+      Abbot of Saint Francis of Cheylas to adopt a point of view more kindly
+      towards a dead man, Madame de Condillac was at dinner, and with her was
+      Valerie de La Vauvraye. Neither woman ate appreciably. The one was
+      oppressed by sorrow, the other by anxiety, and the circumstance that they
+      were both afflicted served perhaps to render the Dowager gentler in her
+      manner towards the girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She watched the pale face and troubled eyes of Valerie; she observed the
+      almost lifeless manner in which she came and went as she was bidden, as
+      though a part of her had ceased to exist, and that part the part that
+      matters most. It did cross her mind that in this condition mademoiselle
+      might the more readily be bent to their will, but she dwelt not overlong
+      upon that reflection. Rather was her mood charitable, no doubt because she
+      felt herself the need of charity, the want of sympathy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was tormented by fears altogether disproportionate to their cause. A
+      hundred times she told herself that no ill could befall Marius. Florimond
+      was a sick man, and were he otherwise, there was still Fortunio to stand
+      by and see to it that the right sword pierced the right heart, else would
+      his pistoles be lost to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nevertheless she was fretted by anxiety, and she waited impatiently for
+      news, fuming at the delay, yet knowing full well that news could not yet
+      reach her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Once she reproved Valerie for her lack of appetite, and there was in her
+      voice a kindness Valerie had not heard for months&mdash;not since the old
+      Marquis died, nor did she hear it now, or, hearing it, she did not heed
+      it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not eating, child,&rdquo; the Dowager said, and her eyes were gentle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie looked up like one suddenly awakened; and in that moment her eyes
+      filled with tears. It was as if the Dowager&rsquo;s voice had opened the
+      floodgates of her sorrow and let out the tears that hitherto had been
+      repressed. The Marquise rose and waved the page and an attendant lackey
+      from the room. She crossed to Valerie&rsquo;s side and put her arm about the
+      girl&rsquo;s shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What ails you, child?&rdquo; she asked. For a moment the girl suffered the
+      caress; almost she seemed to nestle closer to the Dowager&rsquo;s shoulder.
+      Then, as if understanding had come to her suddenly, she drew back and
+      quietly disengaged herself from the other&rsquo;s arms. Her tears ceased; the
+      quiver passed from her lip.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very good, madame,&rdquo; she said, with a coldness that rendered the
+      courteous words almost insulting, &ldquo;but nothing ails me save a wish to be
+      alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have been alone too much of late,&rdquo; the Dowager answered, persisting
+      in her wish to show kindness to Valerie; for all that, had she looked into
+      her own heart, she might have been puzzled to find a reason for her mood&mdash;unless
+      the reason lay in her own affliction of anxiety for Marius.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps I have,&rdquo; said the girl, in the same cold, almost strained voice.
+      &ldquo;It was not by my own contriving.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, but it was, child; indeed it was. Had you been reasonable you had
+      found us kinder. We had never treated you as we have done, never made a
+      prisoner of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie looked up into the beautiful ivory-white face, with its black eyes
+      and singularly scarlet lips, and a wan smile raised the corners of her
+      gentle mouth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had no right&mdash;none ever gave it you&mdash;to set constraint and
+      restraint upon me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had&mdash;indeed, indeed I had,&rdquo; the Marquise answered her, in a tone
+      of sad protest. &ldquo;Your father gave me such a right when he gave me charge
+      of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was it a part of your charge to seek to turn me from my loyalty to
+      Florimond, and endeavour to compel me by means gentle or ungentle into
+      marriage with Marius?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We thought Florimond dead; or, if not dead, then certainly unworthy of
+      you to leave you without news of him for years together. And if he was not
+      dead then, it is odds he will be dead by now.&rdquo; The words slipped out
+      almost unconsciously, and the Marquise bit her lip and straightened
+      herself, fearing an explosion. But none came. The girl looked across the
+      table at the fire that smouldered on the hearth in need of being
+      replenished.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean, madame?&rdquo; she asked; but her tone was listless,
+      apathetic, as of one who though uttering a question is incurious as to
+      what the answer may be.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We had news some days ago that he was journeying homewards, but that he
+      was detained by fever at La Rochette. We have since heard that his fever
+      has grown so serious that there is little hope of his recovery.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And it was to solace his last moments that Monsieur Marius left Condillac
+      this morning?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Dowager looked sharply at the girl; but Valerie&rsquo;s face continued
+      averted, her gaze resting on the fire. Her tone suggested nothing beyond a
+      natural curiosity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the Dowager.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And lest his own efforts to help his brother out of this world should
+      prove insufficient he took Captain Fortunio with him?&rdquo; said Valerie, in
+      the same indifferent voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; the Marquise almost hissed into the girl&rsquo;s ear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie turned to her, a faint colour stirring in her white face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just what I have said, madame. Would you know what I have prayed? All
+      night was I upon my knees from the moment that I recovered consciousness,
+      and my prayers were that Heaven might see fit to let Florimond destroy
+      your son. Not that I desire Florimond&rsquo;s return, for I care not if I never
+      set eyes on him again. There is a curse upon this house, madame,&rdquo; the girl
+      continued, rising from her chair and speaking now with a greater
+      animation, whilst the Marquise recoiled a step, her face strangely altered
+      and suddenly gone grey, &ldquo;and I have prayed that that curse might be worked
+      out upon that assassin, Marius. A fine husband, madame, you would thrust
+      upon the daughter of Gaston de La Vauvraye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And turning, without waiting for an answer, she moved slowly down the
+      room, and took her way to her own desolate apartments, so full of memories
+      of him she mourned&mdash;of him, it seemed to her, she must always mourn;
+      of him who lay dead in the black waters of the moat beneath her window.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Stricken with a sudden, inexplicable terror, the Dowager, who for all her
+      spirit was not without a certain superstition, felt her knees loosen, and
+      she sank limply into a chair. She was amazed at the extent of Valerie&rsquo;s
+      knowledge, and puzzled by it; she was amazed, too, at the seeming apathy
+      of Valerie for the danger in which Florimond stood, and at her avowal that
+      she did not care if she never again beheld him. But such amazement as came
+      to her was whelmed fathoms-deep in her sudden fears for Marius. If he
+      should die! She grew cold at the thought, and she sat there, her hands
+      folded in her lap, her face grey. That mention of the curse the Church had
+      put upon them had frozen her quick blood and turned her stout spirit to
+      mere water.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last she rose and went out into the open to inquire if no messenger had
+      yet arrived, for all that she knew there was not yet time for any
+      messenger to have reached the chateau. She mounted the winding staircase
+      of stone that led to the ramparts, and there alone, in the November
+      sunshine, she paced to and fro for hours, waiting for news, straining her
+      eyes to gaze up the valley of the Isere, watching for the horseman that
+      must come that way. Then, as time sped on and the sun approached its
+      setting and still no one came, she bethought her that if harm had befallen
+      Marius, none would ride that night to Condillac. This very delay seemed
+      pregnant with news of disaster. And then she shook off her fears and tried
+      to comfort herself. There was not yet time. Besides, what had she to fear
+      for Marius? He was strong and quick, and Fortunio was by his side. A man
+      was surely dead by now at La Rochette; but that man could not be Marius.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, in the distance, she espied a moving object, and down on the
+      silent air of eventide came the far-off rattle of a horse&rsquo;s hoofs. Some
+      one was riding, galloping that way. He was returned at last. She leaned on
+      the battlements, her breath coming in quick, short gasps, and watched the
+      horseman growing larger with every stride of his horse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A mist was rising from the river, and it dimmed the figure; and she cursed
+      the mist for heightening her anxiety, for straining further her
+      impatience. Then a new fear was begotten in her mind. Why came one
+      horseman only where two should have ridden? Who was it that returned, and
+      what had befallen his companion? God send, at least, it might be Marius
+      who rode thus, at such a breakneck pace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last she could make him out. He was close to the chateau now, and she
+      noticed that his right arm was bandaged and hanging in a sling. And then a
+      scream broke from her, and she bit her lip hard to keep another in check,
+      for she had seen the horseman&rsquo;s face, and it was Fortunio&rsquo;s. Fortunio&mdash;and
+      wounded! Then, assuredly, Marius was dead!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She swayed where she stood. She set her hand on her bosom, above her
+      heart, as if she would have repressed the beating of the one, the heaving
+      of the other; her soul sickened, and her mind seemed to turn numb, as she
+      waited there for the news that should confirm her fears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The hoofs of his horse thundered over the planks of the drawbridge, and
+      came clatteringly to halt as he harshly drew rein in the courtyard below.
+      There was a sound of running feet and men sprang to his assistance. Madame
+      would have gone below to meet him; but her limbs seemed to refuse their
+      office. She leaned against one of the merlons of the embattled parapet,
+      her eyes on the spot where he should emerge from the stairs, and thus she
+      waited, her eyes haggard, her face drawn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He came at last, lurching in his walk, being overstiff from his long ride.
+      She took a step forward to meet him. Her lips parted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo; she asked him, and her voice sounded harsh and strained. &ldquo;How has
+      the venture sped?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The only way it could,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;As you would wish it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At that she thought that she must faint. Her lungs seemed to writhe for
+      air, and she opened her lips and took long draughts of the rising mist,
+      never speaking for a moment or two until she had sufficiently recovered
+      from this tremendous revulsion from her fears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, where is Marius?&rdquo; she asked at last.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has remained behind to accompany the body home. They are bringing it
+      here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They?&rdquo; she echoed. &ldquo;Who are they?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The monks of Saint Francis of Cheylas,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A something in his tone, a something in his shifty eyes, a cloud upon his
+      fair and usually so ingenuous looking countenance aroused her suspicions
+      and gave her resurrected courage pause.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She caught him viciously by the arms, and forced his glance to meet her
+      own in the fading daylight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the truth you are telling me, Fortunio?&rdquo; she snapped, and her voice
+      was half-angry, half-fearful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He faced her now, his eyes bold. He raised a hand to lend emphasis to his
+      words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I swear, madame, by my salvation, that Monsieur Marius is sound and
+      well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was satisfied. She released his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does he come to-night?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They will be here to-morrow, madame. I rode on to tell you so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An odd fancy, this of his. But&rdquo;&mdash;and a sudden smile overspread her
+      face&mdash;&ldquo;we may find a more useful purpose for one of these monks.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      An hour ago she would willingly have set mademoiselle at liberty in
+      exchange for the assurance that Marius had been successful in the business
+      that had taken him over the border into Savoy. She would have done it
+      gladly, content that Marius should be heir to Condillac. But now that
+      Condillac was assured her son, she must have more for him; her insatiable
+      greed for his advancement and prosperity was again upon her. Now, more
+      than ever&mdash;now that Florimond was dead&mdash;must she have La
+      Vauvraye for Marius, and she thought that mademoiselle would no longer be
+      difficult to bend. The child had fallen in love with that mad Garnache,
+      and when a woman is crossed in love, while her grief lasts it matters
+      little to her where she weds. Did she not know it out of the fund of her
+      own bitter experience? Was it not that&mdash;the compulsion her own father
+      had employed to make her find a mate in a man so much older than herself
+      as Condillac&mdash;that had warped her own nature, and done much to make
+      her what she was?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A lover she had had, and whilst he lived she had resisted them, and stood
+      out against this odious marriage that for convenience&rsquo; sake they forced
+      upon her. He was killed in Paris in a duel, and when the news of it came
+      to her, she had folded her hands and let them wed her to whom they listed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Of just such a dejection of spirit had she observed the signs in Valerie;
+      let them profit by it while it lasted. They had been long enough without
+      Church ceremonies at Condillac. There should be two to-morrow to make up
+      for the empty time&mdash;a wedding and a burial.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was going down the stairs, Fortunio a step behind her, when her mind
+      reverted to the happening at La Rochette.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was it well done?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It made some stir,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;The Marquis had men with him, and had the
+      affair taken place in France ill might have come of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall give me a full account of it,&rdquo; said she, rightly thinking that
+      there was still something to be explained. Then she laughed softly. &ldquo;Yes,
+      it was a lucky chance for us, his staying at La Rochette. Florimond was
+      born under an unlucky star, I think, and you under a lucky one, Fortunio.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think so, too, as regards myself,&rdquo; he answered grimly, and he thought
+      of the sword that had ploughed his cheek last night and pierced his
+      sword-arm that morning, and he thanked such gods as in his godlessness he
+      owned for the luck that had kept that sword from finding out his heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXIII. THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      On the morrow, which was a Friday and the tenth of November&mdash;a date
+      to be hereafter graven on the memory of all concerned in the affairs of
+      Condillac&mdash;the Dowager rose betimes, and, for decency&rsquo;s sake, having
+      in mind the business of the day, she gowned herself in black.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Betimes, too, the Lord Seneschal rode out of Grenoble, attended by a
+      couple of grooms, and headed for Condillac, in doing which&mdash;little
+      though he suspected it&mdash;he was serving nobody&rsquo;s interests more
+      thoroughly than Monsieur de Garnache&rsquo;s.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame received him courteously. She was in a blithe and happy mood
+      that morning&mdash;the reaction from her yesterday&rsquo;s distress of mind. The
+      world was full of promise, and all things had prospered with her and
+      Marius. Her boy was lord of Condillac; Florimond, whom she had hated and
+      who had stood in the way of her boy&rsquo;s advancement, was dead and on his way
+      to burial; Garnache, the man from Paris who might have made trouble for
+      them had he ridden home again with the tale of their resistance, was
+      silenced for all time, and the carp in the moat would be feasting by now
+      upon what was left of him; Valerie de La Vauvraye was in a dejected frame
+      of mind that augured well for the success of the Dowager&rsquo;s plans
+      concerning her, and by noon at latest there would be priests at Condillac,
+      and, if Marius still wished to marry the obstinate baggage, there would be
+      no difficulty as to that.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a glorious morning, mild and sunny as an April day, as though
+      Nature took a hand in the Dowager&rsquo;s triumph and wished to make the best of
+      its wintry garb in honour of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The presence of this gross suitor of hers afforded her another source of
+      satisfaction. There would no longer be the necessity she once had dreaded
+      of listening to his suit for longer than it should be her pleasure to be
+      amused by him. But when Tressan spoke, he struck the first note of discord
+      in the perfect harmony which the Dowager imagined existed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I am desolated that I am not a bearer of better
+      tidings. But for all that we have made the most diligent search, the man
+      Rabecque has not yet been apprehended. Still, we have not abandoned hope,&rdquo;
+       he added, by way of showing that there was a silver lining to his cloud of
+      danger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For just a moment madame&rsquo;s brows were knitted. She had forgotten Rabecque
+      until now; but an instant&rsquo;s reflection assured her that in forgetting him
+      she had done him no more than such honour as he deserved. She laughed, as
+      she led the way down the garden steps&mdash;the mildness of the day and
+      the brightness of her mood had moved her there to receive the Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From the sombreness of your tone one might fear your news to be of the
+      nature of some catastrophe. What shall it signify that Rabecque eludes
+      your men? He is but a lackey after all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True,&rdquo; said the Seneschal, very soberly; &ldquo;but do not forget, I beg, that
+      he is the bearer of letters from one who is not a lackey.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The laughter went out of her face at that. Here was something that had
+      been lost sight of in the all-absorbing joy of other things. In calling
+      the forgotten Rabecque to mind she had but imagined that it was no more
+      than a matter of the tale he might tell&mdash;a tale not difficult to
+      refute, she thought. Her word should always weigh against a lackey&rsquo;s. But
+      that letter was a vastly different matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He must be found, Tressan,&rdquo; she said sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan smiled uneasily, and chewed at his beard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No effort shall be spared,&rdquo; he promised her. &ldquo;Of that you may be very
+      sure. The affairs of the province are at a standstill,&rdquo; he added, that
+      vanity of his for appearing a man of infinite business rising even in an
+      hour of such anxiety, for to himself, no less than to her, was there
+      danger should Rabecque ever reach his destination with the papers Garnache
+      had said he carried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The affairs of the province are at a standstill,&rdquo; he repeated, &ldquo;while all
+      my energies are bent upon this quest. Should we fail to have news of his
+      capture in Dauphiny, we need not, nevertheless, despond. I have sent men
+      after him along the three roads that lead to Paris. They are to spare
+      neither money nor horses in picking up his trail and effecting his
+      capture. After all, I think we shall have him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is our only danger now,&rdquo; the Marquise answered, &ldquo;for Florimond is dead&mdash;of
+      the fever,&rdquo; she added, with a sneering smile which gave Tressan sensations
+      as of cold water on his spine. &ldquo;It were an irony of fate if that miserable
+      lackey were to reach Paris now and spoil the triumph for which we have
+      worked so hard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It were, indeed,&rdquo; Tressan agreed with her, &ldquo;and we must see that he does
+      not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But if he does,&rdquo; she returned, &ldquo;then we must stand together.&rdquo; And with
+      that she set her mind at ease once more, her mood that morning being very
+      optimistic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Always, I hope, Clotilde,&rdquo; he answered, and his little eyes leered up out
+      of the dimples of fat in which they were embedded. &ldquo;I have stood by you
+      like a true friend in this affair; is it not so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Indeed; do I deny it?&rdquo; she answered half scornfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As I shall stand by you always when the need arises. You are a little in
+      my debt concerning Monsieur de Garnache.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&mdash;I realize it,&rdquo; said she, and she felt again as if the sunshine
+      were gone from the day, the blitheness from her heart. She was moved to
+      bid him cease leering at her and to take himself and his wooing to the
+      devil. But she bethought her that the need for him might not yet utterly
+      be passed. Not only in the affair of Garnache&mdash;in which he stood
+      implicated as deeply as herself&mdash;might she require his loyalty, but
+      also in the matter of what had befallen yesterday at La Rochette; for
+      despite Fortunio&rsquo;s assurances that things had gone smoothly, his tale hung
+      none too convincingly together; and whilst she did not entertain any
+      serious fear of subsequent trouble, yet it might be well not utterly to
+      banish the consideration of such a possibility, and to keep the Seneschal
+      her ally against it. So she told him now, with as much graciousness as she
+      could command, that she fully realized her debt, and when, encouraged, he
+      spoke of his reward, she smiled upon him as might a girl smile upon too
+      impetuous a wooer whose impetuosity she deprecates yet cannot wholly
+      withstand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am a widow of six months,&rdquo; she reminded him, as she had reminded him
+      once before. Her widowhood was proving a most convenient refuge. &ldquo;It is
+      not for me to listen to a suitor, however my foolish heart may incline.
+      Come to me in another six months&rsquo; time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you will wed me then?&rdquo; he bleated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By an effort her eyes smiled down upon him, although her face was a trifle
+      drawn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have I not said that I will listen to no suitor? and what is that but a
+      suitor&rsquo;s question?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He caught her hand; he would have fallen on his knees there and then, at
+      her feet, on the grass still wet with the night&rsquo;s mist, but that he in
+      time bethought him of how sadly his fine apparel would be the sufferer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet I shall not sleep, I shall know no rest, no peace until you have
+      given me an answer. Just an answer is all I ask. I will set a curb upon my
+      impatience afterwards, and go through my period of ah&mdash;probation
+      without murmuring. Say that you, will marry me in six months&rsquo; time&mdash;at
+      Easter, say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She saw that an answer she must give, and so she gave him the answer that
+      he craved. And he&mdash;poor fool!&mdash;never caught the ring of her
+      voice, as false as the ring of a base coin; never guessed that in
+      promising she told herself it would be safe to break that promise six
+      months hence, when the need of him and his loyalty would be passed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A man approached them briskly from the chateau. He brought news that a
+      numerous company of monks was descending the valley of the Isere towards
+      Condillac. A faint excitement stirred her, and accompanied by Tressan she
+      retraced her steps and made for the battlements, whence she might overlook
+      their arrival.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As they went Tressan asked for an explanation of this cortege, and she
+      answered him with Fortunio&rsquo;s story of how things had sped yesterday at La
+      Rochette.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Up the steps leading to the battlements she went ahead of him, with a
+      youthful, eager haste that took no thought for the corpulence and
+      short-windedness of the following Seneschal. From the heights she looked
+      eastwards, shading her eyes from the light of the morning sun, and
+      surveyed the procession which with slow dignity paced down the valley
+      towards Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At its head walked the tall, lean figure of the Abbot of Saint Francis of
+      Cheylas, bearing on high a silvered crucifix that flashed and scintillated
+      in the sunlight. His cowl was thrown back, revealing his pale, ascetic
+      countenance and shaven head. Behind him came a coffin covered by a black
+      pall, and borne on the shoulders of six black-robed, black cowled monks,
+      and behind these again walked, two by two, some fourteen cowled brothers
+      of the order of Saint Francis, their heads bowed, their arms folded, and
+      their hands tucked away in their capacious sleeves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a numerous cortege, and as she watched its approach the Marquise
+      was moved to wonder by what arguments had the proud Abbot been induced to
+      do so much honour to a dead Condillac and bear his body home to this
+      excommunicated roof.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Behind the monks a closed carriage lumbered down the uneven mountain way,
+      and behind this rode four mounted grooms in the livery of Condillac. Of
+      Marius she saw nowhere any sign, and she inferred him to be travelling in
+      that vehicle, the attendant servants being those of the dead Marquis.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In silence, with the Seneschal at her elbow, she watched the procession
+      advance until it was at the foot of the drawbridge. Then, while the solemn
+      rhythm of their feet sounded across the planks that spanned the moat, she
+      turned, and, signing to the Seneschal to follow her, she went below to
+      meet them. But when she reached the courtyard she was surprised to find
+      they had not paused, as surely would have been seemly. Unbidden, the Abbot
+      had gone forward through the great doorway and down the gallery that led
+      to the hall of Condillac. Already, when she arrived below, the coffin and
+      its bearers had disappeared, and the last of the monks was passing from
+      sight in its wake. Leaning against the doorway through which they were
+      vanishing stood Fortunio, idly watching that procession and thoughtfully
+      stroking his mustachios. About the yard lounged a dozen or so men-at-arms,
+      practically all the garrison that was left them since the fight with
+      Garnache two nights ago.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After the last monk had disappeared, she still remained there,
+      expectantly; and when she saw that neither the carriage nor the grooms
+      made their appearance, she stepped up to Fortunio to inquire into the
+      reason of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely Monsieur de Condillac rides in that coach,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely,&rdquo; Fortunio answered, himself looking puzzled. &ldquo;I will go seek the
+      reason, madame. Meanwhile will you receive the Abbot? The monks will have
+      deposited their burden.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She composed her features into a fitting solemnity, and passed briskly
+      through to the hall, Tressan ever at her heels. Here she found the coffin
+      deposited on the table, its great black pall of velvet, silver-edged,
+      sweeping down to the floor. No fire had been lighted that morning nor had
+      the sun yet reached the windows, so that the place wore a chill and gloomy
+      air that was perhaps well attuned to the purpose that it was being made to
+      serve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a rare dignity, her head held high, she swept down the length of that
+      noble chamber towards the Abbot, who stood erect as a pikestaff: at the
+      tablehead, awaiting her. And well was it for him that he was a man of
+      austere habit of mind, else might her majestic, incomparable beauty have
+      softened his heart and melted the harshness of his purpose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised his hand when she was within a sword&rsquo;s length of him, and with
+      startling words, delivered in ringing tones, he broke the ponderous
+      silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wretched woman,&rdquo; he denounced her, &ldquo;your sins have found you out. Justice
+      is to be done, and your neck shall be bent despite your stubborn pride.
+      Derider of priests, despoiler of purity, mocker of Holy Church, your
+      impious reign is at an end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan fell back aghast, his face blenching to the lips; for if justice
+      was at hand for her, as the Abbot said, then was justice at hand for him
+      as well. Where had their plans miscarried? What flaw was there that
+      hitherto she had not perceived? Thus he questioned himself in his sudden
+      panic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the Marquise was no sharer in his tremors. Her eyes opened a trifle
+      wider; a faint colour crept into her cheeks; but her only emotions were of
+      amazement and indignation. Was he mad, this shaveling monk? That was the
+      question that leapt into her mind, the very question with which she coldly
+      answered his outburst.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For madness only,&rdquo; she thought fit to add, &ldquo;could excuse such rash
+      temerity as yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not madness, madame,&rdquo; he answered, with chill haughtiness&mdash;&ldquo;not
+      madness, but righteous indignation. You have defied the power of Holy
+      Church as you have defied the power of our sovereign lady, and justice is
+      upon you. We are here to present the reckoning, and see its payment made
+      in full.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She fancied he alluded to the body in the coffin&mdash;the body of her
+      stepson&mdash;and she could have laughed at his foolish conclusions that
+      she must account Florimond&rsquo;s death an act of justice upon her for her
+      impiety. But her rising anger left her no room for laughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought, sir priest, you were come to bury the dead. But it rather
+      seems you are come to talk.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her long and sternly. Then he shook his head, and the
+      faintest shadow of a smile haunted his ascetic face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not to talk, madame; oh, not to talk,&rdquo; he answered slowly. &ldquo;But to act, I
+      have come, madame, to liberate from this shambles the gentle lamb you hold
+      here prisoned.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At that some of the colour left her cheeks; her eyes grew startled: at
+      last she began to realize that all was not as she had thought&mdash;as she
+      had been given to understand.&mdash;Still, she sought to hector it, from
+      very instinct.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;<i>Vertudieu!</i>&rdquo; she thundered at him. &ldquo;What mean you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Behind her Tressan&rsquo;s great plump knees were knocking one against the
+      other. Fool that he had been to come to Condillac that day, and to be
+      trapped thus in her company, a partner in her guilt. This proud Abbot who
+      stood there uttering denunciations had some power behind him, else had he
+      never dared to raise his voice in Condillac within call of desperate men
+      who would give little thought to the sacredness, of his office.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What mean you?&rdquo; she repeated&mdash;adding with a sinister smile, &ldquo;in your
+      zeal, Sir Abbot, you are forgetting that my men are within call.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So, madame, are mine,&rdquo; was his astounding answer, and he waved a hand
+      towards the array of monks, all standing with bowed heads and folded arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that her laughter rang shrill through the chamber. &ldquo;These poor
+      shavelings?&rdquo; she questioned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just these poor shavelings, madame,&rdquo; he answered, and he raised his hand
+      again and made a sign. And then an odd thing happened, and it struck a
+      real terror into the heart of the Marquise and heightened that which was
+      already afflicting her fat lover, Tressan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The monks drew themselves erect. It was as if a sudden gust of wind had
+      swept through their ranks and set them all in motion. Cowls fell back and
+      habits were swept aside, and where twenty monks had stood, there were
+      standing now a score of nimble, stalwart men in the livery of Condillac,
+      all fully armed, all grinning in enjoyment of her and Tressan&rsquo;s dismay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One of them turned aside and locked the door of the chamber. But his
+      movement went unheeded by the Dowager, whose beautiful eyes, starting with
+      horror, were now back upon the grim figure of the Abbot, marvelling almost
+      to see no transformation wrought in him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Treachery!&rdquo; she breathed, in an awful voice, that was no louder than a
+      whisper, and again her eyes travelled round the company, and suddenly they
+      fastened upon Fortunio, standing six paces from her to the right, pulling
+      thoughtfully at his mustachios, and manifesting no surprise at what had
+      taken place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In a sudden, blind choler, she swept round, plucked the dagger from
+      Tressan&rsquo;s belt and flung herself upon the treacherous captain. He had
+      betrayed her in some way; he had delivered up Condillac&mdash;into whose
+      power she had yet had no time to think. She caught him by the throat with
+      a hand of such nervous strength as one would little have suspected from
+      its white and delicate contour. Her dagger was poised in the air, and the
+      captain, taken thus suddenly, was palsied with amazement and could raise
+      no hand to defend himself from the blow impending.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the Abbot stepped suddenly to her side and caught her wrist in his
+      thin, transparent hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forbear,&rdquo; he bade her. &ldquo;The man is but a tool.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She fell back&mdash;dragged back almost by the Abbot&mdash;panting with
+      rage and grief; and then she noticed that during the moment that her back
+      had been turned the pall had been swept from the coffin. The sight of the
+      bare deal box arrested her attention, and for the moment turned aside her
+      anger. What fresh surprise did they prepare her?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      No sooner had she asked herself the question than herself she answered it,
+      and an icy hand seemed to close about her heart. It was Marius who was
+      dead. They had lied to her. Marius&rsquo;s was the body they had borne to
+      Condillac&mdash;those men in the livery of her stepson.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a sudden sob in her throat she took a step towards the coffin. She
+      must see for herself. One way or the other she must at once dispel this
+      torturing doubt. But ere she had taken three paces, she stood arrested
+      again, her hands jerked suddenly to the height of her breast, her lips
+      parting to let out a scream of terror. For the coffin-lid had slowly
+      raised and clattered over. And as if to pile terror for her, a figure rose
+      from the box, and, sitting up, looked round with a grim smile; and the
+      figure was the figure of a man whom she knew to be dead, a man who had
+      died by her contriving&mdash;it was the figure of Garnache. It was
+      Garnache as he had been on the occasion of his first coming to Condillac,
+      as he had been on the day they had sought his life in this very room. How
+      well she knew that great hooked nose and the bright, steely blue eyes, the
+      dark brown hair, ash-coloured at the temples where age had paled it, and
+      the fierce, reddish mustachios, bristling above the firm mouth and long,
+      square chin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She stared and stared, her beautiful face livid and distorted, till there
+      was no beauty to be seen in it, what time the Abbot regarded her coldly
+      and Tressan, behind her, turned almost sick with terror. But not the
+      terror of ghosts was it afflicted him. He saw in Garnache a man who was
+      still of the quick&mdash;a man who by some miracle had escaped the fate to
+      which they supposed him to have succumbed; and his terror was the terror
+      of the reckoning which that man would ask.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After a moment&rsquo;s pause, as if relishing the sensation he had created,
+      Garnache rose to his feet and leapt briskly to the ground. There was
+      nothing ghostly about the thud with which he alighted on his feet before
+      her. A part of her terror left her; yet not quite all. She saw that she
+      had but a man to deal with, yet she began to realize that this man was
+      very terrible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Garnache again!&rdquo; she gasped.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed serenely, his lips smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, madame,&rdquo; he told her pleasantly, &ldquo;always Garnache. Tenacious as a
+      leech, madame; and like a leech come hither to do a little work of
+      purification.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eyes, now kindling again as she recovered from her recent fears,
+      sought Fortunio&rsquo;s shifty glance. Garnache followed it and read what was in
+      her mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What Fortunio has done,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;he has done by your son&rsquo;s authority
+      and sanction.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marius?&rdquo; she inquired, and she was almost fearful lest she should hear
+      that by her son he meant her stepson, and that Marius was dead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Marius,&rdquo; he answered her. &ldquo;I bent him to my will. I threatened him
+      that he and this fellow of his, this comrade in arms so worthy of his
+      master, should be broken on the wheel together unless I were implicitly
+      obeyed. If they would save their lives, this was their chance. They were
+      wise, and they took it, and thus afforded me the means of penetrating into
+      Condillac and rescuing Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then Marius&mdash;?&rdquo; She left her question unfinished, her hand clutching
+      nervously at the bosom of her gown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is sound and well, as Fortunio truthfully will have told you. But he is
+      not yet out of my grasp, nor will be until the affairs of Condillac are
+      settled. For if I meet with further opposition here, broken on the wheel
+      he shall be yet, I promise you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Still she made a last attempt at hectoring it. The long habit of
+      mastership dies hard. She threw back her head; her courage revived now
+      that she knew Marius to be alive and sound.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fine words,&rdquo; she sneered. &ldquo;But who are you that you can threaten so and
+      promise so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am the Queen-Regent&rsquo;s humble mouthpiece, madame. What I threaten, I
+      threaten in her name. Ruffle it no longer, I beseech you. It will prove
+      little worth your while. You are deposed, madame, and you had best take
+      your deposition with dignity and calm&mdash;in all friendliness do I
+      advise it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not yet come so low that I need your advice,&rdquo; she answered sourly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may before the sun sets,&rdquo; he answered, with his quiet smile. &ldquo;The
+      Marquis de Condillac and his wife are still at La Rochette, waiting until
+      my business here is done that they may come home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His wife?&rdquo; she cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His wife, madame. He has brought home a wife from Italy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then&mdash;then&mdash;Marius?&rdquo; She said no more than that. Maybe she had
+      no intention of muttering even so much of her thoughts aloud. But Garnache
+      caught the trend of her mind, and he marvelled to see how strong a habit
+      of thought can be. At once upon hearing of the Marquis&rsquo;s marriage her mind
+      had flown back to its wonted pondering of the possibilities of Marius&rsquo;s
+      wedding Valerie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Garnache dispelled such speculations.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, madame,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Marius looks elsewhere for a wife&mdash;unless
+      mademoiselle of her own free will should elect to wed him&mdash;a thing
+      unlikely.&rdquo; Then, with a sudden change to sternness&mdash;&ldquo;Mademoiselle de
+      La Vauvraye is well, madame?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded her head, but made no answer in words. He turned to Fortunio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go fetch her,&rdquo; he bade the captain, and one of the men unlocked the door
+      to let Fortunio out upon that errand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Parisian took a turn in the apartment, and came close to Tressan. He
+      nodded to the Seneschal with a friendliness that turned him sick with
+      fright.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well met, my dear Lord Seneschal. I am rejoiced to find you here. Had it
+      been otherwise I must have sent for you. There is a little matter to be
+      settled between us. You may depend upon me to settle it to your present
+      satisfaction, if to your future grief.&rdquo; And, with a smile, he passed on,
+      leaving the Seneschal too palsied to answer him, too stricken to disclaim
+      his share in what had taken place at Condillac.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have terms to make with me?&rdquo; the Marquise questioned proudly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; he answered, with his grim courtesy. &ldquo;Upon your acceptance of
+      those terms shall depend Marius&rsquo;s life and your own future liberty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What are they?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That within the hour all your people&mdash;to the last scullion&mdash;shall
+      have laid down their arms and vacated Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was beyond her power to refuse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Marquis will not drive me forth?&rdquo; she half affirmed, half asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Marquis, madame, has no power in this matter. It is for the Queen to
+      deal with your insubordination&mdash;for me as the Queen&rsquo;s emissary.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I consent, monsieur, what then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He shrugged his shoulders, and smiled quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no &lsquo;if,&rsquo; madame. Consent you must, willingly or unwillingly. To
+      make sure of that have I come back thus and with force. But should you
+      deliver battle, you will be worsted&mdash;and it will be very ill for you.
+      Bid your men depart, as I have told you, and you also shall have liberty
+      to go hence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, but whither?&rdquo; she cried, in a sudden frenzy of anger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I realize, madame, from what I know of your circumstances that you will
+      be well-nigh homeless. You should have thought of how one day you might
+      come to be dependent upon the Marquis de Condillac&rsquo;s generosity before you
+      set yourself to conspire against him, before you sought to encompass his
+      death. You can hardly look for generosity at his hands now, and so you
+      will be all but homeless, unless&mdash;&rdquo; He paused, and his eyes strayed
+      to Tressan and were laden with a sardonic look.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You take a very daring tone with me,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;You speak to me as
+      no man has ever dared to speak.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When the power was yours, madame, you dealt with me as none has ever
+      dared to deal. The advantage now is mine. Behold how I use it in your own
+      interests; observe how generously I shall deal with you who deal in
+      murder. Monsieur de Tressan,&rdquo; he called briskly. The Seneschal started
+      forward as if some one had prodded him suddenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mu&mdash;monsieur?&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With you, too, will I return good for evil. Come hither.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Seneschal approached, wondering what was about to take place. The
+      Marquise watched his coming, a cold glitter in her eye, for&mdash;keener
+      of mental vision than Tressan&mdash;she already knew the hideous purpose
+      that was in Garnache&rsquo;s mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldiers grinned; the Abbot looked on with an impassive face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Marquise de Condillac is likely to be homeless henceforth,&rdquo; said the
+      Parisian, addressing the Seneschal. &ldquo;Will you not be gallant enough to
+      offer her a home, Monsieur de Tressan?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will I?&rdquo; gasped Tressan, scarce daring to believe his own ears, his eyes
+      staring with a look that was almost one of vacancy. &ldquo;Madame well knows how
+      readily.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oho?&rdquo; crowed Garnache, who had been observing madame&rsquo;s face. &ldquo;She knows?
+      Then do so, monsieur; and on that condition I will forget your
+      indiscretions here. I pledge you my word that you shall not be called to
+      further account for the lives that have been lost through your treachery
+      and want of loyalty, provided that of your own free will you lay down your
+      Seneschalship of Dauphiny&mdash;an office which I cannot consent to see you
+      filling hereafter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tressan stared from the Dowager to Garnache and back to the Dowager. She
+      stood there as if Garnache&rsquo;s words had turned her into marble, bereft of
+      speech through very rage. And then the door opened, and Mademoiselle de La
+      Vauvraye entered, followed closely by Fortunio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At sight of Garnache she stood still, set her hand on her heart, and
+      uttered a low cry. Was it indeed Garnache she saw&mdash;Garnache, her
+      brave knight-errant? He looked no longer as he had looked during those
+      days when he had been her gaoler; but he looked as she liked to think of
+      him since she had accounted him dead. He advanced to meet her, a smile in
+      his eyes that had something wistful in it. He held out both hands to her,
+      and she took them, and there, under the eyes of all, before he could
+      snatch them away, she had stooped and kissed them, whilst a murmur of
+      &ldquo;Thank God! Thank God!&rdquo; escaped from her lips to heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!&rdquo; he remonstrated, when it was too late to
+      stay her. &ldquo;You must not; it is not seemly in me to allow it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He saw in the act no more than an expression of the gratitude for what he
+      had done to serve her, and for the risk in which his life had been so
+      willingly placed in that service. Under the suasion of his words she grew
+      calm again; then, suddenly, a fear stirred her once more in that place
+      where she had known naught but fears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why are you here, monsieur? You have come into danger again?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; he laughed. &ldquo;These are my own men, at least for the time being.
+      I am come in power this time, to administer justice. What shall be done
+      with this lady, mademoiselle?&rdquo; he asked; and knowing well the merciful
+      sweetness of the girl&rsquo;s soul, he added, &ldquo;Speak, now. Her fate shall rest
+      in your hands.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Valerie looked at her enemy, and then her eyes strayed round the room and
+      took stock of the men standing there in silence, of the Abbot who still
+      remained at the table-head, a pale, scarce-interested spectator of this
+      odd scene.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The change had come so abruptly. A few minutes ago she had been still a
+      prisoner, suffering tortures at having heard that Marius was to return
+      that day, and that, willy-nilly, she must wed him now. And now she was
+      free it seemed: her champion was returned in power, and he stood bidding
+      her decide the fate of her late oppressors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame&rsquo;s face was ashen. She judged the girl by her own self; she had no
+      knowledge of any such infinite sweetness as that of this child&rsquo;s nature, a
+      sweetness that could do no hurt to any. Death was what the Marquise
+      expected, since she knew that death would she herself have pronounced had
+      the positions been reversed. But&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let her go in peace, monsieur,&rdquo; she heard mademoiselle say, and she could
+      not believe but that she was being mocked. And as if mockery were at
+      issue, Garnache laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will let her go, mademoiselle&mdash;yet not quite her own way. You
+      must not longer remain unrestrained, madame,&rdquo; he told the Marquise.
+      &ldquo;Natures such as yours need a man&rsquo;s guidance. I think you will be
+      sufficiently punished if you wed this rash Monsieur de Tressan, just as he
+      will be sufficiently punished later when disillusionment follows his
+      present youthful ardour. Make each other happy, then,&rdquo; and he waved his
+      arms from one to the other. &ldquo;Our good Father, here, will tie the knot at
+      once, and then, my Lord Seneschal, you may bear home your bride. Her son
+      shall follow you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But the Marquise blazed out now. She stamped her foot, and her eyes seemed
+      to have taken fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never, sir! Never in life!&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;I will not be so constrained. I
+      am the Marquise de Condillac, monsieur. Do not forget it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am hardly in danger of doing that. It is because I remember it that I
+      urge you to change your estate with all dispatch; and cease to be the
+      Marquise de Condillac. That same Marquise has a heavy score against her.
+      Let her evade payment by this metamorphosis. I have opened for you,
+      madame, a door through which you may escape.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are insolent,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;By God, sir! I am no baggage to be
+      disposed of by the will of any man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At that Garnache himself took fire. Her anger proved as the steel smiting
+      the flint of his own nature, and one of his fierce bursts of blazing
+      passion whirled about her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what of this child, here?&rdquo; he thundered. &ldquo;What of her, madame? Was
+      she a baggage to be disposed of by the will of any man or woman? Yet you
+      sought to dispose of her against her heart, against her nature, against
+      her plighted word. Enough said!&rdquo; he barked, and so terrific was his mien
+      and voice that the stout-spirited Dowager was cowed, and recoiled as he
+      advanced a step in her direction. &ldquo;Get you married. Take you this man to
+      husband, you who with such calmness sought to drive others into unwilling
+      wedlock. Do it, madame, and do it now, or by the Heaven above us, you
+      shall come to Paris with me, and you&rsquo;ll not find them nice there. It will
+      avail you little to storm and shout at them that you are Marquise de
+      Condillac. As a murderess and a rebel shall you be tried, and as both or
+      either it is odds you will be broken on the wheel&mdash;and your son with
+      you. So make your choice, madame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He ceased. Valerie had caught him by the arm. At once his fury fell from
+      him. He turned to her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it, child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not compel her, if she will not wed him,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;I know&mdash;and&mdash;she
+      did not&mdash;how terrible a thing it is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, patience, child,&rdquo; he soothed her, smiling now, his smile as the
+      sunshine that succeeds a thunderstorm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is none so bad with her. She is but coy. They had plighted their troth
+      already, so it seems. Besides, I do not compel her. She shall marry him of
+      her own free will&mdash;or else go to Paris and stand her trial and the
+      consequences.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They had plighted their troth, do you say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well&mdash;had you not, Monsieur le Seneschal?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We had, monsieur,&rdquo; said Tressan, with conscious pride; &ldquo;and for myself I
+      am ready for these immediate nuptials.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, in God&rsquo;s name, let Madame give us her answer now. We have not the
+      day to waste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood looking at him, her toe tapping the ground, her eyes sullenly
+      angry. And in the end, half-fainting in her great disdain, she consented
+      to do his will. Paris and the wheel formed too horrible an alternative;
+      besides, even if that were spared her, there was but a hovel in Touraine
+      for her, and Tressan, for all his fat ugliness, was wealthy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So the Abbot, who had lent himself to the mummery of coming there to read
+      a burial service, made ready now, by order of the Queen&rsquo;s emissary, to
+      solemnize a wedding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was soon done. Fortunio stood sponsor for Tressan, and Garnache himself
+      insisted upon handing the Lord Seneschal his bride, a stroke of irony
+      which hurt the proud lady of Condillac more than all her sufferings of the
+      past half-hour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When it was over and the Dowager Marquise de Condillac had been converted
+      into the Comtesse de Tressan, Garnache bade them depart in peace and at
+      once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As I have promised, you shall be spared all prosecution, Monsieur de
+      Tressan,&rdquo; he assured the Seneschal at parting. &ldquo;But you must resign at
+      once the King&rsquo;s Seneschalship of Dauphiny, else will you put me to the
+      necessity of having you deprived of your office&mdash;and that might
+      entail unpleasant consequences.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They went, madame with bowed head, her stubborn pride broken at last as
+      the Abbot of Saint Francis had so confidently promised her. After them
+      went the Abbot and the lackeys of Florimond, and Fortunio went with these
+      to carry out Garnache&rsquo;s orders that the men of the Dowager&rsquo;s garrison be
+      sent packing at once, leaving with the Parisian, in the great hall, just
+      Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXIV. SAINT MARTIN&rsquo;S EVE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Uneasy in his mind, seeking some way to tell the thing and acquit himself
+      of the painful task before him, Garnache took a turn in the apartment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mademoiselle leaned against the table, which was still burdened by the
+      empty coffin, and observed him. His ponderings were vain; he could find no
+      way to tell, his story. She had said that she did not exactly love this
+      Florimond, that her loyalty to him was no more than her loyalty to her
+      father&rsquo;s wishes. Nevertheless, he thought, what manner of hurt must not
+      her pride receive when she learned that Florimond had brought him home a
+      wife? Garnache was full of pity for her and for the loneliness that must
+      be hers hereafter, mistress of a vast estate in Dauphiny, alone and
+      friendless. And he was a little sorry for himself and the loneliness
+      which, he felt, would be his hereafter; but that was by the way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last it was she herself who broke the silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; she asked him, and her voice was strained and husky, &ldquo;were you
+      in time to save Florimond?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mademoiselle,&rdquo; he answered readily, glad that by that question she
+      should have introduced the subject. &ldquo;I was in time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And Marius?&rdquo; she inquired. &ldquo;From what I heard you say, I take it that he
+      has suffered no harm.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has suffered none. I have spared him that he might participate in the
+      joy of his mother at her union with Monsieur de Tressan.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad it was so, monsieur. Tell me of it.&rdquo; Her voice sounded formal
+      and constrained.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But either he did not hear or did not heed the question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; he said slowly. &ldquo;Florimond is coming&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Florimond?&rdquo; she broke in, and her voice went shrill, as if with a sudden
+      fear, her cheeks turned white as chalk. The thing that for months she had
+      hoped and prayed for was come at last, and it struck her almost dead with
+      terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He remarked the change, and set it down to a natural excitement. He paused
+      a moment. Then:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is still at La Rochette. But he does no more than wait until he shall
+      have learned that his stepmother has departed from Condillac.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But&mdash;why&mdash;why&mdash;? Was he then in no haste to come to me?&rdquo;
+       she inquired, her voice faltering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is&mdash;&rdquo; He stopped and tugged at his mustachios, his eyes regarding
+      her sombrely. He was close beside her now, where he had halted, and he set
+      his hand gently upon her shoulder, looked down into that winsome little
+      oval face she raised to his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; he inquired, &ldquo;would it afflict you very sorely if you were
+      not destined, after all, to wed the Lord of Condillac?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Afflict me?&rdquo; she echoed. The very question set her gasping with hope. &ldquo;No&mdash;no,
+      monsieur; it would not afflict me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is true? That is really, really true?&rdquo; he cried, and his tone seemed
+      less despondent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you know how true it is?&rdquo; she said, in such accents and with such a
+      shy upward look that something seemed suddenly to take Garnache by the
+      throat. The blood flew to his cheeks. He fancied an odd meaning in those
+      words of hers&mdash;a meaning that set his pulses throbbing faster than
+      joy or peril had ever set them yet. Then he checked himself, and deep down
+      in his soul he seemed to hear a peal of mocking laughter&mdash;just such a
+      burst of sardonic mirth as had broken from his lips two nights ago when on
+      his way to Voiron. Then he went back to the business he had in hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad it is so with you,&rdquo; he said quietly. &ldquo;Because Florimond has
+      brought him home a wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The words were out, and he stood back as stands a man who, having cast an
+      insult, prepares to ward the blow he expects in answer. He had looked for
+      a storm, a wild, frantic outburst; the lightning of flashing, angry eyes;
+      the thunder of outraged pride. Instead, here was a gentle calm, a wan
+      smile overspreading her sweet, pale face, and then she hid that face in
+      her hands, buried face and hands upon his shoulder and fell to weeping
+      very quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This, he thought, was almost worse than the tempest he had looked for. How
+      was he to know that these tears were the overflow of a heart that was on
+      the point of bursting from sheer joy? He patted her shoulder; he soothed
+      her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Little child,&rdquo; he whispered in her ear. &ldquo;What does it matter? You did not
+      really love him. He was all unworthy of you. Do not grieve, child. So, so,
+      that is better.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was looking up at him, smiling through the tears that suffused er
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am weeping for joy, monsieur,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For joy?&rdquo; quoth he. &ldquo;<i>Vertudieu</i>! There is no end to the things a woman
+      weeps for!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Unconsciously, instinctively almost, she nestled closer to him, and again
+      his pulses throbbed, again that flush came to overspread his lean
+      countenance. Very softly he whispered in her ear:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you go to Paris with me, mademoiselle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He meant by that question no more than to ask whether, now that here in
+      Dauphiny she would be friendless and alone, it were not better for her to
+      place herself under the care of the Queen-Regent. But what blame to her if
+      she misunderstood the question, if she read in it the very words her heart
+      was longing to hear from him? The very gentleness of his tone implied his
+      meaning to be the one she desired. She raised her hazel eyes again to his,
+      she nestled closer to him, and then, with a shy fluttering of her lids, a
+      delicious red suffusing her virgin cheek, she answered very softly:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will go anywhere with you, monsieur&mdash;anywhere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With a cry he broke from her. There was no fancying now; no possibility of
+      misunderstanding. He saw how she had misread his question, how she had
+      delivered herself up to him in answer. His almost roughness startled her,
+      and she stared at him as he stamped down the apartment and back to where
+      she stood, seeking in vain to master the turbulence of his feelings. He
+      stood still again. He took her by the shoulders and held her at arms&rsquo; 
+      length, before him, thus surveying her, and there was trouble in his keen
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Valerie, my child, what are you
+      saying to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What would you have me say?&rdquo; she asked, her eyes upon the floor. &ldquo;Was I
+      too forward? It seemed to me there could not be question of such a thing
+      between us now. I belong to you. What man has ever served a woman as you
+      have served me? What better friend, what nobler lover did ever woman have?
+      Why then need I take shame at confessing my devotion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He swallowed hard, and there was a mist before his eyes&mdash;eyes that
+      had looked unmoved on many a scene of carnage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know not what you do,&rdquo; he cried out, and his voice was as the voice
+      of one in pain. &ldquo;I am old.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Old?&rdquo; she echoed in deep surprise, and she looked up at him, as if she
+      sought evidence of what he stated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aye, old,&rdquo; he assured her bitterly. &ldquo;Look at the grey in my hair, the
+      wrinkles in my face. I am no likely lover for you, child. You&rsquo;ll need a
+      lusty, comely young gallant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him, and a faint smile flickered at the corners of her lips.
+      She observed his straight, handsome figure; his fine air of dignity and of
+      strength. Every inch a man was he; never lived there one who was more a
+      man; and what more than such a man could any maid desire?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are all that I would have you,&rdquo; she answered him, and in his mind he
+      almost cursed her stubbornness, her want of reason.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am peevish and cross-grained,&rdquo; he informed her, &ldquo;and I have grown old
+      in ignorance of woman&rsquo;s ways. Love has never come to me until now. What
+      manner of lover, think you, can I make?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eyes were on the windows at his back. The sunshine striking through
+      them seemed to give her the reply she sought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-morrow will be Saint Martin&rsquo;s Day,&rdquo; she told him; &ldquo;yet see with a
+      warmth the sun is shining.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A poor, make-believe Saint Martin&rsquo;s Summer,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I am fitly
+      answered by your allegory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, not make-believe, not make-believe,&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;There is no
+      make-believe in the sun&rsquo;s brightness and its warmth. We see it and we feel
+      it, and we are none the less glad of it because the time of year should be
+      November; rather do we take the greater joy in it. And it is not yet
+      November in your life, not yet by many months.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What you say is apt, perhaps,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;and may seem more apt than it is
+      since my name is Martin, though I am no saint.&rdquo; Then he shook off this
+      mood that he accounted selfish; this mood that would take her&mdash;as the
+      wolf takes the lamb&mdash;with no thought but for his own hunger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no!&rdquo; he cried out. &ldquo;It were unworthy in me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When I love you, Martin?&rdquo; she asked him gently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A moment he stared at her, as if through those clear eyes he would
+      penetrate to the very depths of her maiden soul. Then he sank on to his
+      knees before her as any stripling lover might have done, and kissed her
+      hands in token of the fact that he was conquered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Martin&rsquo;s Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. MARTIN&rsquo;S SUMMER ***
+
+***** This file should be named 2640-h.htm or 2640-h.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/2/6/4/2640/
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Project Gutenberg Volunteer, and David Widger
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase &ldquo;Project
+Gutenberg&rdquo;), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  &ldquo;Project Gutenberg&rdquo; is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (&ldquo;the Foundation&rdquo;
+ or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase &ldquo;Project Gutenberg&rdquo; appears, or with which the phrase &ldquo;Project
+Gutenberg&rdquo; is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase &ldquo;Project Gutenberg&rdquo; associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+&ldquo;Plain Vanilla ASCII&rdquo; or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original &ldquo;Plain Vanilla ASCII&rdquo; or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, &ldquo;Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.&rdquo;
+ 
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+&ldquo;Defects,&rdquo; such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the &ldquo;Right
+of Replacement or Refund&rdquo; described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you &lsquo;AS-IS&rsquo; WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm&rsquo;s
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation&rsquo;s EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state&rsquo;s laws.
+
+The Foundation&rsquo;s principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation&rsquo;s web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+
+</pre>
+  </body>
+</html>
diff --git a/2640.txt b/2640.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c0985fc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2640.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,10613 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost
+no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use
+it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
+eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: St. Martin's Summer
+
+Author: Rafael Sabatini
+
+Release Date: January 2, 2009 [EBook #2640]
+
+Last Updated: August 19, 2013
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. MARTIN'S SUMMER ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Project Gutenberg Volunteer, and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ST. MARTIN'S SUMMER
+
+By Rafael Sabatini
+
+
+Originally published in 1921
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER I. ��THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+
+CHAPTER II. ��MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+
+CHAPTER III. ��THE DOWAGER'S COMPLIANCE
+
+CHAPTER IV. ��THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+
+CHAPTER V. ��MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+
+CHAPTER VI. ��MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+
+CHAPTER VII. ��THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+
+CHAPTER VIII. ��THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+
+CHAPTER IX. ��THE SENESCHAL'S ADVICE
+
+CHAPTER X. ��THE RECRUIT
+
+CHAPTER XI. ��VALERIE'S GAOLER
+
+CHAPTER XII. ��A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+
+CHAPTER XIII. ��THE COURIER
+
+CHAPTER XIV. ��FLORIMOND'S LETTER
+
+CHAPTER XV. ��THE CONFERENCE
+
+CHAPTER XVI. ��THE UNEXPECTED
+
+CHAPTER XVII. ��HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. ��IN THE MOAT
+
+CHAPTER XIX. ��THROUGH THE NIGHT
+
+CHAPTER XX. ��FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+
+CHAPTER XXI. ��THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+
+CHAPTER XXII. ��THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. ����THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. ��SAINT MARTIN'S EVE
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+SAINT MARTIN'S SUMMER
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+
+My Lord of Tressan, His Majesty's Seneschal of Dauphiny, sat at his
+ease, his purple doublet all undone, to yield greater freedom to his
+vast bulk, a yellow silken undergarment visible through the gap, as is
+visible the flesh of some fruit that, swollen with over-ripeness, has
+burst its skin.
+
+His wig--imposed upon him by necessity, not fashion--lay on the table
+amid a confusion of dusty papers, and on his little fat nose, round
+and red as a cherry at its end, rested the bridge of his horn-rimmed
+spectacles. His bald head--so bald and shining that it conveyed an
+unpleasant sense of nakedness, suggesting that its uncovering had been
+an act of indelicacy on the owner's part--rested on the back of his
+great chair, and hid from sight the gaudy escutcheon wrought upon the
+crimson leather. His eyes were closed, his mouth open, and whether from
+that mouth or from his nose--or, perhaps, conflicting for issue between
+both--there came a snorting, rumbling sound to proclaim that my Lord the
+Seneschal was hard at work upon the King's business.
+
+Yonder, at a meaner table, in an angle between two windows, a pale-faced
+thread-bare secretary was performing for a yearly pittance the
+duties for which my Lord the Seneschal was rewarded by emoluments
+disproportionately large.
+
+The air of that vast apartment was disturbed by the sounds of Monsieur
+de Tressan's slumbers, the scratch and splutter of the secretary's
+pen, and the occasional hiss and crackle of the logs that burned in the
+great, cavern-like fireplace. Suddenly to these another sound was added.
+With a rasp and rattle the heavy curtains of blue velvet flecked with
+silver fleurs-de-lys were swept from the doorway, and the master of
+Monsieur de Tressan's household, in a well filled suit of black relieved
+by his heavy chain of office, stepped pompously forward.
+
+The secretary dropped his pen, and shot a frightened glance at his
+slumbering master; then raised his hands above his head, and shook them
+wildly at the head lackey.
+
+"Sh!" he whispered tragically. "Doucement, Monsieur Anselme."
+
+Anselme paused. He appreciated the gravity of the situation. His bearing
+lost some of its dignity; his face underwent a change. Then with a
+recovery of some part of his erstwhile resolution:
+
+"Nevertheless, he must be awakened," he announced, but in an undertone,
+as if afraid to do the thing he said must needs be done.
+
+The horror in the secretary's eyes increased, but Anselme's reflected
+none of it. It was a grave thing, he knew by former experience, to
+arouse His Majesty's Seneschal of Dauphiny from his after-dinner
+nap; but it was an almost graver thing to fail in obedience to that
+black-eyed woman below who was demanding an audience.
+
+Anselme realized that he was between the sword and the wall. He was,
+however, a man of a deliberate habit that was begotten of inherent
+indolence and nurtured among the good things that fell to his share as
+master of the Tressan household. Thoughtfully he caressed his tuft of
+red beard, puffed out his cheeks, and raised his eyes to the ceiling
+in appeal or denunciation to the heaven which he believed was somewhere
+beyond it.
+
+"Nevertheless, he must be awakened," he repeated.
+
+And then Fate came to his assistance. Somewhere in the house a door
+banged like a cannon-shot. Perspiration broke upon the secretary's brow.
+He sank limply back in his chair, giving himself up for lost. Anselme
+started and bit the knuckle of his forefinger in a manner suggesting an
+inarticulate imprecation.
+
+My Lord the Seneschal moved. The noise of his slumbers culminated in a
+sudden, choking grunt, and abruptly ceased. His eyelids rolled slowly
+back, like an owl's, revealing pale blue eyes, which fixed themselves
+first upon the ceiling, then upon Anselme. Instantly he sat up, puffing
+and scowling, his hands shuffling his papers.
+
+"A thousand devils! Anselme, why am I interrupted?" he grumbled
+querulously, still half-asleep. "What the plague do you want? Have you
+no thought for the King's affairs? Babylas"--this to his secretary--"did
+I not tell you that I had much to do; that I must not be disturbed?"
+
+It was the great vanity of the life of this man, who did nothing, to
+appear the busiest fellow in all France, and no audience--not even that
+of his own lackeys--was too mean for him to take the stage to in that
+predilect role.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte," said Anselme, in tones of abject self-effacement,
+"I had never dared intrude had the matter been of less urgency.
+But Madame the Dowager of Condillac is below. She begs to see Your
+Excellency instantly."
+
+At once there was a change. Tressan became wide-awake upon the instant.
+His first act was to pass one hand over the wax-like surface of his
+bald head, whilst his other snatched at his wig. Then he heaved himself
+ponderously out of his great chair. He donned his wig, awry in his
+haste, and lurched forward towards Anselme, his fat fingers straining at
+his open doublet and drawing it together.
+
+"Madame la Douairiere here?" he cried. "Make fast these buttons, rascal!
+Quick! Am I to receive a lady thus? Am I--? Babylas," he snapped,
+interrupting himself and turning aside even as Anselme put forth hands
+to do his bidding. "A mirror, from my closet! Dispatch!"
+
+The secretary was gone in a flash, and in a flash returned, even as
+Anselme completed his master's toilet. But clearly Monsieur de Tressan
+had awakened in a peevish humour, for no sooner were the buttons of
+his doublet secured than with his own fingers he tore them loose again,
+cursing his majordomo the while with vigour.
+
+"You dog, Anselme, have you no sense of fitness, no discrimination? Am
+I to appear in this garment of the mode of a half-century ago before
+Madame la Marquise? Take it off; take it off, man! Get me the coat that
+came last month from Paris--the yellow one with the hanging sleeves and
+the gold buttons, and a sash--the crimson sash I had from Taillemant.
+Can you move no quicker, animal? Are you still here?"
+
+Anselme, thus enjoined, lent an unwonted alacrity to his movements,
+waddling grotesquely like a hastening waterfowl. Between him and the
+secretary they dressed my Lord the Seneschal, and decked him out till he
+was fit to compare with a bird of paradise for gorgeousness of colouring
+if not for harmony of hues and elegance of outline.
+
+Babylas held the mirror, and Anselme adjusted the Seneschal's wig,
+whilst Tressan himself twisted his black mustachios--how they kept their
+colour was a mystery to his acquaintance--and combed the tuft of beard
+that sprouted from one of his several chins.
+
+He took a last look at his reflection, rehearsed a smile, and bade
+Anselme introduce his visitor. He desired his secretary to go to the
+devil, but, thinking better of it, he recalled him as he reached the
+door. His cherished vanity craved expression.
+
+"Wait!" said he. "There is a letter must be written. The King's business
+may not suffer postponement--not for all the dowagers in France. Sit
+down."
+
+Babylas obeyed him. Tressan stood with his back to the open door. His
+ears, strained to listen, had caught the swish of a woman's gown. He
+cleared his throat, and began to dictate:
+
+"To Her Majesty the Queen-Regent--" He paused, and stood with knitted
+brows, deep in thought. Then he ponderously repeated--"To Her Majesty
+the Queen Regent--Have you got that?"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Comte. 'To Her Majesty the Queen Regent.'"
+
+There was a step, and a throat-clearing cough behind him.
+
+"Monsieur de Tressan," said a woman's voice, a rich, melodious voice, if
+haughty and arrogant of intonation.
+
+On the instant he turned, advanced a step, and bowed.
+
+"Your humblest servant, madame," said he, his hand upon his heart. "This
+is an honour which--"
+
+"Which necessity thrusts upon you," she broke in imperiously. "Dismiss
+that fellow."
+
+The secretary, pale and shy, had risen. His eyes dilated at the woman's
+speech. He looked for a catastrophe as the natural result of her taking
+such a tone with this man who was the terror of his household and of
+all Grenoble. Instead, the Lord Seneschal's meekness left him breathless
+with surprise.
+
+"He is my secretary, madame. We were at work as you came. I was on the
+point of inditing a letter to Her Majesty. The office of Seneschal in
+a province such as Dauphiny is helas!--no sinecure." He sighed like
+one whose brain is weary. "It leaves a man little time even to eat or
+sleep."
+
+"You will be needing a holiday, then," said she, with cool insolence.
+"Take one for once, and let the King's business give place for half an
+hour to mine."
+
+The secretary's horror grew by leaps and bounds.
+
+Surely the storm would burst at last about this audacious woman's head.
+But the Lord Seneschal--usually so fiery and tempestuous--did no more
+than make her another of his absurd bows.
+
+"You anticipate, madame, the very words I was about to utter. Babylas,
+vanish!" And he waved the scribbler doorwards with a contemptuous hand.
+"Take your papers with you--into my closet there. We will resume that
+letter to Her Majesty when madame shall have left me."
+
+The secretary gathered up his papers, his quills, and his inkhorn, and
+went his way, accounting the end of the world at hand.
+
+When the door had closed upon him, the Seneschal, with another bow and
+a simper, placed a chair at his visitor's disposal. She looked at the
+chair, then looked at the man much as she had looked at the chair,
+and turning her back contemptuously on both, she sauntered towards the
+fireplace. She stood before the blaze, with her whip tucked under her
+arm, drawing off her stout riding-gloves. She was a tall, splendidly
+proportioned woman, of a superb beauty of countenance, for all that she
+was well past the spring of life.
+
+In the waning light of that October afternoon none would have guessed
+her age to be so much as thirty, though in the sunlight you might have
+set it at a little more. But in no light at all would you have guessed
+the truth, that her next would be her forty-second birthday. Her face
+was pale, of an ivory pallor that gleamed in sharp contrast with the
+ebony of her lustrous hair. Under the long lashes of low lids a pair of
+eyes black and insolent set off the haughty lines of her scarlet lips.
+Her nose was thin and straight, her neck an ivory pillar splendidly
+upright upon her handsome shoulders.
+
+She was dressed for riding, in a gown of sapphire velvet, handsomely
+laced in gold across the stomacher, and surmounted at the neck, where
+it was cut low and square, by the starched band of fine linen which in
+France was already replacing the more elaborate ruff. On her head, over
+a linen coif, she wore a tall-crowned grey beaver, swathed with a scarf
+of blue and gold.
+
+Standing by the hearth, one foot on the stone kerb, one elbow leaning
+lightly on the overmantel, she proceeded leisurely to remove her gloves.
+
+The Seneschal observed her with eyes that held an odd mixture of
+furtiveness and admiration, his fingers--plump, indolent-looking
+stumps--plucking at his beard.
+
+"Did you but know, Marquise, with what joy, with what a--"
+
+"I will imagine it, whatever it may be," she broke in, with that brusque
+arrogance that marked her bearing. "The time for flowers of rhetoric is
+not now. There is trouble coming, man; trouble, dire trouble."
+
+Up went the Seneschal's brows; his eyes grew wider.
+
+"Trouble?" quoth he. And, having opened his mouth to give exit to that
+single word, open he left it.
+
+She laughed lazily, her lip curling, her face twisting oddly, and
+mechanically she began to draw on again the glove she had drawn off.
+
+"By your face I see how well you understand me," she sneered. "The
+trouble concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye."
+
+"From Paris--does it come from Court?" His voice was sunk.
+
+She nodded. "You are a miracle of intuition today, Tressan."
+
+He thrust his tiny tuft of beard between his teeth--a trick he had when
+perplexed or thoughtful. "Ah!" he exclaimed at last, and it sounded like
+an indrawn breath of apprehension. "Tell me more."
+
+"What more is there to tell? You have the epitome of the story."
+
+"But what is the nature of the trouble? What form does it take, and by
+whom are you advised of it?"
+
+"A friend in Paris sent me word, and his messenger did his work well,
+else had Monsieur de Garnache been here before him, and I had not so
+much as had the mercy of this forewarning."
+
+"Garnache?" quoth the Count. "Who is Garnache?"
+
+"The emissary of the Queen-Regent. He has been dispatched hither by her
+to see that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye has justice and enlargement."
+
+Tressan fell suddenly to groaning and wringing his hands a pathetic
+figure had it been less absurd.
+
+"I warned you, madame! I warned you how it would end," he cried. "I told
+you--"
+
+"Oh, I remember the things you told me," she cut in, scorn in her voice.
+"You may spare yourself their repetition. What is done is done, and I'll
+not--I would not--have it undone. Queen-Regent or no Queen-Regent, I
+am mistress at Condillac; my word is the only law we know, and I intend
+that so it shall continue."
+
+Tressan looked at her in surprise. This unreasoning, feminine obstinacy
+so wrought upon him that he permitted himself a smile and a lapse into
+irony and banter.
+
+"Parfaitement," said he, spreading his hands, and bowing. "Why speak of
+trouble, then?"
+
+She beat her whip impatiently against her gown, her eyes staring into
+the fire. "Because, my attitude being such as it is, trouble will there
+be."
+
+The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and moved a step towards her. He
+was cast down to think that he might have spared himself the trouble
+of donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris. She had eyes for no
+finery that afternoon. He was cast down, too, to think how things might
+go with him when this trouble came. It entered his thoughts that he had
+lain long on a bed of roses in this pleasant corner of Dauphiny, and
+he was smitten now with fear lest of the roses he should find nothing
+remaining but the thorns.
+
+"How came the Queen-Regent to hear of--of
+mademoiselle's--ah--situation?" he inquired.
+
+The Marquise swung round upon him in a passion.
+
+"The girl found a dog of a traitor to bear a letter for her. That is
+enough. If ever chance or fate should bring him my way, by God! he shall
+hang without shrift."
+
+Then she put her anger from her; put from her, too, the insolence and
+scorn with which so lavishly she had addressed him hitherto. Instead she
+assumed a suppliant air, her beautiful eyes meltingly set upon his face.
+
+"Tressan," said she in her altered voice, "I am beset by enemies. But
+you will not forsake me? You will stand by me to the end--will you not,
+my friend? I can count upon you, at least?"
+
+"In all things, madame," he answered, under the spell of her gaze. "What
+force does this man Garnache bring with him? Have you ascertained?"
+
+"He brings none," she answered, triumph in her glance.
+
+"None?" he echoed, horror in his. "None? Then--then--"
+
+He tossed his arms to heaven, and stood a limp and shaken thing. She
+leaned forward, and regarded him stricken in surprise.
+
+"Diable! What ails you?" she snapped. "Could I have given you better
+news?"
+
+"If you could have given me worse, I cannot think what it might have
+been," he groaned. Then, as if smitten by a sudden notion that flashed a
+gleam of hope into this terrifying darkness that was settling down upon
+him, he suddenly looked up. "You mean to resist him?" he inquired.
+
+She stared at him a second, then laughed, a thought unpleasantly.
+
+"Pish! But you are mad," she scorned him. "Do you need ask if I intend
+to resist--I, with the strongest castle in Dauphiny? By God! sir, if you
+need to hear me say it, hear me then say that I shall resist him and
+as many as the Queen may send after him, for as long as one stone of
+Condillac shall stand upon another."
+
+The Seneschal blew out his lips, and fell once more to the chewing of
+his beard.
+
+"What did you mean when you said I could have given you no worse news
+than that of his coming alone?" she questioned suddenly.
+
+"Madame," said he, "if this man comes without force, and you resist the
+orders of which he is the bearer, what think you will betide?"
+
+"He will appeal to you for the men he needs that he may batter down my
+walls," she answered calmly.
+
+He looked at her incredulously. "You realize it?" he ejaculated. "You
+realize it?"
+
+"What is there in it that should puzzle a babe?"
+
+Her callousness was like a gust of wind upon the living embers of his
+fears. It blew them into a blaze of wrath, sudden and terrific as that
+of such a man at bay could be. He advanced upon her with the rolling
+gait of the obese, his cheeks purple, his arms waving wildly, his dyed
+mustachios bristling.
+
+"And what of me, madame?" he spluttered. "What of me? Am I to be ruined,
+gaoled, and hanged, maybe, for refusing him men?--for that is what is
+in your mind. Am I to make myself an outlaw? Am I, who have been Lord
+Seneschal of Dauphiny these fifteen years, to end my days in degradation
+in the cause of a woman's matrimonial projects for a simpering
+school-girl? Seigneur du Ciel!" he roared, "I think you are gone
+mad--mad, mad! over this affair. You would not think it too much to set
+the whole province in flames so that you could have your way with this
+wretched child. But, Ventregris! to ruin me--to--to--"
+
+He fell silent for very want of words; just gaped and gasped, and then,
+with hands folded upon his paunch, he set himself to pace the chamber.
+
+Madame de Condillac stood watching him, her face composed, her glance
+cold. She was like some stalwart oak, weathering with unshaken front
+a hurricane. When he had done, she moved away from the fireplace, and,
+beating her side gently with her whip, she stepped to the door.
+
+"Au revoir, Monsieur de Tressan," said she, mighty cool, her back
+towards him.
+
+At that he halted in his feverish stride, stood still and threw up his
+head. His anger went out, as a candle is extinguished by a puff of wind.
+And in its place a new fear crept into his heart.
+
+"Madame, madame!" he cried. "Wait! Hear me."
+
+She paused, half-turned, and looked at him over her shoulder, scorn in
+her glance, a sneer on her scarlet mouth, insolence in every line of
+her.
+
+"I think, monsieur, that I have heard a little more than enough," said
+she. "I am assured, at least, that in you I have but a fair-weather
+friend, a poor lipserver."
+
+"Ah, not that, madame," he cried, and his voice was stricken. "Say not
+that. I would serve you as would none other in all this world--you know
+it, Marquise; you know it."
+
+She faced about, and confronted him, her smile a trifle broader, as if
+amusement were now blending with her scorn.
+
+"It is easy to protest. Easy to say, 'I will die for you,' so long as
+the need for such a sacrifice be remote. But let me do no more than
+ask a favour, and it is, 'What of my good name, madame? What of my
+seneschalship? Am I to be gaoled or hanged to pleasure you?' Faugh!" she
+ended, with a toss of her splendid head. "The world is peopled with your
+kind, and I--alas! for a woman's intuitions--had held you different from
+the rest."
+
+Her words were to his soul as a sword of fire might have been to his
+flesh. They scorched and shrivelled it. He saw himself as she would have
+him see himself--a mean, contemptible craven; a coward who made big talk
+in times of peace, but faced about and vanished into hiding at the first
+sign of danger. He felt himself the meanest, vilest thing a-crawl upon
+this sinful earth, and she--dear God!--had thought him different from
+the ruck. She had held him in high esteem, and behold, how short had he
+not fallen of all her expectations! Shame and vanity combined to work a
+sudden, sharp revulsion in his feelings.
+
+"Marquise," he cried, "you say no more than what is just. But punish
+me no further. I meant not what I said. I was beside myself. Let me
+atone--let my future actions make amends for that odious departure from
+my true self."
+
+There was no scorn now in her smile; only an ineffable tenderness,
+beholding which he felt it in his heart to hang if need be that he might
+continue high in her regard. He sprang forward, and took the hand she
+extended to him.
+
+"I knew, Tressan," said she, "that you were not yourself, and that when
+you bethought you of what you had said, my valiant, faithful friend
+would not desert me."
+
+He stooped over her hand, and slobbered kisses upon her unresponsive
+glove.
+
+"Madame," said he, "you may count upon me. This fellow out of Paris
+shall have no men from me, depend upon it."
+
+She caught him by the shoulders, and held him so, before her. Her face
+was radiant, alluring; and her eyes dwelt on his with a kindness he had
+never seen there save in some wild daydream of his.
+
+"I will not refuse a service you offer me so gallantly," said she. "It
+were an ill thing to wound you by so refusing it."
+
+"Marquise," he cried, "it is as nothing to what I would do did the
+occasion serve. But when this thing 'tis done; when you have had your
+way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and the nuptials shall have been
+celebrated, then--dare I hope--?"
+
+He said no more in words, but his little blue eyes had an eloquence that
+left nothing to mere speech.
+
+Their glances met, she holding him always at arm's length by that grip
+upon his shoulders, a grip that was firm and nervous.
+
+In the Seneschal of Dauphiny, as she now gazed upon him, she beheld a
+very toad of a man, and the soul of her shuddered at the sight of him
+combining with the thing that he suggested. But her glance was steady
+and her lips maintained their smile, just as if that ugliness of his
+had been invested with some abstract beauty existing only to her gaze; a
+little colour crept into her cheeks, and red being the colour of love's
+livery, Tressan misread its meaning.
+
+She nodded to him across the little distance of her outstretched arms,
+then smothered a laugh that drove him crazed with hope, and breaking
+from him she sped swiftly, shyly it almost seemed to him, to the door.
+
+There she paused a moment looking back at him with a coyness that might
+have become a girl of half her years, yet which her splendid beauty
+saved from being unbecoming even in her.
+
+One adorable smile she gave him, and before he could advance to hold the
+door for her, she had opened it and passed out.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+
+To promise rashly, particularly where a woman is the suppliant, and
+afterwards, if not positively to repent the promise, at least to regret
+that one did not hedge it with a few conditions, is a proceeding
+not uncommon to youth. In a man of advanced age, such as Monsieur de
+Tressan, it never should have place; and, indeed, it seldom has, unless
+that man has come again under the sway of the influences by which youth,
+for good or ill, is governed.
+
+Whilst the flush of his adoration was upon him, hot from the contact
+of her presence, he knew no repentance, found room in his mind for no
+regrets. He crossed to the window, and pressed his huge round face to
+the pane, in a futile effort to watch her mount and ride out of the
+courtyard with her little troop of attendants. Finding that he might
+not--the window being placed too high--gratify his wishes in that
+connection, he dropped into his chair, and sat in the fast-deepening
+gloom, reviewing, fondly here, hurriedly there, the interview that had
+but ended.
+
+Thus night fell, and darkness settled down about him, relieved only
+by the red glow of the logs smouldering on the hearth. In the gloom
+inspiration visited him. He called for lights and Babylas. Both came,
+and he dispatched the lackey that lighted the tapers to summon Monsieur
+d'Aubran, the commander of the garrison of Grenoble.
+
+In the interval before the soldier's coming he conferred with Babylas
+concerning what he had in mind, but he found his secretary singularly
+dull and unimaginative. So that, perforce, he must fall back upon
+himself. He sat glum and thoughtful, his mind in unproductive travail,
+until the captain was announced.
+
+Still without any definite plan, he blundered headlong, nevertheless,
+into the necessary first step towards the fulfilment of his purpose.
+
+"Captain," said he, looking mighty grave, "I have cause to believe that
+all is not as it should be in the hills in the district of Montelimar."
+
+"Is there trouble, monsieur?" inquired the captain, startled.
+
+"Maybe there is, maybe there is not," returned the Seneschal
+mysteriously. "You shall have your full orders in the morning.
+Meanwhile, make ready to repair to the neighbourhood of Montelimar
+to-morrow with a couple of hundred men."
+
+"A couple of hundred, monsieur!" exclaimed d'Aubran. "But that will be
+to empty Grenoble of soldiers."
+
+"What of it? We are not likely to require them here. Let your orders for
+preparation go round tonight, so that your knaves may be ready to set
+out betimes to-morrow. If you will be so good as to wait upon me early
+you shall have your instructions."
+
+Mystified, Monsieur d'Aubran departed on his errand, and my Lord
+Seneschal went down to supper well pleased with the cunning device by
+which he was to leave Grenoble without a garrison. It was an astute way
+of escape from the awkward situation into which his attachment to the
+interests of the dowager of Condillac was likely to place him.
+
+But when the morning came he was less pleased with the idea, chiefly
+because he had been unable to invent any details that should lend it the
+necessary colour, and d'Aubran--worse luck--was an intelligent officer
+who might evince a pardonable but embarrassing curiosity. A leader of
+soldiers has a right to know something at least of the enterprise upon
+which he leads them. By morning, too, Tressan found that the intervening
+space of the night, since he had seen Madame de Condillac, had cooled
+his ardour very considerably.
+
+He had reached the incipient stages of regret of his rash promise.
+
+When Captain d'Aubran was announced to him, he bade them ask him to come
+again in an hour's time. From mere regrets he was passing now, through
+dismay, into utter repentance of his promise. He sat in his study,
+at his littered writing-table, his head in his hands, a confusion of
+thoughts, a wild, frenzied striving after invention in his brain.
+
+Thus Anselme found him when he thrust aside the portiere to announce
+that a Monsieur de Garnache, from Paris, was below, demanding to see the
+Lord Seneschal at once upon an affair of State.
+
+Tressan's flesh trembled and his heart fainted. Then, suddenly,
+desperately, he took his courage in both hands. He remembered who he was
+and what he was the King's Lord Seneschal of the Province of Dauphiny.
+Throughout that province, from the Rhone to the Alps, his word was law,
+his name a terror to evildoers--and to some others besides. Was he to
+blench and tremble at the mention of the name of a Court lackey out of
+Paris, who brought him a message from the Queen-Regent? Body of God! not
+he.
+
+He heaved himself to his feet, warmed and heartened by the thought; his
+eye sparkled, and there was a deeper flush than usual upon his cheek.
+
+"Admit this Monsieur de Garnache," said he with a fine loftiness, and in
+his heart he pondered what he would say and how he should say it; how he
+should stand, how move, and how look. His roving eye caught sight of his
+secretary. He remembered something--the cherished pose of being a man
+plunged fathoms-deep in business. Sharply he uttered his secretary's
+name.
+
+Babylas raised his pale face; he knew what was coming; it had come so
+many times before. But there was no vestige of a smile on his drooping
+lips, no gleam of amusement in his patient eye. He thrust aside the
+papers on which he was at work, and drew towards him a fresh sheet on
+which to pen the letter which, he knew by experience, Tressan was
+about to indite to the Queen-mother. For these purposes Her Majesty was
+Tressan's only correspondent.
+
+Then the door opened, the portiere was swept aside, and Anselme
+announced "Monsieur de Garnache."
+
+Tressan turned as the newcomer stepped briskly into the room, and
+bowed, hat in hand, its long crimson feather sweeping the ground, then
+straightened himself and permitted the Seneschal to take his measure.
+
+Tressan beheld a man of a good height, broad to the waist and spare
+thence to the ground, who at first glance appeared to be mainly clad in
+leather. A buff jerkin fitted his body; below it there was a glimpse of
+wine-coloured trunks, and hose of a slightly deeper hue, which vanished
+immediately into a pair of huge thighboots of untanned leather. A
+leather swordbelt, gold-embroidered at the edges, carried a long
+steel-halted rapier in a leather scabbard chaped with steel. The sleeves
+of his doublet which protruded from his leather casing were of the same
+colour and material as his trunks. In one hand he carried his broad
+black hat with its crimson feather, in the other a little roll of
+parchment; and when he moved the creak of leather and jingle of his
+spurs made pleasant music for a martial spirit.
+
+Above all, this man's head, well set upon his shoulders, claimed some
+attention. His nose was hooked and rather large, his eyes were blue,
+bright as steel, and set a trifle wide. Above a thin-lapped, delicate
+mouth his reddish mustachios, slightly streaked with grey, stood out,
+bristling like a cat's. His hair was darker--almost brown save at the
+temples, where age had faded it to an ashen colour. In general his
+aspect was one of rugged strength.
+
+The Seneschal, measuring him with an adversary's eye, misliked his
+looks. But he bowed urbanely, washing his hands in the air, and
+murmuring:
+
+"Your servant, Monsieur de--?"
+
+"Garnache," came the other's crisp, metallic voice, and the name had a
+sound as of an oath on his lips. "Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache.
+I come to you on an errand of Her Majesty's, as this my warrant will
+apprise you." And he proffered the paper he held, which Tressan accepted
+from his hand.
+
+A change was visible in the wily Seneschal's fat countenance. Its round
+expanse had expressed interrogation until now; but at the Parisian's
+announcement that he was an emissary of the Queen's, Tressan insinuated
+into it just that look of surprise and of increased deference which
+would have been natural had he not already been forewarned of Monsieur
+de Garnache's mission and identity.
+
+He placed a chair at his visitor's disposal, himself resuming his seat
+at his writing-table, and unfolding the paper Garnache had given him.
+The newcomer seated himself, hitched his sword-belt round so that he
+could lean both hands upon the hilt, and sat, stiff and immovable,
+awaiting the Lord Seneschal's pleasure. From his desk across the room
+the secretary, idly chewing the feathered end of his goose-quill, took
+silent stock of the man from Paris, and wondered.
+
+Tressan folded the paper carefully, and returned it to its owner. It
+was no more than a formal credential, setting forth that Garnache was
+travelling into Dauphiny on a State affair, and commanding Monsieur de
+Tressan to give him every assistance he might require in the performance
+of his errand.
+
+"Parfaitement," purred the Lord Seneschal. "And now, monsieur, if you
+will communicate to me the nature of your affair, you shall find me
+entirely at your service."
+
+"It goes without saying that you are acquainted with the Chateau de
+Condillac?" began Garnache, plunging straight into business.
+
+"Perfectly." The Seneschal leaned back, and was concerned to feel his
+pulses throbbing a shade too quickly. But he controlled his features,
+and maintained a placid, bland expression.
+
+"You are perhaps acquainted with its inhabitants?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Intimate with them?"
+
+The Seneschal pursed his lips, arched his brows, and slowly waved his
+podgy hands, a combination of grimace and gesture that said much or
+nothing. But reflecting that Monsieur de Tressan had a tongue, Garnache
+apparently did not opine it worth his while to set a strain upon his own
+imagination, for--
+
+"Intimate with them?" he repeated, and this time there was a sharper
+note in his voice.
+
+Tressan leaned forward and brought his finger-tips together. His voice
+was as urbane as it lay within its power to be.
+
+"I understood that monsieur was proposing to state his business, not to
+question mine."
+
+Garnache sat back in his chair, and his eyes narrowed. He scented
+opposition, and the greatest stumbling-block in Garnache's career had
+been that he could never learn to brook opposition from any man. That
+characteristic, evinced early in life, had all but been the ruin of him.
+He was a man of high intellectual gifts, of military skill and great
+resource; out of consideration for which had he been chosen by Marie de
+Medicis to come upon this errand. But he marred it all by a temper so
+ungovernable that in Paris there was current a byword, "Explosive as
+Garnache."
+
+Little did Tressan dream to what a cask of gunpowder he was applying the
+match of his smug pertness. Nor did Garnache let him dream it just yet.
+He controlled himself betimes, bethinking him that, after all, there
+might be some reason in what this fat fellow said.
+
+"You misapprehend my purpose, sir," said he, his lean brown hand
+stroking his long chin. "I but sought to learn how far already you may
+be informed of what is taking place up there, to the end that I may
+spare myself the pains of citing facts with which already you are
+acquainted. Still, monsieur, I am willing to proceed upon the lines
+which would appear to be more agreeable to yourself.
+
+"This, then, is the sum of the affair that brings me: The late Marquis
+de Condillac left two sons. The elder, Florimond--who is the present
+marquis, and who has been and still continues absent, warring in Italy,
+since before his father's death--is the stepson of the present Dowager,
+she being the mother of the younger son, Marius de Condillac.
+
+"Should you observe me to be anywhere at error, I beg, monsieur, that
+you will have the complaisance to correct me."
+
+The Seneschal bowed gravely, and Monsieur de Garnache continued:
+
+"Now this younger son--I believe that he is in his twenty-first year at
+present--has been something of a scapegrace."
+
+"A scapegrace? Bon Dieu, no. That is a harsh name to give him. A little
+indiscreet at times, a little rash, as is the way of youth."
+
+He would have said more, but the man from Paris was of no mind to waste
+time on quibbles.
+
+"Very well," he snapped, cutting in. "We will say, a little indiscreet.
+My errand is not concerned with Monsieur Marius's morals or with his
+lack of them. These indiscretions which you belittle appear to have been
+enough to have estranged him from his father, a circumstance which but
+served the more to endear him to his mother. I am told that she is a
+very handsome woman, and that the boy favours her surprisingly."
+
+"Ah!" sighed the Seneschal in a rapture. "A beautiful woman--a noble,
+splendid woman.'
+
+"Hum!" Garnache observed the ecstatic simper with a grim eye. Then he
+proceeded with his story.
+
+"The late marquis possessed in his neighbour, the also deceased Monsieur
+de La Vauvraye, a very dear and valued friend. Monsieur de La Vauvraye
+had an only child, a daughter, to inherit his very considerable estates
+probably the wealthiest in all Dauphiny, so I am informed. It was
+the dearest wish of his heart to transform what had been a lifelong
+friendship in his own generation into a closer relationship in the
+next--a wish that found a very ready echo in the heart of Monsieur de
+Condillac. Florimond de Condillac was sixteen years of age at the time,
+and Valerie de La Vauvraye fourteen. For all their tender years, they
+were betrothed, and they grew up to love each other and to look forward
+to the consummation of the plans their fathers had laid for them."
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," the Seneschal protested, "how can you possibly
+infer so much? How can you say that they loved each other? What
+authority can you have for pretending to know what was in their inmost
+hearts?"
+
+"The authority of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye," was the unanswerable
+rejoinder. "I am telling you, more or less, what she herself wrote to
+the Queen."
+
+"Ah! Well, well--proceed, monsieur."
+
+"This marriage should render Florimond de Condillac the wealthiest and
+most powerful gentleman in Dauphiny--one of the wealthiest in France;
+and the idea of it pleased the old marquis, inasmuch as the disparity
+there would be between the worldly possessions of his two sons would
+serve to mark his disapproval of the younger. But before settling down,
+Florimond signified a desire to see the world, as was fit and proper
+and becoming in a young man who was later to assume such wide
+responsibilities. His father, realizing the wisdom of such a step, made
+but slight objection, and at the age of twenty Florimond set out for the
+Italian wars. Two years afterwards, a little over six months ago, his
+father died, and was followed to the grave some weeks later by Monsieur
+de La Vauvraye. The latter, with a want of foresight which has given
+rise to the present trouble, misjudging the character of the Dowager
+of Condillac, entrusted to her care his daughter Valerie pending
+Florimond's return, when the nuptials would naturally be immediately
+celebrated. I am probably telling you no more than you already know.
+But you owe the infliction to your own unwillingness to answer my
+questions."
+
+"No, no, monsieur; I assure you that in what you say there is much that
+is entirely new to me."
+
+"I rejoice to hear it, Monsieur de Tressan," said Garnache very
+seriously, "for had you been in possession of all these facts, Her
+Majesty might have a right to learn how it chanced that you had nowise
+interfered in what is toward at Condillac.
+
+"But to proceed: Madame de Condillac and her precious Benjamin--this
+Marius--finding themselves, in Florimond's absence, masters of the
+situation, have set about turning it to their own best advantage.
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, whilst being nominally under their
+guardianship, finds herself practically gaoled by them, and odious plans
+are set before her to marry Marius. Could the Dowager but accomplish
+this, it would seem that she would not only be assuring a future of
+ease and dignity for her son, but also be giving vent to all her pent-up
+hatred of her stepson.
+
+"Mademoiselle, however, withstands them, and in this she is aided by
+a fortuitous circumstance which has arisen out of the overbearing
+arrogance that appears to be madame's chief characteristic. Condillac
+after the marquis's death had refused to pay tithes to Mother Church
+and has flouted and insulted the Bishop. This prelate, after finding
+remonstrance vain, has retorted by placing Condillac under an Interdict,
+depriving all within it of the benefit of clergy. Thus, they have been
+unable to find a priest to venture thither, so that even had they willed
+to marry mademoiselle by force to Marius, they lacked the actual means
+of doing so.
+
+"Florimond continues absent. We have every reason to believe that he has
+been left in ignorance of his father's death. Letters coming from him
+from time to time prove that he was alive and well at least until three
+months ago. A messenger has been dispatched to find him and urge him to
+return home at once. But pending his arrival the Queen has determined
+to take the necessary steps to ensure that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye
+shall be released from her captivity, that she shall suffer no further
+molestation at the hands of Madame de Condillac and her son--enfin, that
+she shall run no further risks.
+
+"My errand, monsieur, is to acquaint you with these facts, and to
+request you to proceed to Condillac and deliver thence Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye, whom I am subsequently to escort to Paris and place under
+Her Majesty's protection until such time as the new marquis shall return
+to claim her."
+
+Having concluded, Monsieur de Garnache sat back in his chair, and threw
+one leg over the other, fixing his eyes upon the Seneschal's face and
+awaiting his reply.
+
+On that gross countenance before him he saw fall the shadow of
+perplexity. Tressan was monstrous ill-at-ease, and his face lost a good
+deal of its habitual plethora of colour. He sought to temporize.
+
+"Does it not occur to you, monsieur, that perhaps too much importance
+may have been attached to the word of this child--this Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye?"
+
+"Does it occur to you that such has been the case, that she has
+overstated it?" counter-questioned Monsieur de Garnache.
+
+"No, no. I do not say that. But--but--would it not be
+better--more--ah--satisfactory to all concerned, if you yourself were
+to go to Condillac, and deliver your message in person, demanding
+mademoiselle?"
+
+The man from Paris looked at him a moment, then stood up suddenly, and
+shifted the carriages of his sword back to their normal position. His
+brows came together in a frown, from which the Seneschal argued that his
+suggestion was not well received.
+
+"Monsieur," said the Parisian very coldly, like a man who contains a
+rising anger, "let me tell you that this is the first time in my life
+that I have been concerned in anything that had to do with women and I
+am close upon forty years of age. The task, I can assure you, was little
+to my taste. I embarked upon it because, being a soldier and having
+received my orders, I was in the unfortunate position of being unable to
+help myself. But I intend, monsieur, to adhere rigidly to the letter of
+these commands. Already I have endured more than enough in the interests
+of this damsel. I have ridden from Paris, and that means close upon a
+week in the saddle--no little thing to a man who has acquired certain
+habits of life and developed a taste for certain minor comforts which he
+is very reluctant to forgo. I have fed and slept at inns, living on the
+worst of fares and sleeping on the hardest, and hardly the cleanest, of
+beds. Ventregris! Figure to yourself that last night we lay at Luzan,
+in the only inn the place contained--a hovel, Monsieur le Seneschal, a
+hovel in which I would not kennel a dog I loved."
+
+His face flushed, and his voice rose as he dwelt upon the things he had
+undergone.
+
+"My servant and I slept in a dormitory'--a thousand devils! monsieur, in
+a dormitory! Do you realize it? We had for company a drunken vintner,
+a pedlar, a pilgrim on his way to Rome, and two peasant women; and
+they sent us to bed without candles, for modesty's sake. I ask you to
+conceive my feelings in such a case as that. I could tell you more; but
+that as a sample of what I have undergone could scarcely be surpassed."
+
+"Truly-truly outrageous," sympathized the Seneschal; yet he grinned.
+
+"I ask you--have I not suffered inconvenience enough already in the
+service of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye that you can blame me if I refuse
+to go a single step further than my orders bid me?"
+
+The Seneschal stared at him now in increasing dismay. Had his own
+interests been less at issue he could have indulged his mirth at the
+other's fiery indignation at the inconveniences he recited. As it was,
+he had nothing to say; no thought or feeling other than what concerned
+finding a way of escape from the net that seemed to be closing in about
+him--how to seem to serve the Queen without turning against the Dowager
+of Condillac; how to seem to serve the Dowager without opposing the
+wishes of the Queen.
+
+"A plague on the girl!" he growled, unconsciously uttering his thoughts
+aloud. "The devil take her!"
+
+Garnache smiled grimly. "That is a bond of sympathy between us," said
+he. "I have said those very words a hundred times--a thousand times,
+indeed--between Paris and Grenoble. Yet I scarcely see that you can damn
+her with as much justice as can I.
+
+"But there, monsieur; all this is unprofitable. You have my message. I
+shall spend the day at Grenoble, and take a well-earned rest. By this
+time to-morrow I shall be ready to start upon my return journey. I
+shall have then the honour to wait upon you again, to the end that I
+may receive from you the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. I shall
+count upon your having her here, in readiness to set out with me, by
+noon to-morrow."
+
+He bowed, with a flourish of his plumed hat, and would with that have
+taken his departure but that the Seneschal stayed him.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," he cried, in piteous affright, "you do not know
+the Dowager of Condillac."
+
+"Why, no. What of it?"
+
+"What of it? Did you know her, you would understand that she is not the
+woman to be driven. I may order her in the Queen's name to deliver up
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But she will withstand me."
+
+"Withstand you?" echoed Garnache, frowning into the face of this fat
+man, who had risen also, brought to his feet by excitement. "Withstand
+you--you, the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny? You are amusing yourself at my
+expense."
+
+"But I tell you that she will," the other insisted in a passion. "You
+may look for the girl in vain tomorrow unless you go to Condillac
+yourself and take her."
+
+Garnache drew himself up and delivered his answer in a tone that was
+final.
+
+"You are the governor of the province, monsieur, and in this matter you
+have in addition the Queen's particular authority--nay, her commands are
+imposed upon you. Those commands, as interpreted by me, you will execute
+in the manner I have indicated."
+
+The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and chewed a second at his beard.
+
+"It is an easy thing for you to tell me what to do. Tell me, rather, how
+to do it, how to overcome her opposition."
+
+"You are very sure of opposition--strangely sure, monsieur," said
+Garnache, looking him between the eyes. "In any case, you have
+soldiers."
+
+"And so has she, and the strongest castle in southern France--to say
+nothing of the most cursed obstinacy in the world. What she says, she
+does."
+
+"And what the Queen says her loyal servants do," was Garnache's
+rejoinder, in a withering tone. "I think there is nothing more to be
+said, monsieur," he added. "By this time to-morrow I shall expect to
+receive from you, here, the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. A
+demain, donc, Monsieur le Seneschal."
+
+And with another bow the man from Paris drew himself erect, turned on
+his heel, and went jingling and creaking from the room.
+
+The Lord Seneschal sank back in his chair, and wondered to himself
+whether to die might not prove an easy way out of the horrid situation
+into which chance and his ill-starred tenderness for the Dowager of
+Condillac had thrust him.
+
+At his desk sat his secretary, who had been a witness of the interview,
+lost in wonder almost as great as the Seneschal's own.
+
+For an hour Tressan remained where he was, deep in thought and gnawing
+at his beard. Then with a sudden burst of passion, expressed in a round
+oath or two, he rose, and called for his horse that he might ride to
+Condillac.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. THE DOWAGER'S COMPLIANCE
+
+Promptly at noon on the morrow Monsieur de Garnache presented himself
+once more at the Seneschal's palace, and with him went Rabecque, his
+body-servant, a lean, swarthy, sharp-faced man, a trifle younger than
+his master.
+
+Anselme, the obese master of the household, received them with profound
+respect, and at once conducted Garnache to Monsieur de Tressan's
+presence.
+
+On the stairs they met Captain d'Aubran, who was descending. The captain
+was not in the best of humours. For four-and-twenty hours he had kept
+two hundred of his men under arms, ready to march as soon as he should
+receive his orders from the Lord Seneschal, yet those instructions were
+not forthcoming. He had been to seek them again that morning, only to be
+again put off.
+
+Monsieur de Garnache had considerable doubt, born of his yesterday's
+interview with the Seneschal, that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye would
+be delivered into his charge as he had stipulated. His relief was,
+therefore, considerable, upon being ushered into Tressan's presence,
+to find a lady in cloak and hat, dressed as for a journey, seated in a
+chair by the great fireplace.
+
+Tressan advanced to meet him, a smile of cordial welcome on his lips,
+and they bowed to each other in formal greeting.
+
+"You see, monsieur," said the Seneschal, waving a plump hand in the
+direction of the lady, "that you have been obeyed. Here is your charge."
+
+Then to the lady: "This is Monsieur de Garnache," he announced, "of whom
+I have already told you, who is to conduct you to Paris by order of Her
+Majesty.
+
+"And now, my good friends, however great the pleasure I derive from your
+company, I care not how soon you set out, for I have some prodigious
+arrears of work upon my hands."
+
+Garnache bowed to the lady, who returned his greeting by an inclination
+of the head, and his keen eyes played briskly over her. She was a
+plump-faced, insipid child, with fair hair and pale blue eyes, stolid
+and bovine in their expressionlessness.
+
+"I am quite ready, monsieur," said she, rising as she spoke, and
+gathering her cloak about her; and Garnache remarked that her voice had
+the southern drawl, her words the faintest suggestion of a patois. It
+was amazing how a lady born and bred could degenerate in the rusticity
+of Dauphiny. Pigs and cows, he made no doubt, had been her chief
+objectives. Yet, even so, he thought he might have expected that she
+would have had more to say to him than just those five words expressing
+her readiness to depart. He had looked for some acknowledgment of
+satisfaction at his presence, some utterances of gratitude either to
+himself or to the Queen-Regent for the promptness with which she had
+been succoured. He was disappointed, but he showed nothing of it, as
+with a simple inclination of the head--
+
+"Good!" said he. "Since you are ready and Monsieur le Seneschal is
+anxious to be rid of us, let us by all means be moving. You have a long
+and tedious journey before you, mademoiselle."
+
+"I--I am prepared for that," she faltered.
+
+He stood aside, and bending from the waist he made a sweeping gesture
+towards the door with the hand that held his hat. To the invitation to
+precede him she readily responded, and, with a bow to the Seneschal, she
+began to walk across the apartment.
+
+Garnache's eyes, narrowing slightly, followed her, like points of steel.
+Suddenly he shot a disturbing glance at Tressan's face, and the corner
+of his wild-cat mustachios twitched. He stood erect, and called her very
+sharply.
+
+"Mademoiselle!"
+
+She stopped, and turned to face him, an incredible shyness seeming to
+cause her to avoid his gaze.
+
+"You have, no doubt, Monsieur le Seneschal's word for my identity. But
+I think it is as well that you should satisfy yourself. Before placing
+yourself entirely in my care, as you are about to do, you would be well
+advised to assure yourself, that I am indeed Her Majesty's emissary.
+Will you be good enough to glance at this?"
+
+He drew forth as he spoke the letter in the queen's own hand, turned
+it upside down, and so presented it to her. The Seneschal looked on
+stolidly, a few paces distant.
+
+"But certainly, mademoiselle, assure yourself that this gentleman is no
+other than I have told you."
+
+Thus enjoined, she took the letter; for a second her eyes met Garnache's
+glittering gaze, and she shivered. Then she bent her glance to the
+writing, and studied it a moment, what time the man from Paris watched
+her closely.
+
+Presently she handed it back to him.
+
+"Thank you, monsieur," was all she said.
+
+"You are satisfied that it is in order, mademoiselle?" he inquired, and
+a note of mockery too subtle for her or the Seneschal ran through his
+question.
+
+"I am quite satisfied."
+
+Garnache turned to Tressan. His eyes were smiling, but unpleasantly,
+and in his voice when he spoke there was something akin to the distant
+rumble that heralds an approaching storm.
+
+"Mademoiselle," said he, "has received an eccentric education."
+
+"Eh?" quoth Tressan, perplexed.
+
+"I have heard tell, monsieur, of a people somewhere in the East who
+read and write from right to left; but never yet have I heard tell of
+any--particularly in France--so oddly schooled as to do their reading
+upside down."
+
+Tressan caught the drift of the other's meaning. He paled a little,
+and sucked his lip, his eyes wandering to the girl, who stood in stolid
+inapprehension of what was being said.
+
+"Did she do that?" said he, and he scarcely knew what he was saying;
+all that he realized was that it urged him to explain this thing.
+"Mademoiselle's education has been neglected--a by no means uncommon
+happening in these parts. She is sensitive of it; she seeks to hide the
+fact."
+
+Then the storm broke about their heads. And it crashed and thundered
+awfully in the next few minutes.
+
+"O liar! O damned, audacious liar," roared Garnache uncompromisingly,
+advancing a step upon the Seneschal, and shaking the parchment
+threateningly in his very face, as though it were become a weapon of
+offence. "Was it to hide the fact that she had not been taught to write
+that she sent the Queen a letter pages-long? Who is this woman?" And the
+finger he pointed at the girl quivered with the rage that filled him at
+this trick they had thought to put upon him.
+
+Tressan sought refuge in offended dignity. He drew himself up, threw
+back his head, and looked the Parisian fiercely in the eye.
+
+"Since you take this tone with me, monsieur--"
+
+"I take with you--as with any man--the tone that to me seems best. You
+miserable fool! As sure as you're a rogue this affair shall cost you
+your position. You have waxed fat and sleek in your seneschalship; this
+easy life in Dauphiny appears to have been well suited to your health.
+But as your paunch has grown, so, of a truth, have your brains dwindled,
+else had you never thought to cheat me quite so easily.
+
+"Am I some lout who has spent his days herding swine, think you, that
+you could trick me into believing this creature to be Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye--this creature with the mien of a peasant, with a breath
+reeking of garlic like a third-rate eating-house, and the walk of a
+woman who has never known footgear until this moment? Tell me, sir, for
+what manner of fool did you take me?"
+
+The Seneschal stood with blanched face and gaping mouth, his fire all
+turned to ashes before the passion of this gaunt man.
+
+Garnache paid no heed to him. He stepped to the girl, and roughly raised
+her chin with his hand so that she was forced to look him in the face.
+
+"What is your name, wench?" he asked her.
+
+"Margot," she blubbered, bursting into tears.
+
+He dropped her chin, and turned away with a gesture of disgust.
+
+"Get you gone," he bade her harshly. "Get you back to the kitchen or the
+onion-field from which they took you."
+
+And the girl, scarce believing her good fortune, departed with a speed
+that bordered on the ludicrous. Tressan had naught to say, no word to
+stay her with; pretence, he realized, was vain.
+
+"Now, my Lord Seneschal," quoth Garnache, arms akimbo, feet planted
+wide, and eyes upon the wretched man's countenance, "what may you have
+to say to me?"
+
+Tressan shifted his position; he avoided the other's glance; he was
+visibly trembling, and when presently he spoke it was in faltering
+accents.
+
+"It--it--seems, monsieur, that--ah--that I have been the victim of some
+imposture."
+
+"It had rather seemed to me that the victim chosen was myself."
+
+"Clearly we were both victims," the Seneschal rejoined. Then he
+proceeded to explain. "I went to Condillac yesterday as you desired me,
+and after a stormy interview with the Marquise I obtained from her--as
+I believed--the person of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. You see I was not
+myself acquainted with the lady."
+
+Garnache looked at him. He did not believe him. He regretted almost that
+he had not further questioned the girl. But, after all, perhaps it
+might be easier and more expedient if he were to appear to accept the
+Seneschal's statement. But he must provide against further fraud.
+
+"Monsieur le Seneschal," said he in calmer tones, putting his anger
+from him, "at the best you are a blunderer and an ass, at the worst
+a traitor. I will inquire no further at present; I'll not seek to
+discriminate too finely."
+
+"Monsieur, these insults--" began the Seneschal, summoning dignity to
+his aid. But Garnache broke in:
+
+"La, la! I speak in the Queen's name. If you have thought to aid the
+Dowager of Condillac in this resistance of Her Majesty's mandate, let
+me enjoin you, as you value your seneschalship--as you value your very
+neck--to harbour that thought no longer.
+
+"It seems that, after all, I must deal myself with the situation. I must
+go myself to Condillac. If they should resist me, I shall look to you
+for the necessary means to overcome that resistance.
+
+"And bear you this in mind: I have chosen to leave it an open question
+whether you were a party to the trick it has been sought to put upon the
+Queen, through me, her representative. But it is a question that I have
+it in my power to resolve at any moment--to resolve as I choose.
+Unless, monsieur, I find you hereafter--as I trust--actuated by the most
+unswerving loyalty, I shall resolve that question by proclaiming you
+a traitor; and as a traitor I shall arrest you and carry you to Paris.
+Monsieur le Seneschal, I have the honour to give you good-day!"
+
+When he was gone, Monsieur de Tressan flung off his wig, and mopped the
+perspiration from his brow. He went white as snow and red as fire by
+turns, as he paced the apartment in a frenzy. Never in the fifteen
+years that were sped since he had been raised to the governorship of
+the province had any man taken such a tone with him and harangued him in
+such terms.
+
+A liar and a traitor had he been called that morning, a knave and a
+fool; he had been browbeaten and threatened; and he had swallowed it
+all, and almost turned to lick the hand that administered the dose.
+Dame! What manner of cur was he become? And the man who had done
+all this--a vulgar upstart out of Paris, reeking of leather and the
+barrack-room still lived!
+
+Bloodshed was in his mind; murder beckoned him alluringly to take her as
+his ally. But he put the thought from him, frenzied though he might be.
+He must fight this knave with other weapons; frustrate his mission, and
+send him back to Paris and the Queen's scorn, beaten and empty-handed.
+
+"Babylas!" he shouted.
+
+Immediately the secretary appeared.
+
+"Have you given thought to the matter of Captain d'Aubran?" he asked,
+his voice an impatient snarl.
+
+"Yes, monsieur, I have pondered it all morning."
+
+"Well? And what have you concluded?"
+
+"Helas! monsieur, nothing."
+
+Tressan smote the table before him a blow that shook some of the dust
+out of the papers that cumbered it. "Ventregris! How am I served? For
+what do I pay you, and feed you, and house you, good-for-naught, if you
+are to fail me whenever I need the things you call your brains? Have you
+no intelligence, no thought, no imagination? Can you invent no plausible
+business, no likely rising, no possible disturbances that shall justify
+my sending Aubran and his men to Montelimar--to the very devil, if need
+be."
+
+The secretary trembled in his every limb; his eyes shunned his master's
+as his master's had shunned Garnache's awhile ago. The Seneschal was
+enjoying himself. If he had been bullied and browbeaten, here, at least,
+was one upon whom he, in his turn, might taste the joys of bullying and
+browbeating.
+
+"You lazy, miserable calf," he stormed, "I might be better served by
+a wooden image. Go! It seems I must rely upon myself. It is always so.
+Wait!" he thundered; for the secretary, only too glad to obey his last
+order, had already reached the door. "Tell Anselme to bid the Captain
+attend me here at once."
+
+Babylas's bowed and went his errand.
+
+A certain amount of his ill-humour vented, Tressan made an effort to
+regain his self-control. He passed his handkerchief for the last time
+over face and head, and resumed his wig.
+
+When d'Aubran entered, the Seneschal was composed and in his wonted
+habit of ponderous dignity. "Ah, d'Aubran," said he, "your men are
+ready?"
+
+"They have been ready these four-and-twenty hours, monsieur."
+
+"Good. You are a brisk soldier, d'Aubran. You are a man to be relied
+upon."
+
+D'Aubran bowed. He was a tall, active young fellow with a pleasant face
+and a pair of fine black eyes.
+
+"Monsieur le Seneschal is very good."
+
+With a wave of the hand the Seneschal belittled his own goodness.
+
+"You will march out of Grenoble within the hour, Captain, and you will
+lead your men to Montelimar. There you will quarter them, and await
+my further orders. Babylas will give you a letter to the authorities,
+charging them to find you suitable quarters. While there, d'Aubran, and
+until my further orders reach you, you will employ your time in probing
+the feeling in the hill district. You understand?"
+
+"Imperfectly," d'Aubran confessed.
+
+"You will understand better when you have been in Montelimar a week or
+so. It may, of course, be a false alarm. Still, we must safeguard the
+King's interests and be prepared. Perhaps we may afterwards be charged
+with starting at shadows; but it is better to be on the alert from the
+moment the shadow is perceived than to wait until the substance itself
+has overwhelmed us."
+
+It sounded so very much as if the Seneschal's words really had some
+hidden meaning, that d'Aubran, if not content with going upon an errand
+of which he knew so little, was, at least, reconciled to obey the orders
+he received. He uttered words that conveyed some such idea to Tressan's
+mind, and within a half-hour he was marching out of Grenoble with
+beating drums, on his two days' journey to Montelimar.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+
+As Captain d'Aubran and his troop were speeding westwards from Grenoble,
+Monsieur de Garnache, ever attended by his man, rode briskly in the
+opposite direction, towards the grey towers of Condillac, that reared
+themselves towards the greyer sky above the valley of the Isere. It was
+a chill, dull, autumnal day, with a raw wind blowing from the Alps; its
+breath was damp, and foretold of the rain that was likely to come anon,
+the rain with which the clouds hanging low about the distant hills were
+pregnant.
+
+But Monsieur de Garnache was totally insensible to his surroundings; his
+mind was very busy with the interview from which he had come, and
+the interview to which he was speeding. Once he permitted himself a
+digression, that he might point a moral for the benefit of his servant.
+
+"You see, Rebecque, what a plague it is to have to do with women. Are
+you sufficiently grateful to me for having quelled your matrimonial
+ardour of two months ago? No, you are not. Grateful you may be;
+sufficiently grateful, never; it would be impossible. No gratitude could
+be commensurate with the benefit I conferred upon you. Yet if you had
+married, and discovered for yourself the troubles that come from too
+close an association with that sex which some wag of old ironically
+called the weaker, and of which contemporary fools with no sense of
+irony continue so to speak in good faith, you could have blamed only
+yourself. You would have shrugged your shoulders and made the best of
+it, realizing that no other man had put this wrong upon you. But with
+me--thousand devils!--it is very different. I am a man who, in one
+particular at least, has chosen his way of life with care; I have seen
+to it that I should walk a road unencumbered by any petticoat. What
+happens? What comes of all my careful plans?
+
+"Fate sends an infernal cut-throat to murder our good king--whose soul
+God rest eternally! And since his son is of an age too tender to wield
+the sceptre, the boy's mother does it in his name. Thus, I, a soldier,
+being subject to the head of the State, find myself, by no devising of
+my own, subject to a woman.
+
+"In itself that is bad enough. Too bad, indeed--Ventregris!--too bad.
+Yet Fate is not content. It must occur to this woman to select me--me
+of all men--to journey into Dauphiny, and release another woman from
+the clutches of yet a third. And to what shifts are we not put, to what
+discomforts not subjected? You know them, Rabecque, for you have shared
+them with me. But it begins to break upon my mind that what we have
+endured may be as nothing to what may lie before us. It is an ill thing
+to have to do with women. Yet you, Rabecque, would have deserted me for
+one of them!"
+
+Rabecque was silent. Maybe he was ashamed of himself; or maybe that,
+not agreeing with his master, he had yet sufficient appreciation of
+his position to be discreetly silent where his opinions might be at
+variance. Thus Garnache was encouraged to continue.
+
+"And what is all this trouble about, which they have sent me to set
+right? About a marriage. There is a girl wants to marry one man, and
+a woman who wants to marry her to another. Ponder the possibilities of
+tragedy in such a situation. Half this world's upheavals have had their
+source in less. Yet you, Rabecque, would have married!"
+
+Necessity at last turned his discourse to other matters.
+
+"Tell me, now," said he abruptly, in a different tone, "is there
+hereabouts a ford?"
+
+"There is a bridge up yonder, monsieur," returned the servant, thankful
+to have the conversation changed.
+
+They rode towards it in silence, Garnache's eyes set now upon the grey
+pile that crowned the hillock, a half-mile away, on the opposite bank of
+the stream. They crossed the bridge and rode up the gently rising, bare,
+and rugged ground towards Condillac. The place wore an entirely peaceful
+air, strong and massive though it appeared. It was encircled by a ditch,
+but the drawbridge was down, and the rust on its chains argued that long
+had it been so.
+
+None coming to challenge them, the pair rode across the planks, and
+the dull thud of their hooves started into activity some one in the
+gatehouse.
+
+A fellow rudely clad--a hybrid between man-at-arms and lackey--lounged
+on a musket to confront them in the gateway. Monsieur de Garnache
+announced his name, adding that he came to crave an audience of Madame
+la Marquise, and the man stood aside to admit him. Thus he and Rabecque
+rode forward into the roughly paved courtyard.
+
+From several doorways other men emerged, some of martial bearing,
+showing that the place was garrisoned to some extent. Garnache took
+little heed of them. He flung his reins to the man whom he had first
+addressed--the fellow had kept pace beside him--and leapt nimbly to the
+ground, bidding Rabecque await him there.
+
+The soldier lackey resigned the reins to Rabecque, and requested
+Monsieur de Garnache to follow him. He led the way through a door on
+the left, down a passage and across an anteroom, and ushered the visitor
+finally into a spacious, gloomy hall, panelled in black oak and lighted
+as much by the piled-up fire that flared on the noble hearth as by the
+grey daylight that filtered through the tall mullioned windows.
+
+As they entered, a liver-coloured hound that lay stretched before the
+fire growled lazily, and showed the whites of his eyes. Paying little
+attention to the dog, Garnache looked about him. The apartment was
+handsome beyond praise, in a sombre, noble fashion. It was hung
+with pictures of departed Condillacs--some of them rudely wrought
+enough--with trophies of ancient armour, and with implements of the
+chase. In the centre stood an oblong table of black oak, very richly
+carved about its massive legs, and in a china bowl, on this, an armful
+of late roses filled the room with their sweet fragrance.
+
+Then Garnache espied a page on the window-seat, industriously burnishing
+a cuirass. He pursued his task, indifferent to the newcomer's advent,
+until the knave who had conducted thither the Parisian called the boy
+and bade him go tell the Marquise that a Monsieur de Garnache, with a
+message from the Queen-Regent, begged an audience.
+
+The boy rose, and simultaneously, out of a great chair by the hearth,
+whose tall back had hitherto concealed him, there rose another figure.
+This was a stripling of some twenty summers--twenty-one, in fact--of
+a pale, beautifully featured face, black hair and fine black eyes, and
+very sumptuously clad in a suit of shimmering silk whose colour shifted
+from green to purple as he moved.
+
+Monsieur de Garnache assumed that he was in the presence of Marius de
+Condillac. He bowed a trifle stiffly, and was surprised to have his bow
+returned with a graciousness that amounted almost to cordiality.
+
+"You are from Paris, monsieur?" said the young man, in a gentle,
+pleasant voice. "I fear you have had indifferent weather for your
+journey."
+
+Garnache thought of other things besides the weather that he had found
+indifferent, and he felt warmed almost to the point of anger at the very
+recollection. But he bowed again, and answered amiably enough.
+
+The young man offered him a seat, assuring him that his mother would not
+keep him waiting long. The page had already gone upon his errand.
+
+Garnache took the proffered chair, and sank down with creak and jingle
+to warm himself at the fire.
+
+"From what you have said, I gather that you are Monsieur Marius de
+Condillac," said he. "I, as you may have heard me announced by your
+servant, am Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache--at your service."
+
+"We have heard of you, Monsieur de Garnache," said the youth as he
+crossed his shapely legs of silken violet, and fingered the great pearl
+that depended from his ear. "But we had thought that by now you would be
+on your way to Paris."
+
+"No doubt--with Margot," was the grim rejoinder.
+
+But Marius either gathered no suggestion from its grimness, or did not
+know the name Garnache uttered, for he continued:
+
+"We understood that you were to escort Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to
+Paris, to place her under the tutelage of the Queen-Regent. I will not
+conceal from you that we were chagrined at the reflection cast upon
+Condillac; nevertheless, Her Majesty's word is law in Dauphiny as much
+as it is in Paris."
+
+"Quite as much, and I am relieved to hear you confess it," said Garnache
+drily, and he scanned more closely the face of this young man. He found
+cause to modify the excellent impression he had received at first.
+Marius's eyebrows were finely pencilled, but they arched a shade too
+much, and his eyes were set a trifle too closely; the mouth, which
+had seemed beautiful at first, looked, in addition, on this closer
+inspection, weak, sensual, and cruel.
+
+There fell upon the momentary silence the sound of an opening door, and
+both men rose simultaneously to their feet.
+
+In the splendid woman that entered, Monsieur de Garnache saw a wonderful
+likeness to the boy who stood beside him. She received the emissary very
+graciously. Marius set a chair for her between the two they had been
+occupying, and thus interchanging phrases of agreeable greeting the
+three sat down about the hearth with every show of the greatest amity.
+
+A younger man might have been put out of countenance; the woman's
+surpassing beauty, her charm of manner, her melodious voice, falling
+on the ear soft and gentle as a caress, might have turned a man of less
+firmness a little from his purpose, a little perhaps from his loyalty
+and the duty that had brought him all the way from Paris. But Monsieur
+de Garnache was to her thousand graces as insensible as a man of stone.
+And he came to business briskly. He had no mind to spend the day at her
+fireside in pleasant, meaningless talk.
+
+"Madame," said he, "monsieur your son informs me that you have heard of
+me and of the business that brings me into Dauphiny. I had not looked
+for the honour of journeying quite so far as Condillac; but since
+Monsieur de Tressan, whom I made my ambassador, appears to have failed
+so signally, I am constrained to inflict my presence upon you."
+
+"Inflict?" quoth she, with a pretty look of make-believe dismay. "How
+harsh a word, monsieur!"
+
+The smoothness of the implied compliment annoyed him.
+
+"I will use any word you think more adequate, madame, if you will
+suggest it," he answered tartly.
+
+"There are a dozen I might suggest that would better fit the case--and
+with more justice to yourself," she answered, with a smile that revealed
+a gleam of white teeth behind her scarlet lips. "Marcus, bid Benoit
+bring wine. Monsieur de Garnache will no doubt be thirsting after his
+ride."
+
+Garnache said nothing. Acknowledge the courtesy he would not; refuse it
+he could not. So he sat, and waited for her to speak, his eyes upon the
+fire.
+
+Madame had already set herself a course. Keener witted than her son, she
+had readily understood, upon Garnache's being announced to her, that his
+visit meant the failure of the imposture by which she had sought to be
+rid of him.
+
+"I think, monsieur," she said presently, watching him from under her
+lids, "that we have, all of us who are concerned in Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye's affairs, been at cross-purposes. She is an impetuous,
+impulsive child, and it happened that some little time ago we had
+words--such things will happen in the most united families. Whilst the
+heat of her foolish anger was upon her, she wrote a letter to the
+Queen, in which she desired to be removed from my tutelage. Since then,
+monsieur, she has come to repent her of it. You, who no doubt understand
+a woman's mind--"
+
+"Set out upon no such presumption, madame," he interrupted. "I know as
+little of a woman's mind as any man who thinks he knows a deal--and that
+is nothing."
+
+She laughed as at an excellent jest, and Marius, overhearing Garnache's
+retort as he was returning to resume his seat, joined in her laugh.
+
+"Paris is a fine whetstone for a man's wits," said he.
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I take it, madame, that you wish me to understand that Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye, repenting of her letter, desires no longer to repair to
+Paris; desires, in fact, to remain here at Condillac in your excellent
+care."
+
+"You apprehend the position exactly, monsieur."
+
+"To my mind," said he, "it presents few features difficult of
+apprehension."
+
+Marius's eyes flashed his mother a look of relief; but the Marquise, who
+had an ear more finely trained, caught the vibration of a second meaning
+in the emissary's words.
+
+"All being as you say, madame," he continued, "will you tell me why,
+instead of some message to this purport, you sent Monsieur de Tressan
+back to me with a girl taken from some kitchen or barnyard, whom it was
+sought to pass off upon me as Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye?"
+
+The Marquise laughed, and her son, who had shown signs of perturbation,
+taking his cue from her, laughed too.
+
+"It was a jest, monsieur"--she told him, miserably conscious that the
+explanation could sound no lamer.
+
+"My compliments, madame, upon the humour that prevails in Dauphiny. But
+your jest failed of its purpose. It did not amuse me, nor, so far as I
+could discern, was Monsieur de Tressan greatly taken with it. But all
+this is of little moment, madame," he continued. "Since you tell me that
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye is content to remain here, I am satisfied
+that it is so."
+
+They were the very words that she desired to hear from him; yet his
+manner of uttering them gave her little reassurance. The smile on her
+lips was forced; her watchful eyes smiled not at all.
+
+"Still," he continued, "you will be so good as to remember that I am not
+my own master in this affair. Were that so, I should not fail to relieve
+you at once of my unbidden presence."
+
+"Oh, monsieur--"
+
+"But, being the Queen's emissary, I have her orders to obey, and those
+orders are to convey Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to Paris. They make
+no allowance for any change that may have occurred in mademoiselle's
+inclinations. If the journey is now distasteful to her, she has but her
+own rashness to blame in having sought it herself. What imports is that
+she is bidden by the Queen to repair to Paris; as a loyal subject she
+must obey the Queen's commands; you, as a loyal subject, must see to
+it that she obeys them. So, madame, I count upon your influence with
+mademoiselle to see that she is ready to set out by noon to-morrow.
+One day already has been wasted me by your--ah--jest, madame. The Queen
+likes her ambassadors to be brisk."
+
+The Dowager reclined in her chair, and bit her lip. This man was too
+keen for her. She had no illusions. He had seen through her as if she
+had been made of glass; he had penetrated her artifices and detected
+her falsehoods. Yet feigning to believe her and them, he had first
+neutralized her only weapons--other than offensive--then used them for
+her own defeat. Marius it was who took up the conversation.
+
+"Monsieur," he cried--and there was a frown drawing together his fine
+brows--"what you suggest amounts to a tyranny on the Queen's part."
+
+Garnache was on his feet, his chair grating the polished floor.
+
+"Monsieur says?" quoth he, his glittering eye challenging the rash boy
+to repeat his words.
+
+But the Dowager intervened with a little trill of laughter.
+
+"Bon Dieu! Marius, what are you saying? Foolish boy! And you, Monsieur
+de Garnache, do not heed him, I beg you. We are so far from Court in
+this little corner of Dauphiny, and my son has been reared in so free
+an atmosphere that he is sometimes betrayed into expressions whose
+impropriety he does not realize."
+
+Garnache bowed in token of his perfect satisfaction, and at that moment
+two servants entered bearing flagons and beakers, fruits and sweetmeats,
+which they placed upon the table. The Dowager rose, and went to do the
+honours of the board. The servants withdrew.
+
+"You will taste our wine of Condillac, monsieur?"
+
+He acquiesced, expressing thanks, and watched her fill a beaker for him,
+one for herself, and another for her son. She brought him the cup in
+her hands. He took it with a grave inclination of the head. Then she
+proffered him the sweetmeats. To take one, he set down the cup on the
+table, by which he had also come to stand. His left hand was gloved and
+held his beaver and whip.
+
+She nibbled, herself, at one of the comfits, and he followed her
+example. The boy, a trifle sullen since the last words, stood on the
+hearth with his back to the fire, his hands clasped behind him.
+
+"Monsieur," she said, "do you think it would enable you to comply
+with what I have signified to be not only our own wishes, but those of
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye herself, if she were to state them to you?"
+
+He looked up sharply, his lips parting in a smile that revealed his
+strong white teeth.
+
+"Are you proposing another of your jests, madame?"
+
+She laughed outright. A wonderful assurance was hers, thought Monsieur
+de Garnache. "Mon Dieu! no, monsieur," she cried. "If you will, you may
+see the lady herself."
+
+He took a turn in the apartment, idly, as does a man in thought.
+
+"Very well," said he, at last. "I do not say that it will alter my
+determination. But perhaps--yes, I should be glad of an opportunity of
+the honour of making Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye's acquaintance. But no
+impersonations, I beg, madame!" He said it half-laughingly, taking his
+cue from her.
+
+"You need have no fear of any."
+
+She walked to the door, opened it, and called "Gaston!" In answer came
+the page whom Garnache had found in the room when he was admitted.
+
+"Desire Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to come to us here at once," she
+bade the boy, and closed the door.
+
+Garnache had been all eyes for some furtive sign, some whispered word;
+but he had surprised neither.
+
+His pacing had brought him to the opposite end of the board, where stood
+the cup of wine madame had poured for Marius. His own, Garnache had left
+untouched. As if abstractedly, he now took up the beaker, pledged madame
+with his glance, and drank. She watched him, and suddenly a suspicion
+darted through her mind--a suspicion that he suspected them.
+
+Dieu! What a man was this! He took no chances. Madame reflected that
+this augured ill for the success of the last resource upon which, should
+all else fail, she was counting to keep mademoiselle at Condillac. It
+seemed incredible that one so wary and watchful should have committed
+the rashness of venturing alone into Condillac without taking his
+precautions to ensure his ability to retreat.
+
+In her heart she felt daunted by him. But in the matter of that
+wine--the faintest of smiles hovered on her lips, her eyebrows went up
+a shade. Then she took up the cup that had been poured for the Parisian,
+and bore it to her son.
+
+"Marius, you are not drinking," said she. And seeing a command in her
+eyes; he took the beaker from her hand and bore it to his lips, emptying
+the half of it, whilst with the faintest smile of scorn the Dowager
+swept Garnache a glance of protest, as of one repudiating an unworthy
+challenge.
+
+Then the door opened, and the eyes of all three were centred upon the
+girl that entered.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+
+"You sent for me, madame," said the girl, seeming to hesitate upon the
+threshold of the room, and her voice--a pleasant, boyish contralto--was
+very cold and conveyed a suggestion of disdain.
+
+The Marquise detected that inauspicious note, and was moved by it to
+regret her already of having embarked upon so bold a game as to confront
+Monsieur de Garnache with Valerie. It was a step she had decided upon
+as a last means of convincing the Parisian of the truth of her statement
+touching the change that had taken place in mademoiselle's inclinations.
+And she had provided for it as soon as she heard of Garnache's arrival
+by informing mademoiselle that should she be sent for, she must tell
+the gentleman from Paris that it was her wish to remain at Condillac.
+Mademoiselle had incontinently refused, and madame, to win her
+compliance, had resorted to threats.
+
+"You will do as you consider best, of course," she had said, in a voice
+that was ominously sweet. "But I promise you that if you do otherwise
+than as I tell you, you shall be married before sunset to Marius,
+whether you be willing or not. Monsieur de Garnache comes alone, and if
+I so will it alone he shall depart or not at all. I have men enough at
+Condillac to see my orders carried out, no matter what they be.
+
+"You may tell yourself that this fellow will return to help you. Perhaps
+he will; but when he does, it will be too late so far as you shall be
+concerned."
+
+Terrified by that threat, Valerie had blenched, and had felt her spirit
+deserting her.
+
+"And if I comply, madame?" she had asked. "If I do as you wish, if I
+tell this gentleman that I no longer desire to go to Paris--what then?"
+
+The Dowager's manner had become more affectionate. She had patted the
+shrinking girl upon the shoulder. "In that case, Valerie, you shall
+suffer no constraint; you shall continue here as you have done."
+
+"And has there been no constraint hitherto?" had been the girl's
+indignant rejoinder.
+
+"Hardly, child," the Dowager had returned. "We have sought to guide you
+to a wise choice--no more than that. Nor shall we do more hereafter if
+you do my pleasure now and give this Monsieur de Garnache the answer
+that I bid you. But if you fail me, remember--you marry Marius before
+nightfall."
+
+She had not waited for the girl to promise her compliance. She was too
+clever a woman to show anxiety on that score. She left her with that
+threat vibrating in her mind, confident that she would scare the girl
+into obedience by the very assurance she exhibited that Valerie would
+not dare to disobey.
+
+But now, at the sound of that chill voice, at the sight of that calm,
+resolved countenance, madame was regretting that she had not stayed
+to receive the girl's promise before she made so very sure of her
+pliability.
+
+She glanced anxiously at Garnache. His eyes were upon the girl. He was
+remarking the slender, supple figure, moderately tall and looking taller
+in its black gown of mourning; the oval face, a trifle pale now from the
+agitation that stirred her, with its fine level brows, its clear,
+hazel eyes, and its crown of lustrous brown hair rolled back under the
+daintiest of white coifs. His glance dwelt appreciatively on the slender
+nose, with its delicate nostrils, the charming line of mouth and chin,
+the dazzling whiteness of her skin, conspicuous not only in neck and
+face but in the long, slender hands that were clasped before her.
+
+These signs of breeding, everywhere proclaimed, left him content that
+here was no imposture; the girl before him was, indeed, Valerie de La
+Vauvraye.
+
+At madame's invitation she came forward. Marius hastened to close the
+door and to set a chair for her, his manner an admirable suggestion of
+ardour restrained by deference.
+
+She sat down with an outward calm under which none would have suspected
+the full extent of her agitation, and she bent her eyes upon the man
+whom the Queen had sent for her deliverance.
+
+After all, Garnache's appearance was hardly suggestive of the role of
+Perseus which had been thrust upon him. She saw a tall, spare man,
+with prominent cheek-bones, a gaunt, high-bridged nose, very fierce
+mustachios, and a pair of eyes that were as keen as sword-blades and
+felt to her glance as penetrating. There was little about him like
+to take a woman's fancy or claim more than a moderate share of her
+attention, even when circumstances rendered her as interested in him as
+was now Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+
+There fell a silence, broken at last by Marius, who leaned, a supple,
+graceful figure, his elbow resting upon the summit of Valerie's chair.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache does us the injustice to find a difficulty in
+believing that you no longer wish to leave us."
+
+That was by no means what Garnache had implied; still, since it really
+expressed his mind, he did not trouble to correct Marius.
+
+Valerie said nothing, but her eyes travelled to madame's countenance,
+where she found a frown. Garnache observed the silence, and drew his own
+conclusions.
+
+"So we have sent for you, Valerie," said the Dowager, taking up her
+son's sentence, "that you may yourself assure Monsieur de Garnache that
+it is so."
+
+Her voice was stern; it bore to the girl's ears a subtle, unworded
+repetition of the threat the Marquise had already voiced. Mademoiselle
+caught it, and Garnache caught it too, although he failed to interpret
+it as precisely as he would have liked.
+
+The girl seemed to experience a difficulty in answering. Her eyes roved
+to Garnache's, and fell away in affright before their glitter. That
+man's glance seemed to read her very mind, she thought; and suddenly
+the reflection that had terrified her became her hope. If it were as she
+deemed it, what matter what she said? He would know the truth, in spite
+of all.
+
+"Yes, madame," she said at last, and her voice was wholly void of
+expression. "Yes, monsieur, it is as madame says. It is my wish to
+remain at Condillac."
+
+From the Dowager, standing a pace or two away from Garnache, came the
+sound of a half-sigh. Garnache missed nothing. He caught the sound,
+and accepted it as an expression of relief. The Marquise stepped back a
+pace; idly, one might have thought; not so thought Garnache. It had this
+advantage: that it enabled her to stand where he might not watch her
+face without turning his head. He was content that such was her motive.
+To defeat her object, to show her that he had guessed it, he stepped
+back, too, also with that same idleness of air, so that he was once more
+in line with her. And then he spoke, addressing Valerie.
+
+"Mademoiselle, that you should have written to the Queen in haste is
+deplorable now that your views have undergone this change. I am a stupid
+man, mademoiselle, just a blunt soldier with orders to obey and no
+authority to think. My orders are to conduct you to Paris. Your will
+was not taken into consideration. I know not how the Queen would have me
+act, seeing your reluctance; it may be that she would elect to leave you
+here, as you desire. But it is not for me to arrogate to determine the
+Queen's mind. I can but be guided by her orders, and those orders
+leave me no course but one--to ask you, mademoiselle, to make ready
+immediately to go with me."
+
+The look of relief that swept into Valerie's face, the little flush
+of colour that warmed her cheeks, hitherto so pale, were all the
+confirmation that he needed of what he suspected.
+
+"But, monsieur," said Marius, "it must be plain to you that since the
+Queen's orders are but a compliance with mademoiselle's wishes, now that
+mademoiselle's wishes have altered, so too would Her Majesty's commands
+alter to comply with them once more."
+
+"That may be plain to you, monsieur; for me, unfortunately, there are
+my orders for only guide," Garnache persisted. "Does not mademoiselle
+herself agree with me?"
+
+She was about to speak; her glance had looked eager, her lips had
+parted. Then, of a sudden, the little colour faded from her cheeks
+again, and she seemed stricken with a silence. Garnache's eyes, directed
+in a sidelong glance to the Marquise's face, surprised there a frown
+that had prompted that sudden change.
+
+He half-turned, his manner changing suddenly to a freezing civility.
+
+"Madame la Marquise," said he, "I beg with all deference to suggest that
+I am not allowed the interview you promised me with Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye."
+
+The ominous coldness with which he had begun to speak had had a
+disturbing effect upon the Dowager; the words he uttered, when she had
+weighed them, brought an immense relief. It seemed, then, that he but
+needed convincing that this was Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. This argued
+that for the rest he was satisfied.
+
+"There, monsieur, you are at fault," she cried, and she was smiling into
+his grave eyes. "Because once I put that jest upon you, you imagine--"
+
+"No, no," he broke in. "You misapprehend me. I do not say that this is
+not Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye; I do not say that--"
+
+He paused; he was at the end of his resources. He did not know how
+to put the thing without giving offence, and it had been his
+resolve--realizing the necessity for it--to conduct this matter with a
+grave courtesy.
+
+To feel that after having carried the affair so far with a for
+him--commendable lightness of touch, he should be at a loss for a
+delicate word to convey a harsh accusation began to anger him. And once
+Garnache began to be angered, the rest followed quickly. It was just
+that flaw in his character that had been the ruin of him, that had
+blighted what otherwise might have been a brilliant career. Astute and
+wily as a fox, brave as a lion, and active as a panther, gifted with
+intelligence, insight and resource, he had carried a dozen enterprises
+up to the very threshold of success, there to have ruined them all by
+giving way to some sudden excess of choler.
+
+So was it now. His pause was but momentary. Yet in that moment, from
+calm and freezing that he had been, he became ruffled and hot. The
+change was visible in his heightened colour, in his flashing eyes, and
+in his twitching mustachios. For just a second he sought to smother
+his wrath; he had a glimmer of remembrance of the need for caution and
+diplomacy in the darkness of anger that was descending over him. Then,
+without further warning, he exploded.
+
+His nervous, sinewy hand clenched itself and fell with a crash upon the
+table, overturning a flagon and sending a lake of wine across the board,
+to trickle over at a dozen points and form in puddles at the feet of
+Valerie. Startled, they all watched him, mademoiselle the most startled
+of the three.
+
+"Madame," he thundered, "I have been receiving dancing-lessons at your
+hands for long enough. It is time, I think, we did a little ordinary
+walking, else shall we get no farther along the road I mean to go and
+that is the road to Paris with mademoiselle for company."
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur!" cried the startled Marquise, placing herself
+intrepidly before him; and Marius trembled for her, for so wild did the
+man seem that he almost feared he might strike her.
+
+"I have heard enough," he blazed. "Not another word from any here in
+Condillac! I'll take this lady with me now, at once; and if any here
+raises a finger to resist me, as Heaven is my witness, it will be the
+last resistance he will ever offer any man. Let a hand be laid upon me,
+or a sword bared before my eyes, and I swear, madame, that I'll come
+back and burn this dunghill of rebellion to the ground."
+
+In the blindness of his passion all his fine keenness was cast to the
+wind, his all-observing watchfulness was smothered in the cloud of anger
+that oppressed his brain. He never saw the sign that madame made to her
+son, never so much as noticed Marius's stealthy progress towards the
+door.
+
+"Oh," he continued, a satirical note running now through his tempestuous
+voice, "it is a fine thing to cozen each other with honeyed words,
+with smirks and with grimaces. But we have done with that, madame." He
+towered grimly above her, shaking a threatening finger in her very face.
+"We have done with that. We shall resort to deeds, instead."
+
+"Aye, monsieur," she answered very coldly, sneering upon his red-hot
+fury, "there shall be deeds enough to satisfy even your outrageous
+thirst for them."
+
+That cold, sneering voice, with its note of threat, was like a hand
+of ice upon his overheated brain. It cooled him on the instant. He
+stiffened, and looked about him. He saw that Marius had disappeared,
+and that mademoiselle had risen and was regarding him with singularly
+imploring eyes.
+
+He bit his lip in mortified chagrin. He cursed himself inwardly for a
+fool and a dolt--the more pitiable because he accounted himself cunning
+above others. Had he but kept his temper, had he done no more than
+maintain the happy pretence that he was a slave to the orders he
+had received--a mere machine--he might have gained his ends by sheer
+audacity. At least, his way of retreat would have remained open, and he
+might have gone, to return another day with force at his heels.
+
+As it was, that pretty whelp, her son, had been sent, no doubt, for men.
+He stepped up to Valerie.
+
+"Are you ready, mademoiselle?" said he; for little hope though he might
+still have of winning through, yet he must do the best to repair the
+damage that was of his making.
+
+She saw that the storm of passion had passed, and she was infected by
+the sudden, desperate daring that prompted that question of his.
+
+"I am ready, monsieur," said she, and her boyish voice had an intrepid
+ring. "I will come with you as I am."
+
+"Then, in God's name, let us be going."
+
+They moved together towards the door, with never another glance for the
+Dowager where she stood, patting the head of the hound that had risen
+and come to stand beside her. In silence she watched them, a sinister
+smile upon her beautiful, ivory face.
+
+Then came a sound of feet and voices in the anteroom. The door was flung
+violently open, and a half-dozen men with naked swords came blundering
+into the room, Marius bringing up the rear.
+
+With a cry of fear Valerie shrank back against the panelled wall, her
+little hands to her cheeks, her eyes dilating with alarm.
+
+Garnache's sword rasped out, an oath rattled from his clenched teeth,
+and he fell on guard. The men paused, and took his measure. Marius urged
+them on, as if they had been a pack of dogs.
+
+"At him!" he snapped, his finger pointing, his handsome eyes flashing
+angrily. "Cut him down!"
+
+They moved; but mademoiselle moved at the same moment. She sprang before
+them, between their swords and their prey.
+
+"You shall not do it; you shall not do it!" she cried, and her face
+looked drawn, her eyes distraught. "It is murder--murder, you curs!" And
+the memory of how that dainty little lady stood undaunted before so much
+bared steel, to shield him from those assassins, was one that abode ever
+after with Garnache.
+
+"Mademoiselle," said he, in a quiet voice, "if you will but stand aside
+there will be some murder done among them first."
+
+But she did not move. Marius clenched his hands, fretted by the delay.
+The Dowager looked on and smiled and patted her dog's head. To her
+mademoiselle now turned in appeal.
+
+"Madame," she exclaimed, "you'll not allow it. You'll not let them
+do this thing. Bid them put up their swords, madame. Bethink you that
+Monsieur de Garnache is here in the Queen's name."
+
+Too well did madame bethink her of it. Garnache need not plague himself
+with vexation that his rash temper alone had wrought his ruin now. It
+had but accelerated it. It was just possible, perhaps, that suavity
+might have offered him opportunities; but, for the rest, from the moment
+that he showed himself firm in his resolve to carry mademoiselle to
+Paris, his doom was sealed. Madame would never willingly have allowed
+him to leave Condillac alive, for she realized that did she do so he
+would stir up trouble enough to have them outlawed. He must perish here,
+and be forgotten. If questions came to be asked later, Condillac would
+know nothing of him.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache promised us some fine deeds on his own account,"
+she mocked him. "We but afford him the opportunity to perform them. If
+these be not enough for his exceeding valour, there are more men without
+whom we can summon."
+
+A feeling of pity for mademoiselle--perhaps of no more than decency--now
+overcame Marius. He stepped forward.
+
+"Valerie," he said, "it is not fitting you should remain."
+
+"Aye, take her hence," the Dowager bade him, with a smile. "Her presence
+is unmanning our fine Parisian."
+
+Eager to do so, over-eager, Marius came forward, past his men-at-arms,
+until he was but some three paces from the girl and just out of reach of
+a sudden dart of Garnache's sword.
+
+Softly, very warily, Garnache slipped his right foot a little farther to
+the right. Suddenly he threw his weight upon it, so that he was clear of
+the girl. Before they understood what he was about, the thing had taken
+place. He had leaped forward, caught the young man by the breast of his
+shimmering doublet, leaped back to shelter beyond mademoiselle, hurled
+Marius to the ground, and planted his foot, shod as it was in his
+thickly mudded riding-boot, full upon the boy's long, shapely neck.
+
+"Move so much as a finger, my pretty fellow," he snapped at him, "and
+I'll crush the life from you as from a toad."
+
+There was a sudden forward movement on the part of the men; but if
+Garnache was vicious, he was calm. Were he again to lose his temper now,
+there would indeed be a speedy end to him. That much he knew, and kept
+repeating to himself, lest he should be tempted to forget it.
+
+"Back!" he bade them in a voice so imperative that they stopped, and
+looked on with gaping mouths. "Back, or he perishes!" And dropping the
+point of his sword, he lightly rested it upon the young man's breast.
+
+In dismay they looked to the Dowager for instruction. She craned
+forward, the smile gone from her lips, a horror in her eyes, her bosom
+heaving. A moment ago she had smiled upon mademoiselle's outward signs
+of fear; had mademoiselle been so minded, she might in her turn have
+smiled now at the terror written large upon the Dowager's own face.
+But her attention was all absorbed by the swiftly executed act by which
+Garnache had gained at least a temporary advantage.
+
+She had turned and looked at the strange spectacle of that dauntless
+man, erect, his foot upon Marius's neck, like some fantastic figure of
+a contemporary Saint George and a contemporary dragon. She pressed her
+hands tighter upon her bosom; her eyes sparkled with an odd approval of
+that brisk deed.
+
+But Garnache's watchful eyes were upon the Dowager. He read the anxious
+fear that marred the beauty of her face, and he took heart at the sight,
+for he was dependent upon the extent to which he might work upon her
+feelings.
+
+"You smiled just now, madame, when it was intended to butcher a man
+before your eyes. You smile no longer, I observe, at this the first of
+the fine deeds I promised you."
+
+"Let him go," she said, and her voice was scarce louder than a whisper,
+horror-laden. "Let him go, monsieur, if you would save your own neck."
+
+"At that price, yes--though, believe me, you are paying too much for so
+poor a life as this. Still, you value the thing, and I hold it; and so
+you'll forgive me if I am extortionate."
+
+"Release him, and, in God's name, go your ways. None shall stay you,"
+she promised him.
+
+He smiled. "I'll need some security for that. I do not choose to take
+your word for it, Madame de Condillac."
+
+"What security can I give you?" she cried, wringing her hands, her eyes
+on the boy's ashen face ashen from mingling fear and rage--where it
+showed beyond Garnache's heavy boot.
+
+"Bid one of your knaves summon my servant. I left him awaiting me in the
+courtyard."
+
+The order was given, and one of the cut-throats departed.
+
+In a tense and anxious silence they awaited his return, though he kept
+them but an instant.
+
+Rabecque's eyes took on a startled look when he had viewed the
+situation. Garnache called to him to deprive those present of their
+weapons.
+
+"And let none refuse, or offer him violence," he added, "or your
+master's life shall pay the price of it."
+
+The Dowager with a ready anxiety repeated to them his commands.
+Rabecque, understanding nothing, went from man to man, and received from
+each his weapons. He placed the armful on the windowseat, at the far
+end of the apartment, as Garnache bade him. At the other end of the long
+room, Garnache ordered the disarmed men to range themselves. When that
+was done, the Parisian removed his foot from his victim's neck.
+
+"Stand up," he commanded, and Marius very readily obeyed him.
+
+Garnache placed himself immediately behind the boy. "Madame," said he,
+"no harm shall come to your son if he is but wise. Let him disobey me,
+or let any man in Condillac lift a hand against us, and that shall be
+the signal for Monsieur de Condillac's death. Mademoiselle, it is your
+wish to accompany me to Paris?"
+
+"Yes, monsieur," she answered fearlessly, her eyes sparkling now.
+
+"We will be going then. Place yourself alongside of Monsieur de
+Condillac. Rabecque, follow me. Forward, Monsieur de Condillac. You will
+be so good as to conduct us to our horses in the courtyard."
+
+They made an odd procession as they marched out of the hall, under
+the sullen eyes of the baulked cut-throats and their mistress. On the
+threshold Garnache paused, and looked over his shoulder.
+
+"Are you content, madame? Have you seen fine deeds enough for one
+day?" he asked her, laughing. But, white to the lips with chagrin, she
+returned no answer.
+
+Garnache and his party crossed the anteroom, after having taken
+the precaution to lock the door upon the Marquise and her men, and
+proceeding down a gloomy passage they gained the courtyard. Here Marius
+was consoled to find some men of the garrison of Condillac a half-score,
+or so--all more or less armed, surrounding the horses of Garnache and
+his lackey. At sight of the odd group that now appeared those ruffians
+stood at gaze, surprised, and with suspicions aroused by Garnache's
+naked sword, ready for anything their master might demand of them.
+
+Marius had in that instant a gleam of hope. Thus far, Garnache had been
+master of the situation. But surely the position would be reversed
+when Garnache and his man came to mount their horses, particularly
+considering how hampered they must be by Valerie. This danger Garnache,
+however, was no less quick to perceive, and with a dismaying promptness
+did he take his measures.
+
+"Remember," he threatened Monsieur de Condillac, "if any of your men
+show their teeth it will be the worse for you." They had come to a halt
+on the threshold of the courtyard. "You will be so good as to bid them
+retreat through that doorway across the yard yonder."
+
+Marius hesitated. "And if I refuse?" he demanded hardily, but keeping
+his back to Garnache. The men stirred, and stray words of mingling
+wonder and anger reached the Parisian.
+
+"You will not," said Garnache, with quiet confidence.
+
+"I think you make too sure," Marius replied, and dissembled his
+misgivings in a short laugh. Garnache became impatient. His position was
+not being improved by delay.
+
+"Monsieur de Condillac," said he, speaking quickly and yet with an
+incisiveness of tone that made his words sound deliberate, "I am a
+desperate man in a desperate position. Every moment that I tarry here
+increases my danger and shortens my temper. If you think to temporize
+in the hope of gaining an opportunity of turning the tables upon me, you
+must be mad to dream that I shall permit it. Monsieur, you will at once
+order those men to leave the courtyard by that doorway, or I give you my
+word of honour that I shall run you through as you stand."
+
+"That would be to destroy yourself," said Marius with an attempted note
+of confidence.
+
+"I should be no less destroyed by delay," answered Garnache; and added
+more sharply, "Give the word, monsieur, or I will make an end."
+
+From the movement behind him Marius guessed almost by instinct that
+Garnache had drawn back for a lunge. At his side Valerie looked over her
+shoulder, with eyes that were startled but unafraid. For a second Marius
+considered whether he might not attempt to elude Garnache by a wild and
+sudden dash towards his men. But the consequences of failure were too
+fearful.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and gave the order. The men hesitated a
+moment, then shuffled away in the direction indicated. But they went
+slowly, with much half-whispered, sullen conferring and many a backward
+glance at Marius and those with him.
+
+"Bid them go faster," snapped Garnache. Marius obeyed him, and the men
+obeyed Marius, and vanished into the gloom of the archway. After
+all, thought Monsieur de Condillac, they need go no farther than that
+doorway; they must have appreciated the situation by now; and he was
+confident they would have the sense to hold themselves in readiness for
+a rush in the moment of Garnache's mounting.
+
+But Garnache's next order shattered that last hope.
+
+"Rebecque," said he, without turning his head, "go and lock them in."
+Before bidding the men go that way, he had satisfied himself that
+there was a key on the outside of the door. "Monsieur de Condillac,"
+he resumed to Marius, "you will order your men in no way to hinder my
+servant. I shall act upon any menace of danger to my lackey precisely as
+I should were I, myself, in danger."
+
+Marius's heart sank within him, as sinks a stone through water. He
+realized, as his mother had realized a little while before, that in
+Garnache they had an opponent who took no chances. In a voice thick with
+the torturing rage of impotence he gave the order upon which the grim
+Parisian insisted. There followed a silence broken by the fall of
+Rabecque's heavily shod feet upon the stones of the yard, as he crossed
+it to do his master's bidding. The door creaked on its hinges; the key
+grated screaming in its lock, and Rabecque returned to Garnache's side
+even as Garnache tapped Marius on the shoulder.
+
+"This way, Monsieur de Condillac, if you please," said he, and as Marius
+turned at last to face him, he stood aside and waved his left hand
+towards the door through which they had lately emerged. A moment stood
+the youth facing his stern conqueror; his hands were clenched until the
+knuckles showed white; his face was a dull crimson. Vainly he sought
+for words in which to vent some of the malicious chagrin that filled
+his soul almost to bursting-point. Then, despairing, with a shrug and an
+inarticulate mutter, he flung past the Parisian, obeying him as the cur
+obeys, with pendant tail and teeth-revealing snarl.
+
+Garnache closed the door upon him with a bang, and smiled quietly as he
+turned to Valerie.
+
+"I think we have won through, mademoiselle," said he, with pardonable
+vanity. "The rest is easy, though you may be subjected to some slight
+discomfort between this and Grenoble."
+
+She smiled back at him, a pale, timid smile, like a gleam of sunshine
+from a wintry sky. "That matters nothing," she assured him, and strove
+to make her voice sound brave.
+
+There was need for speed, and compliments were set aside by Garnache,
+who, at his best, was not felicitous with them. Valerie felt herself
+caught by the wrist, a trifle roughly she remembered afterwards, and
+hurried across the cobbles to the tethered horses, with which Rabecque
+was already busy. She saw Garnache raise his foot to the stirrup and
+hoist himself to the saddle. Then he held down a hand to her, bade her
+set her foot on his, and called with an oath to Rabecque to lend her his
+assistance. A moment later she was perched in front of Garnache, almost
+on the withers of his horse. The cobbles rattled under its hooves, the
+timbers of the drawbridge sent up a booming sound, they were across--out
+of Condillac--and speeding at a gallop down the white road that led to
+the river; after them pounded Rabecque, bumping horribly in his
+saddle, and attempting wildly, and with awful objurgations, to find his
+stirrups.
+
+They crossed the bridge that spans the Isere and took the road to
+Grenoble at a sharp pace, with scarce a backward glance at the grey
+towers of Condillac. Valerie experienced an overwhelming inclination to
+weep and laugh, to cry and sing at one and the same time; but whether
+this odd emotion sprang from the happenings in which she had had her
+part, or from the exhilaration of that mad ride, she could not tell. No
+doubt it sprang from both, owing a part to each. She controlled herself,
+however. A shy, upward glance at the stern, set face of the man whose
+arm encircled and held her fast had a curiously sobering effect upon
+her. Their eyes met, and he smiled a friendly, reassuring smile, such as
+a father might have bestowed upon a daughter.
+
+"I do not think that they will charge me with blundering this time," he
+said.
+
+"Charge you with blundering?" she echoed; and the inflection of the
+pronoun might have flattered him had he not reflected that it was
+impossible she could have understood his allusion. And now she bethought
+her that she had not thanked him--and the debt was a heavy one. He
+had come to her aid in an hour when hope seemed dead. He had come
+single-handed--save for his man Rabecque; and in a manner that was
+worthy of being made the subject of an epic, he had carried her out
+of Condillac, away from the terrible Dowager and her cut-throats. The
+thought of them sent a shiver through her.
+
+"Do you feel the cold?" he asked concernedly; and that the wind might
+cut her less, he slackened speed.
+
+"No, no," she cried, her alarm waking again at the thought of the
+folk of Condillac. "Make haste! Go on, go on! Mon Dieu! if they should
+overtake us!"
+
+He looked over his shoulder. The road ran straight for over a half-mile
+behind them, and not a living thing showed upon it.
+
+"You need have no alarm," he smiled. "We are not pursued. They must
+have realized the futility of attempting to overtake us. Courage,
+mademoiselle. We shall be in Grenoble presently, and once there, you
+will have nothing more to fear."
+
+"You are sure of that?" she asked, and there was doubt in her voice.
+
+He smiled reassuringly again. "The Lord Seneschal shall supply us with
+an escort," he promised confidently.
+
+"Still," she said, "we shall not stay there, I hope, monsieur."
+
+"No longer than may be necessary to procure a coach for you."
+
+"I am glad of that," said she. "I shall know no peace until Grenoble is
+a good ten leagues behind us. The Marquise and her son are too powerful
+there."
+
+"Yet their might shall not prevail against the Queen's," he made reply.
+And as now they rode amain she fell to thanking him, shyly at first,
+then, as she gathered confidence in her subject, with a greater fervour.
+But he interrupted her ere she had gone far, "Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye," said he, "you overstate the matter." His tone was chilling
+almost; and she felt as she had been rebuked. "I am no more than the
+emissary of Her Majesty--it is to her that your thanks are due."
+
+"Ah, but, monsieur," she returned to the assault, "I owe some thanks
+to you as well. What other in your place would have done what you have
+done?"
+
+"I know not that, nor do I greatly care," said he, and laughed, but
+with a laugh that jarred on her. "That which I did I must have done, no
+matter whom it was a question of saving. I am but an instrument in this
+matter, mademoiselle."
+
+His thought was to do no more than belittle the service he had rendered
+her, to stem her flow of gratitude, since, indeed, he felt, as he said,
+that it was to the Queen-Regent her thanks were due. All unwitting was
+it--out of his ignorance of the ways of thought of a sex with which he
+held the view that it is an ill thing to meddle--that he wounded her by
+his disclaimer, in which her sensitive maiden fancy imagined a something
+that was almost contemptuous.
+
+They rode in silence for a little spell, broken at last by Garnache in
+expression of the thoughts that had come to him as a consequence of what
+she had said.
+
+"On this same subject of thanks," said he--and as she raised her eyes
+again she found him smiling almost tenderly--"if any are due between us
+they are surely due from me to you."
+
+"From you to me?" she asked in wonder.
+
+"Assuredly," said he. "Had you not come between me and the Dowager's
+assassins there had been an end to me in the hall of Condillac."
+
+Her hazel eyes were very round for a moment, then they narrowed, and
+little humorous lines formed at the corners of her lips.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache," said she, with a mock coldness that was a faint
+echo of his own recent manner, "you overstate the case. That which I did
+I must have done, no matter whom it was a question of saving. I was but
+an instrument in this matter, monsieur."
+
+His brows went up. He stared at her a moment, gathering instruction from
+the shy mockery of her glance. Then he laughed with genuine amusement.
+
+"True," he said. "An instrument you were; but an instrument of Heaven,
+whereas in me you but behold the instrument of an earthly power. We are
+not quite quits, you see."
+
+But she felt, at least, that she was quits with him in the matter of his
+repudiation of her own thanks, and the feeling bridged the unfriendly
+gap that she had felt was opening out between them; and for no reason in
+the world that she could think of, she was glad that this was so.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+
+Night had fallen and it had begun to rain when Garnache and Valerie
+reached Grenoble. They entered the town afoot, the Parisian not desiring
+to attract attention by being seen in the streets with a lady on the
+withers of his horse.
+
+With thought for her comfort, Monsieur de Garnache had divested himself
+of his heavy horseman's cloak and insisted upon her assuming it, so
+setting it about her that her head was covered as by a wimple. Thus
+was she protected not only from the rain, but from the gaze of the
+inquisitive.
+
+They made their way in the drizzle, through the greasy, slippery
+streets ashine with the lights that fell from door and window, Rabecque
+following closely with the horses. Garnache made straight for his
+inn--the Auberge du Veau qui Tete--which enjoyed the advantage of facing
+the Palais Seneschal.
+
+The ostler took charge of the nags, and the landlord conducted them to
+a room above-stairs, which he placed at mademoiselle's disposal.
+That done, Garnache left Rabecque on guard, and proceeded to make the
+necessary arrangements for the journey that lay before them. He began by
+what he conceived to be the more urgent measure, and stepping across to
+the Palais Seneschal, he demanded to see Monsieur de Tressan at once.
+
+Ushered into the Lord Seneschal's presence, he startled that obese
+gentleman by the announcement that he had returned from Condillac with
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and that he would require an escort to
+accompany them to Paris.
+
+"For I am by no means minded to be exposed to such measures as the
+tigress of Condillac and her cub may take to recover their victim," he
+explained with a grim smile.
+
+The Seneschal combed his beard and screwed up his pale eyes until they
+vanished in the cushions of his cheeks. He was lost in amazement.
+He could only imagine that the Queen's emissary had been duped more
+successfully this time.
+
+"I am to gather, then," said he, dissembling what was passing through
+his mind, "that you delivered the lady by force or strategy."
+
+"By both, monsieur," was the short answer.
+
+Tressan continued to comb his beard, and pondered the situation. If
+things were so, indeed, they could not have fallen out more to his
+taste. He had had no hand in it, one way or the other. He had run with
+the hare and hunted with the hounds, and neither party could charge him
+with any lack of loyalty. His admiration and respect for Monsieur de
+Garnache grew enormously. When the rash Parisian had left him that
+afternoon for the purpose of carrying his message himself to Condillac,
+Tressan had entertained little hope of ever again seeing him alive.
+Yet there he stood, as calm and composed as ever, announcing that
+singlehanded he had carried out what another might well have hesitated
+to attempt with a regiment at his heels.
+
+Tressan's curiosity urged him to beg for the details of this marvel, and
+Garnache entertained him with a brief recital of what had taken
+place, whereat, realizing that Garnache had indeed outwitted them, the
+Seneschal's wonder increased.
+
+"But we are not out of the quagmire yet," cried Garnache; "and that is
+why I want an escort."
+
+Tressan became uneasy. "How many men shall you require?" he asked,
+thinking that the Parisian would demand at least the half of a company.
+
+"A half-dozen and a sergeant to command them."
+
+Tressan's uneasiness was dissipated, and he found himself despising
+Garnache more for his rashness in being content with so small a number
+than he respected him for the boldness and courage he had so lately
+displayed. It was not for him to suggest that the force might prove
+insufficient; rather was it for him to be thankful that Garnache had not
+asked for more. An escort Tressan dared not refuse him, and yet refuse
+it him he must have done--or broken with the Condillacs--had he asked
+for a greater number. But six men! Pooh! they would be of little
+account. So he very readily consented, inquiring how soon Garnache would
+require them.
+
+"At once," was the Parisian's answer. "I leave Grenoble to-night. I hope
+to set out in an hour's time. Meanwhile I'll have the troopers form a
+guard of honour. I am lodged over the way."
+
+Tressan, but too glad to be quit of him, rose there and then to give
+the necessary orders, and within ten minutes Garnache was back at the
+Sucking Calf with six troopers and a sergeant, who had left their horses
+in the Seneschal's stables until the time for setting out. Meanwhile
+Garnache placed them on duty in the common-room of the inn.
+
+He called for refreshment for them, and bade them remain there at the
+orders of his man Rabecque. His reason for this step was that it became
+necessary that he should absent himself for a while to find a carriage
+suitable for the journey; for as the Sucking Calf was not a post-house
+he must seek one elsewhere--at the Auberge de France, in fact, which was
+situate on the eastern side of the town by the Porte de Savoie--and
+he was not minded to leave the person of Valerie unguarded during his
+absence. The half-dozen troopers he considered ample, as indeed they
+were.
+
+On this errand he departed, wrapped tightly in his cloak, walking
+briskly through the now heavier rain.
+
+But at the Auberge de France a disappointment awaited him. The host
+had no horses and no carriage, nor would he have until the following
+morning. He was sorrow-stricken that the circumstance should discompose
+Monsieur de Garnache; he was elaborate in his explanations of how
+it happened that he could place no vehicle at Monsieur de Garnache's
+disposal--so elaborate that it is surprising Monsieur de Garnache's
+suspicions should not have been aroused. For the truth of the matter
+was that the folk of Condillac had been at the Auberge de France before
+him--as they had been elsewhere in the town wherever a conveyance might
+be procurable--and by promises of reward for obedience and threats of
+punishment for disobedience, they had contrived that Garnache should
+hear this same story on every hand. His mistake had lain in his
+eagerness to obtain a guard from the Seneschal. Had he begun by making
+sure of a conveyance, anticipating, as he should have done, this move on
+the part of the Condillacs--a move which he did not even now suspect--it
+is possible that he might have been spared much of the trouble that was
+to follow.
+
+An hour or so later, after having vainly ransacked the town for the
+thing he needed, he returned wet and annoyed to the Veau qui Tote. In a
+corner of the spacious common-room--a corner by the door leading to the
+interior of the inn--he saw the six troopers at table, waxing a trifle
+noisy over cards. Their sergeant sat a little apart, in conversation
+with the landlord's wife, eyes upturned adoringly, oblivious of the
+increasing scowl that gathered about her watchful husband's brow.
+
+At another table sat four gentlemen--seemingly travellers, by their air
+and garb--in a conversation that was hushed at Garnache's entrance.
+But he paid no heed to them as he stalked with ringing step across the
+rushstrewn floor, nor observed how covertly and watchfully their glances
+followed him as returning, in passing the sergeant's prompt salute he
+vanished through the doorway leading to the stairs.
+
+He reappeared again a moment later, to call the host, and give him
+orders for the preparing of his own and Rabecque's supper.
+
+On the landing above he found Rabecque awaiting him.
+
+"Is all well?" he asked, and received from his lackey a reassuring
+answer.
+
+Mademoiselle welcomed him gladly. His long absence, it appeared, had
+been giving her concern. He told her on what errand he had been, and
+alarm overspread her face upon hearing its result.
+
+"But, monsieur," she cried, "you are not proposing that I should remain
+a night in Grenoble."
+
+"What alternative have we?" he asked, and his brows met, impatient at
+what he accounted no more than feminine whimsey.
+
+"It is not safe," she exclaimed, her fears increasing. "You do not know
+how powerful are the Condillacs."
+
+He strode to the fire, and the logs hissed under the pressure of his wet
+boot. He set his back to the blaze, and smiled down upon her.
+
+"Nor do you know how powerful are we," he answered easily. "I have below
+six troopers and a sergeant of the Seneschal's regiment; with myself
+and Rabecque we are nine men in all. That should be a sufficient guard,
+mademoiselle. Nor do I think that with all their power the Condillacs
+will venture here to claim you at the sword point."
+
+"And yet," she answered, for all that she was plainly reassured, at
+least in part, "I would rather you had got me a horse, that we might
+have ridden to Saint Marcellin, where no doubt a carriage might be
+obtained."
+
+"I did not see the need to put you to so much discomfort," he returned.
+"It is raining heavily."
+
+"Oh, what of that?" she flung back impatiently.
+
+"Besides," he added, "it seems there are no horses at the post-house. A
+benighted place this Dauphiny of yours, mademoiselle."
+
+But she never heeded the gibe at her native province. "No horses?" she
+echoed, and her hazel eyes looked up sharply, the alarm returning to her
+face. She rose, and approached him. "Surely that is impossible."
+
+"I assure you that it is as I say--neither at the post-house nor at any
+of the inns I visited could I find me a spare horse."
+
+"Monsieur," she cried, "I see the hand of Condillac in this."
+
+"As how?" he inquired, and his tone again was quickened by impatience.
+
+"They have anticipated you. They seek to keep you here--to keep us in
+Grenoble."
+
+"But to what end?" he asked, his impatience growing. "The Auberge de
+France has promised me a carriage in the morning. What shall it avail
+them at Condillac to keep us here to-night?"
+
+"They may have some project. Oh, monsieur! I am full of fears."
+
+"Dismiss them," he answered lightly; and to reassure her he added,
+smiling: "Rest assured we shall keep good watch over you, Rabecque and
+I and the troopers. A guard shall remain in the passage throughout the
+night. Rabecque and I will take turn about at sentry-go. Will that give
+you peace?"
+
+"You are very good," she said, her voice quivering with feeling and real
+gratitude, and as he was departing she called after him. "You will be
+careful of yourself," she said.
+
+He paused under the lintel, and turned, surprised. "It is a habit of
+mine," said he, with a glint of humour in his eye.
+
+But there was no answering smile from her. Her face was all anxiety.
+
+"Beware of pitfalls," she bade him. "Go warily; they are cruelly
+cunning, those folk of Condillac. And if evil should befall you..."
+
+"There would still remain Rabecque and the troopers," he concluded.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders. "I implore you to be careful," she insisted.
+
+"You may depend upon me," he said, and closed the door.
+
+Outside he called Rabecque, and together they went below. But mindful of
+her fears, he dispatched one of the troopers to stand sentry outside her
+door whilst he and his lackey supped. That done, he called the host, and
+set himself at table, Rabecque at his elbow in attendance to hand him
+the dishes and pour his wine.
+
+Across the low-ceilinged room the four travellers still sat in talk, and
+as Garnache seated himself, one of them shouted for the host and asked
+in an impatient tone to know if his supper was soon to come.
+
+"In a moment, sir," answered the landlord respectfully, and he turned
+again to the Parisian. He went out to bring the latter's meal, and
+whilst he was gone Rabecque heard from his master the reason of their
+remaining that night in Grenoble. The inference drawn by the astute
+lackey--and freely expressed by him--from the lack of horses or
+carriages in Grenoble that night, coincided oddly with Valerie's. He
+too gave it as his opinion that his master had been forestalled by
+the Dowager's people, and without presuming to advise Garnache to go
+warily--a piece of advice that Garnache would have resented, to the
+extent perhaps of boxing the fellow's ears--he determined, there and
+then, to keep a close watch upon his master, and under no circumstances,
+if possible, permit him to leave the Sucking Calf that night.
+
+The host returned, bearing a platter on which there steamed a ragout
+that gave out an appetizing odour; his wife followed with other dishes
+and a bottle of Armagnac under her arm. Rabecque busied himself at
+once, and his hungry master disposed himself to satisfy the healthiest
+appetite in France, when suddenly a shadow fell across the table. A man
+had come to stand beside it, his body screening the light of one of the
+lamps that hung from a rafter of the ceiling.
+
+"At last!" he exclaimed, and his voice was harsh with ill-humour.
+
+Garnache looked up, pausing in the very act of helping himself to
+that ragout. Rabecque looked up from behind his master, and his lips
+tightened. The host looked up from the act of drawing the cork of the
+flagon he had taken from his wife, and his eyes grew big as in his mind
+he prepared a judicious blend of apology and remonstrance wherewith
+to soothe this very impatient gentleman. But before he could speak,
+Garnache's voice cut sharply into the silence. An interruption at such a
+moment vexed him sorely.
+
+"Monsieur says?" quoth he.
+
+"To you, sir--nothing," answered the fellow impudently, and looked him
+straight between the eyes.
+
+With a flush mounting to his cheeks, and his brows drawn together in
+perplexity, Garnache surveyed him. He was that same traveller who had
+lately clamoured to know when he might sup, a man of rather more than
+middle height, lithe and active of frame, yet with a breadth of shoulder
+and depth of chest that argued strength and endurance as well. He had
+fair, wavy hair, which he wore rather longer than was the mode, brown
+eyes, and a face which, without being handsome, was yet more than
+ordinarily engaging by virtue of its strength and frank ingenuousness.
+His dress was his worst feature. It was flamboyant and showy; cheap, and
+tawdrily pretentious. Yet he bore himself with the easy dignity of a man
+who counts more inferiors than superiors.
+
+Despite the arrogant manner of his address, Garnache felt prepossessed
+in the newcomer's favour. But before he could answer him, the host was
+speaking.
+
+"Monsieur mistakes..." he began.
+
+"Mistakes?" thundered the other in an accent slightly foreign. "It is
+you who mistake if you propose to tell me that this is not my supper.
+Am I to wait all night, while every jackanapes who follows me into your
+pigsty is to be served before me?"
+
+"Jackanapes?" said Garnache thoughtfully, and looked the man in the face
+again. Behind the stranger pressed his three companions now, whilst the
+troopers across the room forgot their card-play to watch the altercation
+that seemed to impend.
+
+The foreigner--for such, indeed, his French proclaimed him--turned
+half-contemptuously to the host, ignoring Garnache with an air that was
+studiously offensive.
+
+"Jackanapes?" murmured Garnache again, and he, too, turned to the host.
+"Tell me, Monsieur l'Hote," said he, "where do the jackanapes bury their
+dead in Grenoble? I may need the information."
+
+Before the distressed landlord could utter a word, the stranger had
+wheeled about again to face Garnache. "What shall that mean?" he asked
+sharply, a great fierceness in his glance.
+
+"That Grenoble may be witnessing the funeral of a foreign bully by
+to-morrow, Monsieur l'Etranger," said Garnache, showing his teeth in a
+pleasant smile. He became conscious in that moment of a pressure on his
+shoulder blade, but paid no heed to it, intent on watching the other's
+countenance. It expressed surprise a moment, then grew dark with anger.
+
+"Do you mean that for me, sir?" he growled.
+
+Garnache spread his hands. "If monsieur feels that the cap fits him, I
+shall not stay him in the act of donning it."
+
+The stranger set one hand upon the table, and leaned forward towards
+Garnache. "May I ask monsieur to be a little more definite?" he begged.
+
+Garnache sat back in his chair and surveyed the man, smiling. Quick
+though his temper usually might be, it was checked at present by
+amusement. He had seen in his time many quarrels spring from the
+flimsiest of motives, but surely never had he seen one quite so
+self-begotten. It was almost as if the fellow had come there of set
+purpose to pick it with him.
+
+A suspicion flashed across his mind. He remembered the warning
+mademoiselle had given him. And he wondered. Was this a trick to lure
+him to some guet-apens? He surveyed his man more closely; but the
+inspection lent no colour to his suspicions. The stranger looked so
+frank and honest; then again his accent was foreign. It might very well
+be that he was some Savoyard lordling unused to being kept waiting,
+and that his hunger made him irritable and impatient. If that were so,
+assuredly the fellow deserved a lesson that should show him he was now
+in France, where different manners obtained to those that he displayed;
+yet, lest he should be something else, Garnache determined to pursue a
+policy of conciliation. It would be a madness to embroil himself just
+then, whether this fellow were of Condillac or not.
+
+"I have asked you, monsieur," the stranger insisted, "to be a little
+more definite."
+
+Garnache's smile broadened and grew more friendly. "Frankly," said he,
+"I experience difficulty. My remark was vague. I meant it so to be."
+
+"But it offended me, monsieur," the other answered sharply.
+
+The Parisian raised his eyebrows, and pursed his lips. "Then I deplore
+it," said he. And now he had to endure the hardest trial of all. The
+stranger's expression changed to one of wondering scorn.
+
+"Do I understand that monsieur apologizes?"
+
+Garnache felt himself crimsoning; his self-control was slipping from
+him; the pressure against his shoulder blade was renewed, and in time he
+became aware of it and knew it for a warning from Rabecque.
+
+"I cannot conceive, sir, that I have offended," said he at length,
+keeping a tight hand upon his every instinct--which was to knock this
+impertinent stranger down. "But if I have, I beg that you will believe
+that I have done so unwittingly. I had no such intent."
+
+The stranger removed his hand from the table and drew himself erect.
+
+"So much for that, then," said he, provokingly contemptuous. "If you
+will be as amiable in the matter of the supper I shall be glad to
+terminate an acquaintance which I can see no honour to myself in
+pursuing."
+
+This, Garnache felt, was more than he could endure. A spasm of passion
+crossed his face, another instant and despite Rabecque's frantic
+proddings he might have flung the ragout in the gentleman's face; when
+suddenly came the landlord unexpectedly to the rescue.
+
+"Monsieur, here comes your supper now," he announced, as his wife
+reentered from the kitchen with a laden tray.
+
+For a moment the stranger seemed out of countenance. Then he looked with
+cold insolence from the dishes set before Garnache to those which were
+being set for himself.
+
+"Ah," said he, and his tone was an insult unsurpassable, "perhaps it is
+to be preferred. This ragout grows cold, I think."
+
+He sniffed, and turning on his heel, without word or sign of salutation
+to Garnache, he passed to the next table, and sat down with his
+companions. The Parisian's eyes followed him, and they blazed
+with suppressed wrath. Never in all his life had he exercised such
+self-control as he was exercising then--which was the reason why he had
+failed to achieve greatness--and he was exercising it for the sake of
+that child above-stairs, and because he kept ever-present in his mind
+the thought that she must come to grievous harm if ill befell himself.
+But he controlled his passion at the cost of his appetite. He could not
+eat, so enraged was he. And so he pushed the platter from him, and rose.
+
+He turned to Rabecque, and the sight of his face sent the lackey back a
+pace or two in very fear. He waved his hand to the table.
+
+"Sup, Rabecque," said he. "Then come to me above."
+
+And followed, as before, by the eyes of the stranger and his companions,
+Garnache strode out of the room, and mounting the stairs went to find
+solace in talk with Valerie. But however impossible he might find it to
+digest the affront he had swallowed, no word of the matter did he utter
+to the girl, lest it should cause her fears to reawaken.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+
+Garnache spent a sleepless night at Grenoble, on guard throughout the
+greater part of it since nothing short of that would appease the fears
+of Valerie. Yet it passed without any bellicose manifestation on the
+part of the Condillacs such as Valerie feared and such as Garnache was
+satisfied would not--could not, indeed--take place.
+
+Betimes next morning he dispatched Rabecque to the Auberge de France for
+the promised carriage, and broke his fast in the common-room what time
+he awaited his man's return. The chamber was again occupied by the
+stranger of yesternight, who sat apart, however, and seemed no longer
+disposed to interfere with the Parisian. Garnache wondered idly, might
+this be due to the circumstance that that same stranger was supported
+now by one single companion, and was therefore less valorous than when
+he had been in the company of three.
+
+At another table were two gentlemen, sprung he knew not whence, quiet
+in dress and orderly in manner, to whom he paid little heed until one of
+them a slender, swarthy, hawk-faced fellow--looking up suddenly, started
+slightly at sight of the Parisian and addressed him instantly by name.
+Garnache paused in the act of rising from table, half-turned, and
+sharply scrutinized the swarthy gentleman, but failed to recognize him.
+He advanced towards him.
+
+"I have the honour to be known to you, monsieur?" he half-stated,
+half-inquired.
+
+"Parbleu, Monsieur de Garnache!" exclaimed the other with a ready
+smile, the more winning since it lighted up a face that at rest was very
+sombre. "Lives there a Parisian to whom you are not known? I have seen
+you often at the Hotel de Bourgogne."
+
+Garnache acknowledged the courtesy by a slight inclination of the head.
+
+"And once," continued the other, "I had the honour to be presented to
+you by Monsieur le Duc himself. My name is Gaubert--Fabre Gaubert." And
+as he introduced himself he rose out of respect for Garnache, who had
+remained standing. Garnache knew him not at all, yet never doubted that
+his tale was true; the fellow had a very courtly, winning air; moreover,
+Garnache was beginning to feel lonely in the wilds of Dauphiny, so that
+it rejoiced him to come into the company of one whom he might regard as
+something of a fellow-creature. He held out his hand.
+
+"I am honoured in that you should have borne me in your memory,
+monsieur," said he. He was about to add that he would be overjoyed if
+it should happen that Monsieur Gaubert was travelling to Paris, since he
+might give himself the pleasure of his company on that tedious journey;
+but he checked himself betimes. He had no reason to suspect this
+gentleman; and yet, all things considered, he bethought him suddenly
+that he would do well to observe the greatest circumspection. So with a
+pleasant but meaningless civility touching Monsieur Gaubert's presence
+in those parts, Garnache passed on and gained the door. He paused in the
+porch, above which the rebus-like sign of the Sucking Calf creaked and
+grated in each gust of the chill wind that was blowing from the Alps.
+The rain had ceased, but the sky was dark and heavy with great banks of
+scudding clouds. In the street the men of his escort sat their horses,
+having mounted at his bidding in readiness for the journey. A word or
+two he exchanged with the sergeant, and then with a great rumble the
+clumsy carriage from the Auberge de France heralded its approach. It
+rolled up the street, a vast machine of wood and leather, drawn by three
+horses, and drew up at the door of the inn. Out sprang Rabecque, to be
+immediately sent by his master to summon mademoiselle. They would set
+out upon the instant.
+
+Rabecque turned to obey; but in that same moment he was thrust rudely
+aside by a man with the air of a servant, who issued from he inn
+carrying a valise; after him, following close upon his heels, with head
+held high and eyes that looked straight before him and took no heed of
+Garnache, came the foreigner of yesternight.
+
+Rabecque, his shoulders touching the timbers of the porch, against which
+he had been thrust, remained at gaze, following with resentful eye the
+fellow who had so rudely used him. Garnache, on the other side, watched
+with some wonder the advent of the ingenuous-looking stranger, but as
+yet with no suspicion of his intent.
+
+Not until the servant had thrown open the door of the coach and
+deposited within the valise he carried, did Garnache stir. Not, indeed,
+until the foreigner's foot was on the step preparatory to mounting did
+Garnache speak.
+
+"Hi! monsieur," he called to him, "what is your pleasure with my
+carriage?"
+
+The stranger turned, and stared at Garnache with a look of wonder that
+artfully changed to one of disdainful recognition.
+
+"Ah?" said he, and his eyebrows went up. "The apologetic gentleman! You
+said?"
+
+Garnache approached him, followed a step not only by Rabecque, but also
+by Monsieur Gaubert, who had sauntered out a second earlier. Behind
+them, in the porch, lounged now the foreigner's friend, and behind him
+again was to be seen the great face and staring, somewhat startled eyes
+of the landlord.
+
+"I asked you, monsieur," said Garnache, already at grips with that quick
+temper of his, "what might be your pleasure with my coach?"
+
+"With your coach?" echoed the other, his superciliousness waxing more
+and more offensive. "Voyons! on! my apologetic friend, do all things
+in Grenoble belong to you?" He turned to the post-boy, who looked on
+stolidly. "You are from the Auberge de France, are you not?" quoth he.
+
+"I am, monsieur," replied the man. "This carriage was ordered last night
+by a gentleman lodging at the Veau qui Tete?"
+
+"Perfectly," replied the stranger, in a tone of finality. "It was
+ordered by me." And he was about to turn away, when Garnache approached
+him by yet another step.
+
+"I will ask you to observe, monsieur," said he and for all that his tone
+and words were civil, that they were forcedly so was obvious from their
+quiver--"I will ask you to observe that the carriage was fetched by my
+own man there, who rode hither in it."
+
+The stranger looked him up and down with a curling lip.
+
+"It seems, sir," said he, with a broad sneer, "that you are one of
+those impertinent fellows who will be for ever thrusting themselves upon
+gentlemen with an eye to such profit as they can make." He produced
+a purse and opened it. "Last night it was my supper you usurped. I
+suffered that. Now you would do the same by my coach, and that I
+shall not suffer. But there is for your pains, and to be quit of your
+company." And he tossed a silver coin at the Parisian.
+
+There was an exclamation of horror in the background, and Monsieur de
+Gaubert thrust himself forward.
+
+"Sir, sir," he exclaimed in an agitated voice, "you cannot know whom
+you are addressing. This is Monsieur Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache,
+Mestre-de-Champ in the army of the King."
+
+"Of all those names the one I should opine might fit him best, but for
+his ugliness, is that of Marie," answered the foreigner, leering, and
+with a contemptuous shrug he turned again to mount the carriage.
+
+At that all Garnache's self-control deserted him, and he did a thing
+deplorable. In one of his blind excesses of fury, heedless of the
+faithful and watchful Rabecque's arresting tug at his sleeve, he stepped
+forward, and brought a heavy hand down upon the supercilious gentleman's
+shoulder. He took him in the instant in which, with one foot off the
+ground and the other on the step of the carriage, the foreigner was
+easily thrown' off his balance; he dragged him violently backward, span
+him round and dropped him floundering in the mire of the street-kennel.
+
+That done, there fell a pause--a hush that was ominous of things
+impending. A little crowd of idlers that had gathered was quickly
+augmenting now, and from some there came a cry of "Shame!" at Garnache's
+act of violence.
+
+This is no moment at which to pause to moralize. And yet, how often is
+it not so? How often does not public sympathy go out to the man who has
+been assaulted without thought of the extent to which that man may have
+provoked and goaded his assailant.
+
+That cry of "Shame!" did no more than increase the anger that was
+mastering Garnache. His mission in Grenoble was forgotten; mademoiselle
+above-stairs was forgotten; the need for caution and the fear of the
+Condillacs were forgotten; everything was thrust from his mind but the
+situation of the moment.
+
+Amid the hush that followed, the stranger picked himself slowly up, and
+sought to wipe the filth from his face and garments. His servant and his
+friend flew to his aid, but he waved them aside, and advanced towards
+Garnache, eyes blazing, lips sneering.
+
+"Perhaps," said he, in that soft, foreign tone of his, laden now with
+fierce mock-politeness, "perhaps monsieur proposes to apologize again."
+
+"Sir, you are mad," interposed Gaubert. "You are a foreigner, I
+perceive, else you would--"
+
+But Garnache thrust him quietly aside. "You are very kind, Monsieur
+Gaubert," said he, and his manner now was one of frozen calm--a manner
+that betrayed none of the frenzy of seething passion underneath.
+"I think, sir," said he to the stranger, adopting something of that
+gentleman's sardonic manner, "that it will be a more peaceful world
+without you. It is that consideration restrains me from apologizing. And
+yet, if monsieur will express regret for having sought, and with such
+lack of manners, to appropriate my carriage--"
+
+"Enough!" broke in the other. "We are wasting time, and I have a long
+journey before me. Courthon," said he, addressing his friend, "will you
+bring me the length of this gentleman's sword? My name, sir," he added
+to Garnache, "is Sanguinetti."
+
+"Faith," said Garnache, "it sorts well with your bloody spirit."
+
+"And will sort well, no doubt, with his condition presently," put in
+hawk-faced Gaubert. "Monsieur de Garnache, if you have no friend at hand
+to act for you, I shall esteem myself honoured." And he bowed.
+
+"Why, thanks, sir. You are most opportunely met. You should be a
+gentleman since you frequent the Hotel de Bourgogne. My thanks."
+
+Gaubert went aside to confer with Monsieur Courthon. Sanguinetti stood
+apart, his manner haughty and impressive, his eye roaming scornfully
+through the ranks of what had by now become a crowd. Windows were
+opening in the street, and heads appearing, and across the way Garnache
+might have beheld the flabby face of Monsieur de Tressan among the
+spectators of that little scene.
+
+Rabecque drew near his master.
+
+"Have a care, monsieur," he implored him. "If this should be a trap."
+
+Garnache started. The remark sobered him, and brought to his mind his
+own suspicions of yesternight, which his present anger had for the
+moment lulled. Still, he conceived that he had gone too far to extricate
+himself. But he could at least see to it that he was not drawn away
+from the place that sheltered mademoiselle. And so he stepped forward,
+joining Courthon and Gaubert, to insist that the combat should take
+place in the inn--either in the common room or in the yard. But the
+landlord, overhearing this, protested loudly that he could not consent
+to it. He had his house to think of. He swore that they should not fight
+on his premises, and implored them in the same breath not to attempt it.
+
+At that Garnache, now thoroughly on his guard, was for putting off the
+encounter.
+
+"Monsieur Courthon," said he--and he felt a flush of shame mounting
+to his brow, and realized that it may need more courage to avoid an
+encounter than to engage in one--"there is something that in the heat
+of passion I forgot; something that renders it difficult for me to meet
+your friend at present."
+
+Courthon looked at him as he might look at an impertinent lackey.
+
+"And what may that be?" he inquired, mightily contemptuous. There was
+a snigger from some in the crowd that pressed about them, and even
+Monsieur Gaubert looked askance.
+
+"Surely, sir," he began, "if I did not know you for Monsieur de
+Garnache--"
+
+But Garnache did not let him finish.
+
+"Give me air," he cried, and cuffed out to right and left of him at the
+grinning spectators, who fell back and grinned less broadly. "My reason,
+Monsieur de Courthon," said he, "is that I do not belong to my self at
+present. I am in Grenoble on business of the State, as the emissary of
+the Queen-Regent, and so it would hardly become me to engage in private
+quarrels."
+
+Courthon raised his brows.
+
+"You should have thought of that before you rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti
+in the mud," he answered coldly.
+
+"I will tender him my apologies for that," Garnache promised, swallowing
+hard, "and if he still insists upon a meeting he shall have it in, say,
+a month's time."
+
+"I cannot permit--" began Courthon, very fiercely.
+
+"You will be so good as to inform your friend of what I have said,"
+Garnache insisted, interrupting him.
+
+Cowed, Courthon shrugged and went apart to confer with his friend.
+
+"Ah!" came Sanguinetti's soft voice, yet loud enough to be heard by
+all present. "He shall have a caning then for his impertinence." And
+he called loudly to the post-boy for his whip. But at that insult
+Garnache's brain seemed to take fire, and his cautious resolutions were
+reduced to ashes by the conflagration. He stepped forward, and,
+virulent of tone and terrific of mien, he announced that since Monsieur
+Sanguinetti took that tone with him, he would cut his throat for him at
+once and wherever they should please.
+
+At last it was arranged that they should proceed there and then to the
+Champs aux Capuchins, a half-mile away behind the Franciscan convent.
+
+Accordingly they set out, Sanguinetti and Courthon going first, and
+Garnache following with Gaubert; the rear being brought up by a regiment
+of rabble, idlers and citizens, that must have represented a very
+considerable proportion of the population of Grenoble. This audience
+heartened Garnache, to whom some measure of reflection had again
+returned. Before such numbers it was unthinkable that these
+gentlemen--assuming them to be acting on behalf of Condillac--should
+dare to attempt foul measures with him. For the rest he had taken the
+precaution of leaving Rabecque at the Sucking Calf, and he had given the
+sergeant strict injunctions that he was not to allow any of his men to
+leave their posts during his absence, and that the troopers were to
+hold themselves entirely at the orders of Rabecque. Comparatively easy
+therefore in his mind, and but little exercised by any thought of the
+coming encounter, Garnache walked briskly along.
+
+They came at last to the Champs aux Capuchins--a pleasant stretch
+of verdure covering perhaps half an acre and set about by a belt of
+beech-trees.
+
+The crowd disposed itself on the fringe of the sward, and the duellists
+went forward, and set about the preparations. Principals and seconds
+threw off cloak and doublet, and Sanguinetti, Courthon, and Gaubert
+removed their heavy boots, whilst Garnache did no more than detach the
+spurs from his.
+
+Sanguinetti, observing this, drew the attention of the others to it, and
+an altercation arose. It was Gaubert who came to beg Garnache that he
+should follow the example they had set him in that respect. But Garnache
+shook his head.
+
+"The turf is sodden."
+
+"But it is precisely on that account, sir," protested Gaubert very
+earnestly. "In your boots you will be unable to stand firm; you will run
+the risk of slipping every time that you break ground."
+
+"I venture to think, sir, that that is my affair," said Garnache
+stiffly.
+
+"But it is not," the other cried. "If you fight in your boots, we must
+all do the same, and for myself--well, I have not come here to commit
+suicide."
+
+"Look you, Monsieur Gaubert," said Garnache quietly, "your opponent will
+be Monsieur Courthon, and since he is in his stockinged feet, there is
+no reason why you yourself should not remain so too. As for me, I retain
+my boots, and Monsieur Sanguinetti may have all the advantage that may
+give him. Since I am content, in Heaven's name let the fight go forward.
+I am in haste."
+
+Gaubert bowed in submission; but Sanguinetti, who had overheard, turned
+with an oath.
+
+"By God, no!" said he. "I need no such advantage, sir. Courthon, be so
+good as to help me on with my boots again." And there was a fresh delay
+whilst he resumed them.
+
+At last, however, the four men came together, and proceeded to the
+measurement of swords. It was found that Sanguinetti's was two inches
+longer than any of the other three.
+
+"It is the usual length in Italy," said Sanguinetti with a shrug.
+
+"If monsieur had realized that he was no longer in Italy, we might
+perhaps have been spared this very foolish business," answered Garnache
+testily.
+
+"But what are we to do?" cried the perplexed Gaubert.
+
+"Fight," said Garnache impatiently. "Is there never to be an end to
+these preliminaries?"
+
+"But I cannot permit you to oppose yourself to a sword two inches longer
+than your own," cried Gaubert, almost in a temper.
+
+"Why not, if I am satisfied?" asked Garnache. "Mine is the longer reach;
+thus matters will stand equal."
+
+"Equal?" roared Gaubert. "Your longer reach is an advantage that you
+had from God, his longer sword is one he had from an armourer. Is that
+equality?"
+
+"He may have my sword, and I'll take his," cut in the Italian, also
+showing impatience. "I too am in haste."
+
+"In haste to die, then," snapped Gaubert.
+
+"Monsieur, this is not seemly," Courthon reproved him.
+
+"You shall teach me manners when we engage," snapped the hawk-faced
+gentleman.
+
+"Sirs, sirs," Garnache implored them, "are we to waste the day in words?
+Monsieur Gaubert, there are several gentlemen yonder wearing swords; I
+make no doubt that you will find one whose blade is of the same length
+as your own, sufficiently obliging to lend it to Monsieur Sanguinetti."
+
+"That is an office that my friend can do for me," interposed
+Sanguinetti, and thereupon Courthon departed, to return presently with a
+borrowed weapon of the proper length.
+
+At last it seemed that they might proceed with the business upon which
+they were come; but Garnache was wrong in so supposing. A discussion now
+arose between Gaubert and Courthon as to the choice of spot. The turf
+was drenched and slippery, and for all that they moved from place to
+place testing the ground, their principals following, nowhere could they
+find the conditions sufficiently improved to decide upon engaging.
+To Garnache the utility of this was apparent from the first. If these
+gentlemen had thought to avoid slippery ground, they should have elected
+to appoint the meeting elsewhere. But having chosen the Champs aux
+Capuchins, it was idle to expect that one stretch of turf would prove
+firmer than another.
+
+Wearied at last by this delay, he gave expression to his thoughts.
+
+"You are quite right, monsieur," said Courthon. "But your second is
+over-fastidious. It would simplify matters so much if you would remove
+your boots."
+
+"Look you, sirs," said Garnache, taking a firm stand, "I will engage in
+my boots and on this very spot or not at all. I have told you that I am
+in haste. As for the slipperiness of the ground, my opponent will run
+no greater risks than I. I am not the only impatient one. The spectators
+are beginning to jeer at us. We shall have every scullion in Grenoble
+presently saying that we are afraid of one another. Besides which, sirs,
+I think I am taking cold."
+
+"I am quite of monsieur's mind, myself," drawled Sanguinetti.
+
+"You hear, sir," exclaimed Courthon, turning to Gaubert. "You can scarce
+persist in finding objections now."
+
+"Why, since all are satisfied, so be it," said Gaubert, with a shrug. "I
+sought to do the best for my principal. As it is, I wash my hands of all
+responsibility, and by all means let us engage, sirs."
+
+They disposed themselves accordingly, Gaubert engaging Courthon, on
+Garnache's right hand, and Garnache himself falling on guard to receive
+the attack of Sanguinetti. The jeers and murmurs that had been rising
+from the ever-growing crowd that swarmed about the outskirts of the
+place fell silent as the clatter of meeting swords rang out at last. And
+then, scarce were they engaged when a voice arose, calling angrily:
+
+"Hold, Sanguinetti! Wait!"
+
+A big, broad-shouldered man, in a suit of homespun and a featherless
+hat, thrust his way rudely trough the crowd and broke into the space
+within the belt of trees. The combatants had fallen apart at this
+commanding cry, and the newcomer now dashed forward, flushed and out of
+breath as if with running.
+
+"_Vertudieu_! Sanguinetti," he swore, and his manner was half-angry,
+half-bantering; "do you call this friendship?"
+
+"My dear Francois" returned the foreigner, "you arrive most
+inopportunely."
+
+"And is that all the greeting you have for me?"
+
+Looking more closely, Garnache thought that he recognized in him one of
+Sanguinetti's companions of yesternight.
+
+"But do you not see that I am engaged?"
+
+"Ay; and that is my grievance that you should be engaged upon such an
+affair, and that I should have no share in it. It is to treat me like
+a lackey, and have the right to feel offended. Enfin! It seems I am not
+come too late."
+
+Garnache cut in. He saw the drift of the fellow's intentions, and he was
+not minded to submit to fresh delays; already more than half an hour was
+sped since he had left the Sucking Calf. He put it plainly to them that
+more than enough delay had there been already and he begged the newcomer
+to stand aside and allow them to terminate the business on which they
+were met. But Monsieur Francois--as Sanguinetti had called him--would
+not hear of it. He proved, indeed, a very testy fellow, and he had,
+moreover, the support of the others, including even Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+"Let me implore you not to spoil sport, sir," the latter begged
+Garnache. "I have a friend at the inn who would never forgive me if I
+permitted him to miss such a morning's diversion as this gentleman is
+willing to afford him. Suffer me to go for him."
+
+"Look you, sir," answered Garnache sharply, "however you may view this
+meeting, it is not with me an affair of jest or sport. I am in a quarrel
+that has been forced upon me, and--"
+
+"Surely not, sir," Courthon interrupted sweetly. "You forget that you
+rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti in the mud. That is hardly to have a quarrel
+forced upon you."
+
+Garnache bit his lip to the blood in his vexation.
+
+"However the quarrel may have originated," said Francois, with a great
+laugh, "I swear that it goes not forward until I am accommodated, too."
+
+"You had better accede, monsieur," murmured Gaubert. "I shall not be
+gone five minutes, and it will save time in the end."
+
+"Oh, very well," cried poor Garnache in his despair. "Anything to save
+time; anything! In God's name fetch your friend, and I hope you and he
+and every man here will get his fill of fighting for once."
+
+Gaubert departed on his errand, and there were fresh murmurs in the mob
+until the reason of his going was understood. Five minutes sped; ten
+minutes, and yet he returned not. Grouped together were Sanguinetti
+and his two friends, in easy, whispered talk. At a little distance from
+them, Garnache paced up and down to keep himself warm. He had thrown his
+cloak over his shoulders again, and with sword tucked under arm and head
+thrust forward, he stamped backwards and forwards, the very picture
+of ill-humour. Fifteen minutes passed; twelve o'clock boomed from the
+Church of Saint Francois d'Assisi and still Monsieur Gaubert returned
+not. Garnache stood still a moment, in angry thought. This must not go
+on. There must be an end, and at once. The tastes and inclinations
+of brawlers were no concern of his. He had business of State--however
+unworthy--to dispatch. He turned, intending to demand of Monsieur
+Sanguinetti that they should engage at once and be done, when suddenly
+a fellow roughly dressed, with dirty face and a shock head of fair
+hair, pushed his way through the throng and advanced towards Monsieur
+Sanguinetti and his friends. Garnache checked in his movement to look
+at the fellow, for he recognized in him the ostler of the Auberge de
+France: He spoke at that moment, and Garnache overheard the words he
+uttered.
+
+"Monsieur Sanguinetti," said he, addressing that gentleman, "my master
+sends to inquire if you shall want the carriage you ordered for to-day.
+It has been standing for an hour at the door of the Auberge de France,
+awaiting you, and if you don't want it--"
+
+"Standing where?" asked Sanguinetti harshly.
+
+"At the door of the Auberge de France."
+
+"Peste, fool!" cried the foreigner, "why is it there, when I bade it be
+sent to the Sucking Calf?"
+
+"I don't know, sir. I know no more than Monsieur l'Hote told me."
+
+"Now, a plague on Monsieur l'Hote," swore Sanguinetti, and in that
+moment his eye fell upon Garnache, standing there, attentive. At sight
+of the Parisian he seemed lost in confusion. He dropped his glance and
+appeared on the point of turning aside. Then to the ostler: "I shall
+want the carriage, and I shall come for it anon. Carry that message
+to your master." And with that he turned and advanced to Garnache. His
+whilom arrogance was all fallen from him; he wore instead an air of
+extreme contrition.
+
+"Monsieur, what shall I say to you?" he asked in a voice that was rather
+small. "It seems there has been an error. I am deeply grieved, believe
+me--"
+
+"Say no more, I beg," cried Garnache, immensely relieved that at last
+there should be a conclusion to an affair which had threatened to be
+interminable. "Let me but express my regrets for the treatment you
+received at my hands."
+
+"I accept your expressions, and I admire their generosity," returned the
+other as courteous now as subservient, indeed, in his courtesy--as
+he had been erstwhile fierce and intractable. "As for the treatment I
+received, I confess that my mistake and my opinionativeness deserved it
+me. I deplore to deprive these gentlemen of the entertainment to which
+they were looking forward, but unless you should prove of an excessive
+amiability I am afraid they must suffer with me the consequences of my
+error."
+
+Garnache assured him very briefly, and none too politely that he did not
+intend to prove of any excessive amiability. He spoke whilst struggling
+into his doublet. He felt that he could cheerfully have caned the fellow
+for the inconvenience he had caused him, and yet he realized that he had
+other more pressing matters to attend to. He sheathed his sword, took up
+his cloak and hat, made those gentlemen the compliments that became the
+occasion, in terms a trifle more brief, perhaps, than were usual, and,
+still wondering why Monsieur de Gaubert had not yet returned, he stalked
+briskly away. Followed by the booings of the disappointed crowd, he set
+out for the Sucking Calf at a sharp pace, taking the shorter way behind
+the Church and across the graveyard of Saint Francois.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+
+Upon leaving the Champs aux Capuchins, hawk-faced Monsieur Gaubert had
+run every foot of the way to the Sucking Calf, and he had arrived there
+within some five minutes, out of breath and wearing every appearance of
+distress--of a distress rather greater than his haste to find his friend
+should warrant.
+
+At the door of the inn he found the carriage still waiting; the
+post-boy, however, was in the porch, leaning in talk with one of the
+drawers. The troopers sat their horses in stolid patience, keeping
+guard, and awaiting, as they had been bidden, the return of Monsieur de
+Garnache. Rabecque, very watchful, lounged in the doorway, betraying in
+his air none of the anxiety and impatience with which he looked for his
+master.
+
+At sight of Monsieur Gaubert, running so breathlessly, he started
+forward, wondering and uneasy. Across the street, from the Palais
+Seneschal, came at that same moment Monsieur de Tressan with rolling
+gait. He reached the door of the inn together with Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+Full of evil forebodings, Rabecque hailed the runner.
+
+"What has happened?" he cried. "Where is Monsieur de Garnache?"
+
+Gaubert came to a staggering halt; he groaned and wrung his hands.
+
+"Killed!" he panted, rocking himself in a passion of distress. "He has
+been butchered! Oh! it was horrible!"
+
+Rabecque gripped him by the shoulder, and steadied him with a hand that
+hurt. "What do you say?" he gasped, his face white to the lips.
+
+Tressan halted, too, and turned upon Gaubert, a look of incredulity in
+his fat countenance. "Who has been killed?" he asked. "Not Monsieur de
+Garnache?"
+
+"Helas! yes," groaned the other. "It was a snare, a guet-apens to which
+they led us. Four of them set upon us in the Champs aux Capuchins. As
+long as he lived, I stood beside him. But seeing him fallen, I come for
+help."
+
+"My God!" sobbed Rabecque, and loosed his grasp of Monsieur Gaubert's
+shoulder.
+
+"Who did it?" inquired Tressan, and his voice rumbled fiercely.
+
+"I know not who they were. The man who picked the quarrel with Monsieur
+de Garnache called himself Sanguinetti. There is a riot down there at
+present. There was a crowd to witness the combat, and they have fallen
+to fighting among themselves. Would to Heaven they had stirred in time
+to save that poor gentleman from being murdered."
+
+"A riot, did you say?" cried Tressan, the official seeming to awaken in
+him.
+
+"Aye," answered the other indifferently; "they are cutting one another's
+throats."
+
+"But... But... Are you sure that he is dead, monsieur?" inquired
+Rabecque; and his tone was one that implored contradiction.
+
+Gaubert looked and paused, seeming to give the matter a second's
+thought. "I saw him fall," said he. "It may be that he was no more than
+wounded."
+
+"And you left him there?" roared the servant. "You left him there?"
+
+Gaubert shrugged his shoulders. "What could I do against four? Besides,
+the crowd was interfering already, and it seemed best to me to come for
+help. These soldiers, now--"
+
+"Aye," cut in Tressan, and he turned about and called the sergeant.
+"This becomes my affair." And he announced his quality to Monsieur
+Gaubert. "I am the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny."
+
+"I am fortunate in finding you," returned Gaubert, and bowed. "I could
+place the matter in no better hand."
+
+But Tressan, without heeding him, was already ordering the sergeant
+to ride hard with his troopers for the Champs aux Capuchins. Rabecque,
+however, thrust himself suddenly forward.
+
+"Not so, Monsieur le Seneschal," he interposed in fresh alarm, and
+mindful of his charge. "These men are here to guard Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye. Let them remain. I will go to Monsieur de Garnache."
+
+The Seneschal stared at him with contemptuously pouting underlip. "You
+will go?" said he. "And what can you do alone? Who are you?" he asked.
+
+"I am Monsieur de Garnache's servant."
+
+"A lackey? Ah!" And Tressan turned aside and resumed his orders as
+if Rabecque did not exist or had never spoken. "To the Champs aux
+Capuchins!" said he. "At the gallop, Pommier! I will send others after
+you."
+
+The sergeant rose in his stirrups and growled an order. The troopers
+wheeled about; another order, and they were off, their cantering hoofs
+thundering down the narrow street.
+
+Rabecque clutched at the Lord Seneschal's arm.
+
+"Stop them, monsieur!" he almost screamed in his excitement. "Stop them!
+There is some snare, some trick in this."
+
+"Stop them?" quoth the Seneschal. "Are you mad?" He shook off Rabecque's
+detaining hand, and left him, to cross the street again with ponderous
+and sluggish haste, no doubt to carry out his purpose of sending more
+troopers to the scene of the disturbance.
+
+Rabecque swore angrily and bitterly, and his vexation had two entirely
+separate sources. On the one hand his anxiety and affection for his
+master urged him to run at once to his assistance, whilst Tressan's
+removal of the troopers rendered it impossible for him to leave
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye unguarded--though what he should do with
+her if Garnache came not back at all, he did not at this stage pause
+to consider. On the other hand, an instinctive and growing suspicion of
+this Monsieur Gaubert--who was now entering the inn--inspired him with
+the opinion that the fat Seneschal had been duped by a wild tale to
+send the troopers from the spot where they might presently become very
+necessary.
+
+Full of fears, anxiety, and mistrust, it was a very dispirited Rabecque
+that now slowly followed Monsieur Gaubert into the inn. But as he set
+his foot across the threshold of the common-room, a sight met his eyes
+that brought him to a momentary standstill, and turned to certainty all
+his rising suspicions. He found it tenanted by a half-dozen fellows of
+very rude aspect, all armed and bearing an odd resemblance in air and
+accoutrements to the braves he had seen at Condillac the day before.
+As to how they came there, he could only surmise that they had entered
+through the stable-yard, as otherwise he must have observed their
+approach. They were grouped now at the other end of the long, low
+chamber, by the door leading to the interior of the inn. A few paces
+distant the landlord watched them with uneasy eyes.
+
+But what dismayed Garnache's servant most of all was to see the man who
+called himself Gaubert standing in talk with a slender, handsome youth,
+magnificently arrayed, in whom he recognized Marius de Condillac.
+
+Rabecque checked in his advance, and caught in that moment from Marius
+the words: "Let her be told that it is Monsieur de Garnache wishes her
+to descend."
+
+At that Rabecque stepped towards them, very purposeful of mien. Gaubert
+turned at his approach, and smiled. Marius looked up quickly; then
+made a sign to the men. Instantly two of them went out by the door they
+guarded, and ere it swung back again Rabecque saw that they were
+making for the stairs. The remaining four ranged themselves shoulder
+to shoulder across the doorway, plainly with intent to bar the way.
+Gaubert, followed immediately by Marius, stepped aside and approached
+the landlord with arms akimbo and a truculent smile on his pale hawk
+face. What he and Marius said, Rabecque could not make out, but he
+distinctly heard the landlord's answer delivered with a respectful bow
+to Marius:
+
+"Bien, Monsieur de Condillac. I would not interfere in your
+concerns--not for the world. I will be blind and deaf."
+
+Marius acknowledged the servile protestation by a sneer, and Rabecque,
+stirring at last, went forward boldly towards the doorway and its ugly,
+human barrier.
+
+"By your leave, sirs," said he--and he made to thrust one of them aside.
+
+"You cannot pass this way, sir," he was answered, respectfully but
+firmly.
+
+Rabecque stood still, clenching and unclenching his hands and quivering
+with anger. It was in that moment that he most fervently cursed Tressan
+and his stupid meddling. Had the troopers still been there, they could
+have made short work of these tatter-demalions. As it was, and with
+Monsieur de Garnache dead, or at least absent, everything seemed at an
+end. He might have contended that, his master being slain, it was no
+great matter what he did, for in the end the Condillacs must surely have
+their way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But he never paused to think
+of that just then. His sense of trust was strong; his duty to his master
+plain. He stepped back, and drew his sword.
+
+"Let me pass!" he roared. But at the same instant there came the soft
+slither of another weapon drawn, and Rabecque was forced to turn to meet
+the onslaught of Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+"You dirty traitor," cried the angry lackey, and that was all they left
+him breath to say. Strong arms gripped him from behind. The sword was
+wrenched from his hand. He was flung down heavily, and pinned prone in a
+corner by one of those bullies who knelt on his spine. And then the door
+opened again, and poor Rabecque groaned in impotent anguish to behold
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye pause white-faced and wide-eyed on, the
+threshold at sight of Monsieur de Condillac bowing low before her.
+
+She stood there a moment between the two ruffians who had been sent to
+fetch her, and her eyes travelling round that room discovered Rabecque
+in his undignified and half; strangled condition.
+
+"Where... Where is Monsieur de Garnache?" she faltered.
+
+"He is where all those who cross the will of Condillac must sooner or
+later find themselves," said Marius airily. "He is... disposed of."
+
+"Do you mean that he is dead?" she cried.
+
+"I think it very probable by now," he smiled. "So you see, mademoiselle,
+since the guardian the Queen appointed you has... deserted you, you
+would do well to return to my mother's roof. Let me assure you that we
+shall very gladly welcome your return. We blame none but Garnache for
+your departure, and he has paid for the brutality of his abduction of
+you."
+
+She turned in despair from that mocking gentleman, and attempted to make
+appeal to the landlord, as though he could help her who could not help
+himself.
+
+"Monsieur l'Hote--" she began, but Marius cut in sharply.
+
+"Take her out that way," he said, and pointed back down the passage by
+the stairs. "To the coach. Make haste."
+
+She sought to resist them now; but they dragged her back, and there
+was a rush of the others following through the doorway, the rear being
+brought up by Gaubert.
+
+"Follow presently," was his parting command to the man who still knelt
+upon Rabecque, and with that he vanished too.
+
+Their steps died away in the passage; a door banged in the distance.
+There followed a silence, disturbed only by the sound of Rabecque's
+laboured breathing; then came a stir outside the door of the inn; some
+one shouted an order. There was a movement of hoofs, a creak and crunch
+of wheels, and presently the rumble of a heavy carriage being driven
+rapidly away. But too well did Rabecque surmise what had taken place.
+
+The ruffian released him at last, and, leaping to his feet, was gone
+before Rabecque could rise. Once up, however, the lackey darted to the
+door. In the distance he saw his late assailant running hard; the
+coach had disappeared. He turned, and his smouldering eye fell upon the
+landlord.
+
+"O pig!" he apostrophized him, snarling at him to vent some of his
+pent-up rage. "O cowardly pig."
+
+"What would you?" expostulated the frightened taverner. "They had cut my
+throat if I resisted them."
+
+Rabecque poured abuse upon him, until for very lack of words he was
+forced to cease, then, with a final bark of contempt, he went to recover
+his sword, which had been flung into a corner of the room. He was
+stooping in the act, when a quick step rang behind him on the threshold,
+an angry voice harsh and metallic pronounced his name:
+
+"Rebecque!"
+
+The sword clattered from Rabecque's hand suddenly gone
+nerveless--nerveless with sheer joy, all else forgotten in the
+perception that there, safe and sound, stood his beloved master.
+
+"Monsieur!" he cried, and the tears welled up to the rough servant's
+eyes. "Monsieur!" he cried again, and then with the tears streaming
+down his cheeks, sallow and wrinkled as parchment, "Oh, thank God!" he
+blubbered. "Thank God!"
+
+"For what?" asked Garnache, coming forward, a scowl like a thunder-cloud
+upon his brow. "Where is the coach, where the troopers? Where is
+mademoiselle? Answer me!"
+
+He caught Rabecque's wrist in a grip that threatened to snap it. His
+face was livid, his eyes aflame.
+
+"They--they--" stammered Rabecque. He had not the courage to tell the
+thing that had happened. He feared Garnache would strike him dead.
+
+And then out of his terror he gathered an odd daring. He spoke to
+Garnache as never he had dreamt to speak to him, and it may well be that
+by his tone and by what he said he saved his life just then.
+
+"You fool," he cried to him. "I told you to be on your guard. I warned
+you to go warily. But you would not heed me. You know better than
+Rabecque. You would have your way. You must go a-brawling. And they
+duped you, they fooled you to the very top of their bent, monsieur."
+
+Garnache dropped the servant's hand and stood back a pace. That
+counter-blast of passion and that plain speaking from a quarter so
+unexpected served, in part at least, to sober him. He understood the
+thing that had happened, the thing that already he suspected must have
+happened; but he understood too that he alone was to blame for it--he
+and his cursed temper.
+
+"Who--who fooled me?" he stammered.
+
+"Gaubert--the fellow that calls himself Gaubert. He and his friends.
+They fooled you away. Then Gaubert returned with a tale that you
+had been killed and that there was a disturbance in the Champs aux
+Capuchins. Monsieur de Tressan was here, as ill-luck would have it,
+and Gaubert implored him to send soldiers thither to quell the riot.
+He dispatched the escort. I sought in vain to stay them. He would not
+listen to me. The troopers went, and then Monsieur Gaubert entered
+the inn, to join Monsieur de Condillac and six of his braves who were
+waiting there. They overpowered me, and carried mademoiselle off in the
+coach. I did what I could, but--"
+
+"How long have they been gone?" Garnache interrupted him to inquire.
+
+"But few minutes before you came."
+
+"It would be, then, the coach that passed me near the Porte de Savoie.
+We must go after them, Rabecque. I made a short cut across the graveyard
+of Saint Francis, or I must have met the escort. Oh, perdition!" he
+cried, smiting his clenched right hand into his open left. "To have so
+much good work undone by a moment's unguardedness." Then abruptly he
+turned on his heels. "I am going to Monsieur de Tressan," said he over
+his shoulder, and went out.
+
+As he reached the threshold of the porch, the escort rode up the street,
+returned at last. At sight of him the sergeant broke into a cry of
+surprise.
+
+"At least you are safe, monsieur," he said. "We had heard that you were
+dead, and I feared it must be so, for all that the rest of the story
+that was told us was clearly part of a very foolish jest."
+
+"Jest? It was no jest, _Vertudieu_!" said Garnache grimly. "You had best
+return to the Palais Seneschal. I have no further need of an escort," he
+added bitterly. "I shall require a larger force."
+
+And he stepped out into the rain, which had begun again a few minutes
+earlier, and was now falling in a steady downpour.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. THE SENESCHAL'S ADVICE
+
+Straight across to the Palais Seneschal went Garnache. And sorely though
+his temper might already have been tried that day, tempestuously though
+it had been vented, there were fresh trials in store for him, fresh
+storms for Tressan.
+
+"May I ask, Monsieur le Seneschal," he demanded arrogantly, "to what end
+it was that you permitted yourself to order from its post the escort you
+had placed under my command?"
+
+"To what end?" returned the Seneschal, between sorrow and indignation.
+"Why, to the end that it might succour you if still in time. I had heard
+that if not dead already, you were in danger of your life."
+
+The answer was one that disarmed Garnache, in spite of his mistrust
+of Tressan, and followed as it now was by the Seneschal's profuse
+expressions of joy at seeing Garnache safe and well, it left him
+clearly unable to pursue the subject of his grievance in this particular
+connection. Instead, he passed on to entertain Tressan with the recital
+of the thing that had been done; and in reciting it his anger revived
+again, nor did the outward signs of sympathetic perturbation which
+the Seneschal thought it judicious to display do aught to mollify his
+feelings.
+
+"And now, monsieur," he concluded, "there remains but one course to
+be pursued--to return in force, and compel them at the sword-point to
+surrender me mademoiselle. That accomplished, I shall arrest the Dowager
+and her son and every jackanapes within that castle. Her men can lie
+in Grenoble gaol to be dealt with by yourself for supporting her in an
+attempt to resist the Queen's authority. Madame and her son shall go
+with me to Paris to answer there for their offence."
+
+The Seneschal looked grave. He thoughtfully combed his beard with his
+forefinger, and his little eyes peered a shade fearfully at Garnache
+through his horn-rimmed spectacles--Garnache had found him at his
+never-failing pretence of work.
+
+"Why, yes," he agreed, speaking slowly, "that way lies your duty."
+
+"I rejoice, monsieur, to hear you say so. For I shall need your aid."
+
+"My aid?" The Seneschal's face assumed a startled look.
+
+"I shall require of you the necessary force to reduce that garrison."
+
+The Seneschal blew out his cheeks almost to bursting point, then wagged
+his head and smiled wistfully.
+
+"And where," he asked, "am I to find such a force?"
+
+"You have upwards of ten score men in quarters at Grenoble."
+
+"If I had those men--which I have not--what, think you, could they do
+against a fortress such as Condillac? Monsieur deludes himself. If they
+resist, you'll need ten times that number to bring them to their senses.
+They are well victualled; they have an excellent water-supply. My
+friend, they would just draw up the bridge, and laugh at you and your
+soldiers from the ramparts."
+
+Garnache looked at him from under lowering brows. But for all his
+mistrust of the man--a mistrust most excellently founded--he was forced
+to confess that there was wisdom in what Tressan said.
+
+"I'll sit down and besiege them if need be," he announced.
+
+Again the Seneschal wagged his head. "You would have to be prepared to
+spend your winter there in that case, and it can be cold in the valley
+of Isere. Their garrison is small--some twenty men at most; but it is
+sufficient for their defence, and not too many mouths to feed. No, no,
+monsieur, if you would win your way by force you must count upon more
+than ten score men."
+
+And now a flash of inspiration helped Tressan. It was his aim, as we
+know, to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. Break with Madame
+de Condillac his foolish hopeful heart would not permit him. Break with
+this man, who personified authority and the King, he dared not. He
+had sought--and it had given him much to do--to steer a middle course,
+serving the Dowager and appearing not to withstand the Parisian. Now it
+almost seemed to him as if he were come to an impasse beyond which he
+could no longer pursue that course, but must halt and declare his side.
+But the notion that now occurred to him helped him to win through
+this difficulty. For Madame de Condillac's schemes he cared not a jot;
+whether they came safe to harbour or suffered shipwreck on the way
+was all one to him; whether Valerie de La Vauvraye married Marius de
+Condillac or the meanest cobbler in Grenoble was, similarly, a matter
+that never disturbed his mind. He would not even be concerned if he,
+himself, were to help the Dowager's schemes to frustration, so long as
+she were to remain in ignorance of his defection, so long as outwardly
+he were to appear faithful to her interests.
+
+"Monsieur," said he gravely, "the only course that promises you success
+is to return to Paris, and, raising sufficient men, with guns and other
+modern siege appliances such as we possess not here, come back and
+batter down the walls of Condillac."
+
+There the Seneschal spoke good sense. Garnache realized it, so much
+so that he almost began to doubt whether he had not done the man an
+injustice in believing him allied to the other party. But, however fully
+he might perceive the wisdom of the advice, such a step was one that
+must wound his pride, must be an acknowledgment that his own resources,
+upon which the Queen had relied when she sent him single-handed to deal
+with this situation, had proved insufficient.
+
+He took a turn in the apartment without answering, tugging at his
+mustachios and pondering the situation what time the Seneschal
+furtively watched him in the candle-light. At last he came abruptly to
+a standstill by the Seneschal's writing-table, immediately opposite
+Tressan. His hand fell to his side, his eyes took on a look of
+determination.
+
+"As a last resource your good advice may guide me, Monsieur le
+Seneschal," said he. "But first I'll see what can be done with such men
+as you have here."
+
+"But I have no men," answered Tressan, dismayed to see the failure of
+his effort.
+
+Garnache stared at him in an unbelief that was fast growing to
+suspicion. "No men?" he echoed dully. "No men?"
+
+"I might muster a score--no more than that."
+
+"But, monsieur, it is within my knowledge that you have at least two
+hundred. I saw at least some fifty drawn up in the courtyard below here
+yesterday morning."
+
+"I had them, monsieur," the Seneschal made haste to cry, his hands
+upheld, his body leaning forward over his table. "I had them. But,
+unfortunately, certain disturbances in the neighbourhood of Montelimar
+have forced me to part with them. They were on the point of setting out
+when you saw them."
+
+Garnache looked at him a moment without speaking. Then, sharply:
+
+"They must be recalled, monsieur," said he.
+
+And now the Seneschal took refuge in a fine pretence of indignation.
+
+"Recalled?" he cried, and besides indignation there was some horror
+in his voice. "Recalled? And for what? That they may assist you in
+obtaining charge of a wretched girl who is so headstrong as to wish to
+marry other than her guardians have determined. A pretty affair that, as
+God's my life! And for the adjustment of such a family dispute as this,
+a whole province is to go to ruin, a conflagration of rebellion is to
+spread unquenched? On my soul, sir, I begin to think that this mission
+of yours has served to turn your head. You begin to see it out of all
+proportion to its size."
+
+"Monsieur, it may have turned my head, or it may not; but I shall not be
+amazed if in the end it be the means of losing you yours. Tell me now:
+What is the disturbance you speak of in Montelimar?" That was a question
+all Tressan's ingenuity could not answer.
+
+"What affair is it of yours?" he demanded. "Are you Seneschal of
+Dauphiny, or am I? If I tell you that there is a disturbance, let that
+suffice. In quelling it I do but attend to my own business. Do you
+attend to yours--which seems to be that of meddling in women's matters."
+
+This was too much. There was such odious truth in it that the iron sank
+deep into Garnache's soul. The very reflection that such a business
+should indeed be his, was of itself enough to put him in a rage, without
+having it cast in his teeth as Tressan had none too delicately done.
+
+He stormed and raged; he waved his arms and thumped the table, and
+talked of cutting men to ribbons--among which men no doubt he counted my
+Lord the Seneschal of Dauphiny. But from the storm of fierce invective,
+of threats and promises with which he filled the air, the Seneschal
+gathered with satisfaction the one clear statement that he would take
+his advice.
+
+"I'll do as you say," Garnache had ended. "I'll get me back to Paris as
+fast as horse can carry me. When I return woe betide Condillac! And I
+shall send my emissaries into the district of Montelimar to inquire into
+these disturbances you tell of. Woe betide you if they find the country
+quiet. You shall pay a heavy price for having dispatched your soldiers
+thither to the end that they might not be here to further the Queen's
+business."
+
+With that he caught up his rain-sodden hat, flung it on his head, and
+stalked out of the room, and, so, out of the Palace.
+
+He left Grenoble next morning, and it was a very tame and crestfallen
+Garnache who quitted the Auberge du Veau qui Tete and rode out of the
+town to take the road to Paris. How they would laugh at him at the
+Luxembourg! Not even an affair of this kind was he fit to carry
+through; not even as a meddler in women's matters as Tressan had
+called him--could he achieve success. Rabecque, reflecting his master's
+mood--as becomes a good lackey--rode silent and gloomy a pace or two in
+the rear.
+
+By noon they had reached Voiron, and here, at a quiet hostelry, they
+descended to pause awhile for rest and refreshment. It was a chill,
+blustering day, and although the rain held off, the heavens were black
+with the promise of more to come. There was a fire burning in the
+general-room of the hostelry, and Garnache went to warm him at its
+cheerful blaze. Moodily he stood there, one hand on the high mantel
+shelf, one foot upon an andiron, his eyes upon the flames.
+
+He was disconsolately considering his position; considering how utterly,
+how irrevocably he had failed; pondering the gibes he would have to
+stomach on his return to Paris, the ridicule it would incumb him to live
+down. It had been a fine thing to breathe fire and blood and vengeance
+to Tressan yesterday, to tell him of the great deeds he would perform on
+his return. It was odds he never would return. They would send another
+in his place, if indeed they sent at all. For, after all, before he
+could reach Paris and the force required be in Dauphiny, a fortnight
+must elapse, let them travel never so quickly. By that time they must be
+singularly sluggish at Condillac if they did not so contrive that no
+aid that came should come in time for mademoiselle, now that they were
+warned that the Queen was stirring in the matter.
+
+Oh! he had blundered it all most cursedly. Had he but kept his temper
+yesterday at Grenoble; had he but had the wit to thwart their plans, by
+preserving an unruffled front to insult, he might have won through and
+carried mademoiselle out of their hands. As it was--! he let his arms
+fall to his sides in his miserable despair.
+
+"Your wine, monsieur," said Rabecque at his elbow. He turned, and took
+the cup of mulled drink from his servant. The beverage warmed him in
+body; but it would need a butt of it to thaw the misery from his soul.
+
+"Rabecque," he said with a pathetic grimness, "I think I am the most
+cursed blunderer that ever was entrusted with an errand."
+
+The thing so obsessed his mind that he must speak of it, if it be only
+to his lackey. Rabecque's sharp face assumed a chastened look. He sighed
+most dutifully. He sought for words of consolation. At last:
+
+"At least, monsieur has made them fear him up there at Condillac," said
+he.
+
+"Fear me?" laughed Garnache. "Pish! Deride me, you would say."
+
+"Fear you, I repeat, monsieur. Else why are they at such pains to
+strengthen the garrison?"
+
+"Eh?" he questioned. But his tone was not greatly interested. "Are they
+doing that? Are they strengthening it? How know you?"
+
+"I had it from the ostler at the Veau qui Tete that a certain Captain
+Fortunio--an Italian soldier of fortune who commands the men at
+Condillac--was at the Auberge de France last night, offering wine to
+whomsoever would drink with him, and paying for it out of Madame la
+Marquise's purse. To such as accepted his hospitality he talked of the
+glory of a military career, particularly a free-lance's; and to those
+who showed interest in what he said he offered a pike in his company."
+
+"Enrolled he many, did you learn?"
+
+"Not one, monsieur, the ostler told me; and it seems he spent the
+evening watching him weave his spider's web. But the flies were
+over-wary. They knew whence he came; they knew the business for which he
+desired to enrol them--for a rumour had gone round that Condillac was in
+rebellion against the Queen's commands--and there were none so desperate
+at the Auberge de France as to risk their necks by enlisting, no matter
+what the wage he offered."
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders. "No matter," said he. "Get me another
+cup of wine." But as Rabecque turned away to obey him there came a
+sudden gleam into the eye of Monsieur de Garnache which lightened the
+depression of his countenance.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X. THE RECRUIT
+
+In the great hall of the Chateau de Condillac sat the Dowager, her son,
+and the Lord Seneschal, in conference.
+
+It was early in the afternoon of the last Thursday in October, exactly a
+week since Monsieur de Garnache all but broken-hearted at the failure of
+his mission--had departed from Grenoble. They had dined, and the table
+was still strewn with vessels and the fragments of their meal, for
+the cloth had not yet been raised. But the three of them had left the
+board--the Seneschal with all that reluctance with which he was wont to
+part company with the table, no matter how perturbed in spirit he
+might be--and they had come to group themselves about the great open
+fireplace.
+
+A shaft of pale October sunshine entering through the gules of an
+escutcheon on the mullioned windows struck a scarlet light into silver
+and glass upon the forsaken board.
+
+Madame was speaking. She was repeating words that she had uttered at
+least twenty times a day during the past week.
+
+"It was a madness to let that fellow go. Had we but put him and his
+servant out of the way, we should be able now to sleep tranquil in our
+beds. I know their ways at Court. They might have marvelled a little at
+first that he should tarry so long upon his errand, that he should send
+them no word of its progress; but presently, seeing him no more, he
+would little by little have been forgotten, and with him the affair in
+which the Queen has been so cursedly ready to meddle.
+
+"As it is, the fellow will go back hot with the outrage put upon him;
+there will be some fine talk of it in Paris; it will be spoken of as
+treason, as defiance of the King's Majesty, as rebellion. The Parliament
+may be moved to make outlaws of us, and the end of it all--who shall
+foresee?"
+
+"It is a long distance from Condillac to Paris, madame," said her son,
+with a shrug.
+
+"And you will find them none so ready to send soldiers all this way,
+Marquise," the Seneschal comforted her.
+
+"Bah! You make too sure of your security. You make too sure of what they
+will do, what leave undone. Time will show, my friends; and, mor-dieu! I
+am much at fault if you come not both to echo my regret that we did not
+dispose of Monsieur de Garnache and his lackey when we had them in our
+power."
+
+Her eye fell with sinister promise upon Tressan, who shivered slightly
+and spread his hands to the blaze, as though his shiver had been of
+cold. But Marius did not so readily grow afraid.
+
+"Madame," he said, "at the worst we can shut our gates and fling
+defiance at them. We are well-manned, and Fortunio is seeking fresh
+recruits."
+
+"Seeking them, yes," she sneered. "For a week has the fellow been
+spending money like water, addling the brains of half Grenoble with the
+best wine at the Auberge de France, yet not a single recruit has come
+in, so far."
+
+Marius laughed. "Your pessimism leads you into rash conclusions," he
+cried. "You are wrong. One recruit has come in."
+
+"One!" she echoed. "A thousand devils! A brave number that! A fine
+return for the river of wine with which we have washed the stomachs of
+Grenoble."
+
+"Still, it is a beginning," ventured the Seneschal.
+
+"Aye, and, no doubt, an ending," she flashed back at him. "And what
+manner of fool may this one be, whose fortunes were so desperate that he
+could throw them in with ours?"
+
+"He is an Italian--a Piedmontese who has tramped across Savoy and was on
+his way to Paris to make his fortune, when Fortunio caught him and made
+it clear to him that his fortune was made for him at Condillac. He is
+a lusty, stalwart fellow, speaking no word of French, who was drawn to
+Fortunio by discovering in him a fellow-countryman."
+
+Mockery flashed from the Dowager's beautiful eyes.
+
+"In that you have the reason of his enrolling himself. He knew no word
+of French, poor devil, so could not learn how rash his venture was.
+Could we find more such men as this one it might be well. But where
+shall we find them? Pish! my dear Marius, matters are little mended,
+nor ever will be, for the mistake we made in allowing Garnache to go his
+ways."
+
+"Madame;" again ventured Tressan, "I think that you want for
+hopefulness."
+
+"At least, I do not want for courage, Monsieur le Comte," she answered
+him; "and I promise you that while I live--to handle a sword if need
+be--no Paris men shall set foot in Condillac."
+
+"Aye," grumbled Marius, "you can contemplate that, and it is all you
+do contemplate. You will not see, madame that our position is far from
+desperate; that, after all, there may be no need to resist the King. It
+is three months since we had news of Florimond. Much may happen in three
+months when a man is warring. It may well be that he is dead."
+
+"I wish I knew he was--and damned," she snapped, with a tightening of
+her scarlet lips.
+
+"Yes," agreed Marius, with a sigh, "that were an end to all our
+troubles."
+
+"I'm none so sure. There is still mademoiselle, with her new-formed
+friends in Paris--may a pestilence blight them all! There are still the
+lands of La Vauvraye to lose. The only true end to our troubles as they
+stand at present lies in your marrying this headstrong baggage."
+
+"That the step should be rendered impossible, you can but blame
+yourself," Marius reminded her.
+
+"How so?" she cried, turning sharply upon him.
+
+"Had you kept friends with the Church, had you paid tithes and saved
+us from this cursed Interdict, we should have no difficulty in getting
+hither a priest, and settling the matter out of hand, be Valerie willing
+or not."
+
+She looked at him, scorn kindling in her glance. Then she swung round to
+appeal to Tressan.
+
+"You hear him, Count," said she. "There is a lover for you! He would wed
+his mistress whether she love him or not--and he has sworn to me that he
+loves the girl."
+
+"How else should the thing be done since she opposes it?" asked Marius,
+sulkily.
+
+"How else? Do you ask me how else? God! Were I a man, and had I your
+shape and face, there is no woman in the world should withstand me if
+I set my heart on her. It is address you lack. You are clumsy as a lout
+where a woman is concerned. Were I in your place, I had taken her by
+storm three months ago, when first she came to us. I had carried her out
+of Condillac, out of France, over the border into Savoy, where there are
+no Interdicts to plague you, and there I would have married her."
+
+Marius frowned darkly, but before he could speak, Tressan was
+insinuating a compliment to the Marquise.
+
+"True, Marius," he said, with pursed lips. "Nature has been very good to
+you in that she has made you the very counterpart of your lady mother.
+You are as comely a gentleman as is to be found in France--or out of
+it."
+
+"Pish!" snapped Marius, too angered by the reflection cast upon his
+address, to be flattered by their praises of his beauty. "It is an easy
+thing to talk; an easy thing to set up arguments when we consider but
+the half of a question. You forget, madame, that Valerie is betrothed to
+Florimond and that she clings faithfully to her betrothal."
+
+"_Vertudieu_!" swore the Marquise, "and what is this betrothal, what
+this faithfulness? She has not seen her betrothed for three years. She
+was a child at the time of their fiancailles. Think you her faithfulness
+to him is the constancy of a woman to her lover? Go your ways, you
+foolish boy. It is but the constancy to a word, to the wishes of her
+father. Think you constancy that has no other base than that would stand
+between her and any man who--as you might do, had you the address--could
+make her love him?"
+
+"I do say so," answered Marius firmly.
+
+She smiled the pitying smile of one equipped with superior knowledge
+when confronted with an obstinate, uninformed mind.
+
+"There is a droll arrogance about you, Marius," she told him, quietly.
+"You, a fledgling, would teach me, a woman, the ways of a woman's heart!
+It is a thing you may live to regret."
+
+"As how?" he asked.
+
+"Once already has mademoiselle contrived to corrupt one of our men,
+and send him to Paris with a letter. Out of that has sprung our present
+trouble. Another time she may do better. When she shall have bribed
+another to assist her to escape; when she, herself, shall have made
+off to the shelter of the Queen-mother, perhaps you will regret that my
+counsel should have fallen upon barren ground."
+
+"It is to prevent any such attempt that we have placed her under guard,"
+said he. "You are forgetting that."
+
+"Forgetting it? Not I. But what assurance have you that she will not
+bribe her guard?"
+
+Marius laughed, rose, and pushed back his chair.
+
+"Madame," said he, "you are back at your contemplation of the worst side
+of this affair; you are persisting in considering only how we may be
+thwarted. But set your mind at rest. Gilles is her sentinel. Every night
+he sleeps in her anteroom. He is Fortunio's most trusted man. She will
+not corrupt him."
+
+The Dowager smiled pensively, her eyes upon the fire. Suddenly she
+raised them to his face. "Berthaud was none the less trusted. Yet, with
+no more than a promise of reward at some future time should she succeed
+in escaping from us, did she bribe him to carry her letter to the Queen.
+What happened to Berthaud that may not happen to Gilles?"
+
+"You might change her sentry nightly," put in the Seneschal.
+
+"Yes, if we knew whom we could trust; who would be above corruption.
+As it is"--she shrugged her shoulders "that would be but to afford her
+opportunities to bribe them one by one until they were all ready to act
+in concert."
+
+"Why need she any sentinel at all?" asked Tressan, with some show of
+sense.
+
+"To ward off possible traitors," she told him, and Marius smiled and
+wagged his head.
+
+"Madame is never done foreseeing the worst, monsieur."
+
+"Which shows my wisdom. The men in our garrison are mercenaries, all
+attached to us only because we pay them. They all know who she is and
+what her wealth."
+
+"Pity you have not a man who is deaf and dumb," said Tressan, half in
+jest. But Marius looked up suddenly, his eyes serious.
+
+"We have as good," said he. "There is the Italian knave Fortunio
+enrolled yesterday, as I have told you. He knows neither her wealth nor
+her identity; nor if he did could he enter into traffic with her, for he
+knows no French, and she no Italian."
+
+The Dowager clapped her hands. "The very man!" she cried.
+
+But Marius, either from sheer perverseness, or because he did not share
+her enthusiasm, made answer: "I have faith in Gilles."
+
+"Yes," she mocked him, "and you had faith in Berthaud. Oh, if you have
+faith in Gilles, let him remain; let no more be said."
+
+The obstinate boy took her advice, and shifted the subject, speaking to
+Tressan of some trivial business connected with the Seneschalship.
+
+But madame, woman-like, returned to the matter whose abandoning she had
+herself suggested. Marius, for all his affected disdain of it, viewed it
+with a certain respect. And so in the end they sent for the recruit.
+
+Fortunio--who was no other than the man Garnache had known as
+"Sanguinetti"--brought him, still clad in the clothes in which he had
+come. He was a tall, limber fellow, with a very swarthy skin and black,
+oily-looking hair that fell in short ringlets about his ears and neck,
+and a black, drooping mustache which gave him a rather hang-dog look.
+There was a thick stubble of beard of several days' growth about his
+chin and face; his eyes were furtive in their glances, but of a deep
+blue that contrasted oddly with his blackness when he momentarily raised
+them.
+
+He wore a tattered jerkin, and his legs, in default of stockings, were
+swathed in soiled bandages and cross-gartered from ankle to knee. He
+stood in a pair of wooden shoes, from one of which peeped forth some
+wisps of straw, introduced, no doubt, to make the footgear fit. He
+slouched and shuffled in his walk, and he was unspeakably dirty.
+Nevertheless, he was girt with a sword in a ragged scabbard hanging from
+a frayed and shabby belt of leather.
+
+Madame scanned him with interest. The fastidious Marius eyed him with
+disgust. The Seneschal peered at him curiously through shortsighted
+eyes.
+
+"I do not think I have ever seen a dirtier ruffian," said he.
+
+"I like his nose," said madame quietly. "It is the nose of an intrepid
+man."
+
+"It reminds me of Garnache's," laughed the Seneschal.
+
+"You flatter the Parisian," commented Marius.
+
+The mercenary, meanwhile, stood blandly smiling at the party, showing at
+least a fine array of teeth, and wearing the patient, attentive air of
+one who realizes himself to be under discussion, yet does not understand
+what is being said.
+
+"A countryman of yours, Fortunio?" sneered Marius.
+
+The captain, whose open, ingenuous countenance dissembled as
+villainous a heart as ever beat in the breast of any man, disowned the
+compatriotism with a smile.
+
+"Hardly, monsieur," said he. "'Battista' is a Piedmontese." Fortunio
+himself was a Venetian.
+
+"Is he to be relied upon, think you?" asked madame. Fortunio shrugged
+his shoulders and spread his hands. It was not his habit to trust any
+man inordinately.
+
+"He is an old soldier," said he. "He has trailed a pike in the
+Neapolitan wars. I have cross-questioned him, and found his answers bore
+out the truth of what he said."
+
+"And what brings him to France?" asked Tressan. The captain smiled
+again, and there came again that expressive shrug of his. "A little
+over-ready with the steel," said he.
+
+They told Fortunio that they proposed to place him sentry over
+mademoiselle instead of Gilles, as the Italian's absolute lack of French
+would ensure against corruption. The captain readily agreed with them.
+It would be a wise step. The Italian fingered his tattered hat, his eyes
+on the ground.
+
+Suddenly madame spoke to him. She asked him for some account of himself
+and whence he came, using the Italian tongue, of which she had a passing
+knowledge. He followed her questions very attentively, at times with
+apparent difficulty, his eyes on her face, his head craned a little
+forward.
+
+Now and then Fortunio had to intervene, to make plainer to this ignorant
+Piedmontese mind the Marquise's questions. His answers came in a
+deep, hoarse voice, slurred by the accent of Piedmont, and madame--her
+knowledge of Italian being imperfect--had frequently to have recourse to
+Fortunio to discover the meaning of what he said.
+
+At last she dismissed the pair of them, bidding the captain see that he
+was washed and more fittingly clothed.
+
+An hour later, after the Seneschal had taken his departure to ride home
+to Grenoble, it was madame herself, accompanied by Marius and Fortunio,
+who conducted Battista--such was the name the Italian had given--to
+the apartments above, where mademoiselle was now confined practically a
+prisoner.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI. VALERIE'S GAOLER
+
+My child, said the Dowager, and her eyes dwelt on Valerie with a look of
+studied gentleness, "why will you not be reasonable?"
+
+The constant reflection that Garnache was at large, making his way back
+to Paris to stir up vengeance for the outrage put upon him, was not
+without a certain chastening effect upon the Dowager. She had a way of
+saying that she had as good a stomach for a fight as any man in France,
+and a fight there should be if it came to it and Garnache should return
+to assail Condillac. Yet a certain pondering of the consequences, a
+certain counting of the cost--ordinarily unusual to her nature led her
+to have recourse to persuasion and to a gentleness no less unusual.
+
+Valerie's eyes were raised to hers with a look that held more scorn than
+wonder. They were standing in the antechamber of Valerie's room. Yonder
+at his post lounged the recruit "Battista," looking a trifle cleaner
+than when first he had been presented to the Marquise, but still not
+clean enough for a lady's antechamber. He was leaning stolidly against
+the sill of the window, his eyes on the distant waters of the Isere,
+which shone a dull copper colour in the afterglow of the October sunset.
+His face was vacant, his eyes pensive, as he stood there undisturbed by
+the flow of a language he did not understand.
+
+Fortunio and Marius had departed, and the Marquise--played upon by her
+unusual tremors--had remained behind for a last word with the obstinate
+girl.
+
+"In what, madame," asked Valerie, "does my conduct fall short of
+reasonableness?"
+
+The Dowager made a movement of impatience. If at every step she were
+to be confronted by these questions, which had in them a savour of
+challenge, she was wasting time in remaining.
+
+"You are unreasonable, in this foolish clinging to a promise given for
+you."
+
+"Given by me, madame," the girl amended, knowing well to what promise
+the Dowager referred.
+
+"Given by you, then; but given at an age when you could not understand
+the nature of it. They had no right to bind you so."
+
+"If it is for any to question that right, it is for me," Valerie made
+answer, her eyes ever meeting the Dowager's unflinchingly. "And I am
+content to leave that right unquestioned. I am content to fill the
+promise given. In honour I could not do less."
+
+"Ah! In honour!" The Dowager sighed. Then she came a step nearer, and
+her face grew sweetly wistful. "But your heart, child; what of your
+heart?"
+
+"My heart concerns myself. I am the betrothed of Florimond--that is all
+that concerns the world and you. I respect and admire him more than any
+living man, and I shall be proud to become his wife when he returns, as
+his wife I shall become in spite of all that you and your son may do."
+
+The Dowager laughed softly, as if to herself.
+
+"And if I tell you that Florimond is dead?"
+
+"When you give me proof of that, I shall believe it," the girl replied.
+The Marquise looked at her, her face manifesting no offence at the
+almost insulting words.
+
+"And if I were to lay that proof before you?" she inquired, sadly
+almost.
+
+Valerie's eyes opened a trifle wider, as if in apprehension. But her
+answer was prompt and her voice steady. "It still could have no effect
+upon my attitude towards your son."
+
+"This is foolishness, Valerie--"
+
+"In you it is, madame," the girl broke in; "a foolishness to think you
+can constrain a girl, compel her affections, command her love, by such
+means as you have employed towards me. You think that it predisposes me
+to be wooed, that it opens my heart to your son, to see myself gaoled
+that he may pay me his court."
+
+"Gaoled, child? Who gaols you?" the Dowager cried, as if the most
+surprising utterance had fallen from Valerie's lips.
+
+Mademoiselle smiled in sorrow and some scorn.
+
+"Am I not gaoled, then?" she asked. "What call you this? What does that
+fellow there? He is to lie outside my door at nights to see that none
+holds communication with me. He is to go with me each morning to the
+garden, when, by your gracious charity I take the air. Sleeping and
+waking the man is ever within hearing of any word that I may utter--"
+
+"But he has no French!" the Dowager protested.
+
+"To ensure, no doubt, against any attempt of mine to win him to my side,
+to induce him to aid me escape from this prison. Oh, madame, I tell you
+you do but waste time, and you punish me and harass yourself to little
+purpose. Had Marius been such a man as I might have felt it in my nature
+to love--which Heaven forbid!--these means by which you have sought to
+bring that thing about could but have resulted in making me hate him as
+I do."
+
+The Dowager's fears were banished from her mind at that, and with them
+went all thought of conciliating Valerie. Anger gleamed in her eyes; the
+set of her lips grew suddenly sneering and cruel, so that the beauty of
+her face but served to render it hateful the more.
+
+"So that you hate him, ma mie?" a ripple of mockery on the current of
+her voice, "and he a man such as any girl in France might be proud
+to wed. Well, well, you are not to be constrained, you say." And
+the Marquise's laugh was menacing and unpleasant. "Be not so sure,
+mademoiselle. Be not so sure of that. It may well betide that you shall
+come to beg upon your knees for this alliance with a man whom you tell
+me that you hate. Be not so sure you cannot be constrained."
+
+Their eyes met; both women were white to the lips, but it was curbed
+passion in the one, and deadly fear in the other; for what the Dowager's
+words left unsaid her eyes most eloquently conveyed. The girl shrank
+back, her hands clenched, her lip caught in her teeth.
+
+"There is a God in heaven, madame," she reminded the Marquise.
+
+"Aye--in heaven," laughed the Marquise, turning to depart. She paused by
+the door, which the Italian had sprung forward to open for her.
+
+"Marius shall take the air with you in the morning if it is fine. Ponder
+meanwhile what I have said."
+
+"Does this man remain here, madame?" inquired the girl, vainly seeking
+to render her voice steady.
+
+"In the outer anteroom is his place: but as the key of this room is on
+his side of the door, he may enter here when he so pleases, or when he
+thinks that he has reason to. If the sight of him displeases you, you
+may lock yourself from it in your own chamber yonder."
+
+The same she said in Italian to the man, who bowed impassively,
+and followed the Dowager into the outer room, closing the door upon
+mademoiselle. It was a chamber almost bare of furniture, save for a
+table and chair which had been placed there, so that the gaoler might
+take his meals.
+
+The man followed the Marquise across the bare floor, their steps
+resounding as they went, and he held the outer door for her.
+
+Without another word she left him, and where he stood he could hear her
+steps as she tripped down the winding staircase of stone. At last the
+door of the courtyard closed with a bang, and the grating of a key
+announced to the mercenary that he and his charge were both imprisoned
+in that tower of the Chateau de Condillac.
+
+Left alone in the anteroom, mademoiselle crossed to the window and
+dropped limply into a chair. Her face was still very white, her heart
+beating tumultuously, for the horrid threat that had been conveyed in
+the Dowager's words had brought her her first thrill of real fear since
+the beginning of this wooing-by-force three months ago, a wooing which
+had become more insistent and less like a wooing day by day, until it
+had culminated in her present helpless position.
+
+She was a strong-souled, high-spirited girl, but tonight hope seemed
+extinguished in her breast. Florimond, too, seemed to have abandoned
+her. Either he had forgotten her, or he was dead, as the Dowager said.
+Which might be the true state of things she did not greatly care. The
+realization of how utterly she was in the power of Madame de Condillac
+and her son, and the sudden chance discovery of how unscrupulously that
+power might be wielded, filled her mind to the exclusion of all else.
+
+By the window she sat, watching, without heeding them, the fading
+colours in the sky. She was abandoned to these monsters, and it seemed
+they would devour her. She could hope for no help from outside since
+they had as she believed--slain Monsieur de Garnache. Her mind dwelt for
+a moment on that glimpse of rescue that had been hers a week ago, upon
+the few hours of liberty which she had enjoyed, but which only seemed
+now to increase the dark hopelessness of her imprisonment.
+
+Again with the eyes of her mind she beheld that grim, stalwart figure,
+saw his great nose, his greying hair, his fierce mustachios and his
+stern, quick eyes. Again she heard the rasp of his metallic voice with
+its brisk derision. She saw him in the hall below, his foot upon the
+neck of that popinjay of Condillac daring them all to draw a breath,
+should he forbid it; again in fancy she rode on the withers of his horse
+at the gallop towards Grenoble. A sigh escaped her. Surely that was the
+first man who was indeed a man she had ever set eyes on since her father
+died. Had Garnache been spared, she would have felt courage and she
+would have hoped, for there was something about him that suggested
+energy and resource such as it is good to lean upon in times of stress.
+Again she heard that brisk, metallic voice: "Are you content, madame?
+Have you had fine deeds enough for one day?"
+
+And then, breaking in upon her musings came the very voice of her
+day-dream, so suddenly, sounding so natural and lifelike that she almost
+screamed, so startled was she.
+
+"Mademoiselle," it said, "I beg that you'll not utterly lose heart. I
+have come back to the thing Her Majesty bade me do, and I'll do it, in
+spite of that tigress and her cub."
+
+She sat still as a statue, scarce breathing, her eyes fixed upon the
+violet sky. The voice had ceased, but still she sat on. Then it was
+slowly borne in upon her that that was no dream-voice, no trick of her
+overburdened mind. A voice, a living, actual voice had uttered those
+words in this room, here at her elbow.
+
+She turned, and again she almost screamed; for there, just behind her,
+his glittering eyes fixed upon her with singular intentness, stood the
+swarthy, black-haired Italian gaoler they had given her because he had
+no French.
+
+He had come up so quietly behind her that she had not heard his
+approach, and he was leaning forward now, with an odd suggestion of
+crouching in his attitude, like a beast about to spring. Yet his gaze
+riveted hers as with a fascination. And so, while she looked, his lips
+moved, and from them, in that same voice of her dreams, came from this
+man who had no French, the words:
+
+"Be not afraid, mademoiselle. I am that blunderer, Garnache, that
+unworthy fool whose temper ruined what chance of saving you he had a
+week ago."
+
+She stared like one going mad.
+
+"Garnache!" said she, in a husky whisper. "You Garnache?"
+
+Yet the voice, she knew, was Garnache's and none other. It was a voice
+not easily mistaken. And now, as she looked and looked, she saw that the
+man's nose was Garnache's, though oddly stained, and those keen eyes,
+they were Garnache's too. But the hair that had been brown and flecked
+with grey was black; the reddish mustachios that had bristled like a
+mountain cat's were black, too, and they hung limp and hid from sight
+the fine lines of his mouth. A hideous stubble of unshorn beard defaced
+his chin and face, and altered its sharp outline; and the clear, healthy
+skin that she remembered was now a dirty brown.
+
+Suddenly the face smiled, and it was a smile that reassured her and
+drove away the last doubt that she had. She was on her feet in an
+instant.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," was all that she could say; but her longing was to
+fling her arms about the neck of this man, as she might have flung them
+about the neck of a brother or a father, and sob out upon his shoulder
+the sudden relief and revulsion that his presence brought.
+
+Garnache saw something of her agitation, and to relieve it he smiled and
+began to tell her the circumstances of his return and his presentation
+to Madame as a knave who had no French.
+
+"Fortune was very good to me, mademoiselle," said he. "I had little hope
+that such a face as mine could be disguised, but I take no pride in what
+you see. It is the handiwork of Rabecque, the most ingenious lackey that
+ever served a foolish master. It helped me that having been ten years in
+Italy when I was younger, I acquired the language so well as to be able
+to impose even upon Fortunio. In that lay a circumstance which at once
+disarmed suspicion, and if I stay not so long as it shall take the dye
+to wear from my hair and beard and the staining from my face, I shall
+have little to fear."
+
+"But, monsieur," she cried, "you have everything to fear!" And alarm
+grew in her eyes.
+
+But he laughed again for answer. "I have faith in my luck, mademoiselle,
+and I think I am on the tide of it at present. I little hoped when I
+made my way into Condillac in this array that I should end, by virtue
+of my pretended ignorance of French, in being appointed gaoler to you. I
+had some ado to keep the joy from my eyes when I heard them planning it.
+It is a thing that has made all else easy."
+
+"But what can you do alone, monsieur?" she asked him; and there was a
+note almost of petulance in her voice.
+
+He moved to the window, and leaned his elbow on the sill. The light was
+fast fading. "I know not yet. But I am here to contrive a means. I shall
+think and watch."
+
+"You know in what hourly peril I am placed," she cried, and suddenly
+remembering that he must have overheard and understood the Dowager's
+words, a sudden heat came to her cheeks to recede again and leave them
+marble-pale. And she thanked Heaven that in the dusk and in the shadow
+where she stood he could but ill make out her face.
+
+"If you think that I have been rash in returning--"
+
+"No, no, not rash, monsieur; noble and brave above all praise. I would
+indeed I could tell you how noble and brave I account your action."
+
+"It is as nothing to the bravery required to let Rabecque do this
+hideous work upon a face for which I have ever entertained some measure
+of respect."
+
+He jested, sooner than enlighten her that it was his egregious pride
+had fetched him back when he was but a few hours upon his journey
+Pariswards, his inability to brook the ridicule that would be his when
+he announced at the Luxembourg that failure had attended him.
+
+"Ah, but what can you do alone?" she repeated.
+
+"Give me at least a day or two to devise some means; let me look round
+and take the measure of this gaol. Some way there must be. I have not
+come so far and so successfully to be beaten now. Still," he continued,
+"if you think that I overrate my strength or my resource, if you
+would sooner that I sought men and made an assault upon Condillac,
+endeavouring to carry it and to let the Queen's will prevail by force of
+arms, tell me so, and I am gone tomorrow."
+
+"Whither would you go?" she cried, her voice strained with sudden
+affright.
+
+"I might seek help at Lyons or Moulins. I might find loyal soldiers who
+would be willing to follow me by virtue of my warrant to levy such help
+as I may require, if I but tell them that the help was refused me in
+Grenoble. I am not sure that it would be so, for, unfortunately, my
+warrant is for the Seneschal of Dauphiny only. Still, I might make the
+attempt."
+
+"No, no," she implored him, and in her eagerness to have him put all
+thought of leaving her from his mind, she caught him by the arm and
+raised a pleading face to his. "Do not leave me here, monsieur; of your
+pity do not leave me alone amongst them. Think me a coward if you will,
+monsieur: I am no less. They have made a coward of me."
+
+He understood the thing she dreaded, and a great pity welled up from
+his generous heart for this poor unfriended girl at the mercy of the
+beautiful witch of Condillac and her beautiful rascally son. He patted
+the hand that clutched his arm.
+
+"I think, myself, that it will be best if I remain, now that I have come
+so far," he said. "Let me ponder things. It may well be that I shall
+devise some way."
+
+"May Heaven inspire you, monsieur. I shall spend the night in prayer, I
+think, imploring God and His saints to show you the way you seek."
+
+"Heaven, I think, should hear your prayers, mademoiselle," he answered
+musingly, his glance upon the white, saintly face that seemed to shine
+in the deepening gloom. Then, suddenly he stirred and bent to listen.
+
+"Sh! Some one is coming," he whispered. And he sped quickly from her
+side and into the outer room, where he sank noiselessly on to his chair
+as the steps ascended the stone staircase and a glow of yellow light
+grew gradually in the doorway that opened on to it.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII. A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+
+That he might inspire the more confidence in the Dowager and her son
+Garnache organized and performed a little comedy at Condillac a couple
+of nights after his appointment as mademoiselle's gaoler. He gave an
+alarm at dead midnight, and when half-clad men, followed presently
+by madame and Marian, rushed into the anteroom where he stood, a very
+picture of the wildest excitement, he drew their attention to two
+twisted sheets, tied end to end, hanging from the window which
+overlooked the moat; and in answer to the marquise's questions he
+informed her that he had been disturbed by sounds of movements and
+upon entering the chamber he had discovered mademoiselle making these
+preparations for departure.
+
+Valerie, locked in the inner chamber, refused to come forth as the
+Marquise bade her, but her voice reassured Madame de Condillac of her
+presence, and so, since her attempt had failed, madame was content to
+let her be.
+
+"The little fool," she said, peering down from the window into the
+night; "she would have been killed for certain. Her rope of sheets does
+not reach more than a third of the way down. She would have had over
+thirty feet to fall, and if that had not been enough to finish her, she
+would of a certainty have, been drowned in the moat."
+
+She signified her satisfaction with the faithful "Battista's" vigilance
+by a present of some gold pieces in the morning, and since the height of
+the window and the moat beneath it did not appear sufficient obstacles
+to mademoiselle's attempts at effecting her escape, the Dowager had the
+window nailed down. Thus, only by breaking it could egress be obtained,
+and the breaking of it could not be effected without such a noise as
+must arouse "Battista."
+
+Under Garnache's instructions the comedy was carried a little further.
+Mademoiselle affected for her gaoler a most unconquerable aversion, and
+this she took pains to proclaim.
+
+One morning, three days after her attempted escape, she was taking the
+air in the garden of Condillac, "Battista," ever watchful, a few paces
+behind her, when suddenly she was joined by Marius--a splendid, graceful
+figure in a riding-suit of brown velvet and biscuit-coloured hose, his
+points tipped with gold, his long boots of the finest marroquin leather,
+his liver-coloured hound at his heels. It was the last day of October,
+but the weather, from cold and wet that it had been for the past
+fortnight, had taken on a sudden improvement. The sun shone, the air
+was still and warm, and but for the strewn leaves and the faint smell
+of decay with which the breath of autumn is ever laden, one might have
+fancied it a day of early spring.
+
+It was not Valerie's wont to pause when Marius approached. Since she
+might not prevent him from walking where he listed, she had long since
+abandoned the futility of bidding him begone when he came near her. But,
+at least, she had never stopped in her walk, never altered its pace; she
+had suffered what she might not avoid, but she had worn the outward air
+of suffering it with indifference. This morning, however, she made a
+departure from her long habit. Not only did she pause upon observing his
+approach, but she called to him as if she would have him hasten to her
+side. And hasten he did, a new light in his eyes that was mostly of
+surprise, but a little, also, of hope.
+
+She was gracious to him for once, and gave him good morning in a manner
+that bordered upon the pleasant. Wondering, he fell into step beside
+her, and they paced together the yew-bordered terrace, the ever-vigilant
+but discreet "Battista" following them, though keeping now a few paces
+farther in the rear.
+
+For a little while they appeared constrained, and their talk was of the
+falling leaves and the grateful change that had so suddenly come upon
+the weather. Suddenly she stopped and faced him.
+
+"Will you do me a favour, Marius?" she asked. He halted too, and turned
+to her, studying her gentle face, seeking to guess her mind in the
+clear hazel eyes she raised to his. His eyebrows lifted slightly with
+surprise. Nevertheless--
+
+"There is in all the world, Valerie, nothing you could ask me that I
+would not do," he protested.
+
+She smiled wistfully. "How easy it is to utter words!" she sighed.
+
+"Marry me," he answered, leaning towards her, his eyes devouring her
+now, "and you shall find my words very quickly turned to deeds."
+
+"Ah," said she, and her smile broadened and took on a scornful twist,
+"you make conditions now. If I will marry you, there is nothing you will
+not do for me; so that, conversely, I may take it that if I do not marry
+you, there is nothing you will do. But in the meantime, Marius, until
+I resolve me whether I will marry you or not, would you not do a little
+thing that I might ask of you?"
+
+"Until you resolve?" he cried, and his face flushed with the sudden hope
+he gathered from those words. Hitherto there had been no suggestion of
+a possible modification of attitude towards his suit. It had been
+repulsion, definite and uncompromising. Again he studied her face.
+Was she fooling him, this girl with the angel-innocence of glance? The
+thought of such a possibility cooled him instantly. "What is it you want
+of me?" he asked, his voice ungracious.
+
+"Only a little thing, Marius." Her glance travelled back over her
+shoulder to the tall, limber fellow in leather jerkin and with
+cross-gartered legs who lounged a dozen steps behind them. "Rid me of
+that ruffian's company," said she.
+
+Marius looked back at "Battista," and from him to Valerie. Then he
+smiled and made a slight movement with his shoulders.
+
+"But to what end?" he asked, as one who pleadingly opposes an argument
+that is unreasonable. "Another would replace him, and there is little to
+choose among the men that garrison Condillac."
+
+"Little, perhaps; but that little matters." Sure of her ground, and
+gathering from his tone and manner that the more ardently she begged
+this thing the less likely would it be that she should prevail, she
+pursued her intercessions with a greater heat. "Oh," she cried, in a
+pretended rage, "it is to insult me to give me that unclean knave for
+perpetual company. I loathe and detest him. The very sight of him is too
+much to endure."
+
+"You exaggerate," said he coldly.
+
+"I do not; indeed I do not," she rejoined, looking frankly, pleadingly
+into his face. "You do not realize what it is to suffer the insolent
+vigilance of such as he; to feel that your every step is under
+surveillance; to feel his eyes ever upon you when you are within his
+sight. Oh, it is insufferable!"
+
+Suddenly he gripped her arm, his face within a hand's breadth of her
+own, his words falling hot and quickly on her ear.
+
+"It is yours to end it when you will, Valerie," he passionately reminded
+her. "Give yourself into my keeping. Let it be mine to watch over you
+henceforth. Let me--"
+
+Abruptly he ceased. She had drawn back her head, her face was white to
+the lips, and in her eyes, as they dwelt on his at such close quarters,
+there appeared a look of terror, of loathing unutterable. He saw it, and
+releasing her arm he fell back as if she had struck him. The colour left
+his face too.
+
+"Or is it," he muttered thickly, "that I inspire you, with much the same
+feeling as does he?"
+
+She stood before him with lowered eyelids, her bosom heaving still from
+the agitation of fear his closeness had aroused in her. He studied her
+in silence a moment, with narrowing eyes and tightening lips. Then
+anger stirred in him, and quenched the sorrow with which at first he had
+marked the signs of her repulsion. But anger in Marius de Condillac was
+a cold and deadly emotion that vented itself in no rantings, uttered
+no loud-voiced threats or denunciations, prompted no waving of arms or
+plucking forth of weapons.
+
+He stooped towards her again from his stately, graceful height.
+The cruelty hidden in the beautiful lines of his mouth took instant
+prominence in the smile that flickered round it.
+
+"I think that Battista makes a very excellent watchdog," he said, and
+you would have thought him amused, as if at the foolish subterfuge of
+some little child. "You may be right to dislike him. He knows no French,
+so that it may not be yours to pervert and bribe him with promises of
+what you will do if he assists you to escape; but you will see that this
+very quality which renders him detestable to you renders him invaluable
+to us."
+
+He laughed softly, as one well pleased with his own astuteness, doffed
+his hat with a politeness almost exaggerated, and whistling his dog he
+abruptly left her.
+
+Thus were Marius and his mother--to whom he bore the tale of Valerie's
+request--tricked further into reposing the very fullest trust in the
+watchful, incorruptible "Battista." Realizing that this would be so,
+Garnache now applied himself more unreservedly to putting into effect
+the plans he had been maturing. And he went about it with a zest that
+knew no flagging, with a relish that nothing could impair. Not that it
+was other than usual for Garnache to fling himself whole-heartedly into
+the conduct of any enterprise he might have upon his hands; but he
+had come into this affair at Condillac against his will; stress of
+circumstances it was had driven him on, step by step, to take a personal
+hand in the actual deliverance of Valerie.
+
+It was vanity and pride that had turned him back when already he was on
+the road to Paris; not without yet a further struggle would he accept
+defeat. To this end had he been driven, for the first time in his life,
+to the indignity of his foul disguise; and he, whose methods had ever
+been direct, had been forced to have recourse to the commonest of
+subterfuges. It was with anger in his heart that he had proceeded to
+play the part he had assumed. He felt it to be a thing unworthy of
+him, a thing that derogated from his self-respect. Had he but had the
+justification of some high political aim, he might have endured it
+with a better resignation; the momentous end to be served might have
+sanctioned the ignoble means adopted. But here was a task in itself
+almost as unworthy of him as the methods by which he now set about
+accomplishing it. He was to black his face and dye his beard and hair,
+stain his skin and garb himself in filthy rags, for no better end than
+that he might compass the enlargement of a girl from the captivity into
+which she had been forced by a designing lady of Dauphiny. Was that a
+task to set a soldier, a man of his years and birth and name? He had
+revolted at it; yet that stubborn pride of his that would not brook his
+return to Paris to confess himself defeated by a woman over this woman's
+business, held him relentlessly to his distasteful course.
+
+And gradually the distaste of it had melted. It had begun to fall
+away five nights ago, when he had heard what passed between Madame de
+Condillac and Valerie. A great pity for this girl, a great indignation
+against those who would account no means too base to achieve their ends
+with her, a proper realization of the indignities she was suffering,
+caused him to shed some of his reluctance, some of his sense of injury
+to himself.
+
+His innate chivalry, that fine spirit of his which had ever prompted him
+to defend the weak against the oppressor, stirred him now, and stirred
+him to such purpose that, in the end, from taking up the burden of his
+task reluctantly, he came to bear it zestfully and almost gladly. He was
+rejoiced to discover himself equipped with histrionic gifts of which
+he had had no suspicion hitherto, and it delighted him to set them into
+activity.
+
+Now it happened that at Condillac there was a fellow countryman of
+"Battista's," a mercenary from Northern Italy, a rascal named Arsenio,
+whom Fortunio had enlisted when first he began to increase the garrison
+a month ago. Upon this fellow's honesty Garnache had formed designs.
+He had closely observed him, and in Arsenio's countenance he thought he
+detected a sufficiency of villainy to augur well for the prosperity
+of any scheme of treachery that might be suggested to him provided the
+reward were adequate.
+
+Garnache went about sounding the man with a wiliness peculiarly his own.
+Arsenio being his only compatriot at Condillac it was not wonderful
+that in his few daily hours of relief from his gaoler's duty "Battista"
+should seek out the fellow and sit in talk with him. The pair became
+intimate, and intercourse between them grew more free and unrestrained.
+Garnache waited, wishing to risk nothing by precipitancy, and watched
+for his opportunity. It came on the morrow of All Saints. On that Day of
+the Dead, Arsenio, whose rearing had been that of a true son of Mother
+Church, was stirred by the memory of his earthly mother, who had died
+some three years before. He was silent and moody, and showed little
+responsiveness to Garnache's jesting humour. Garnache, wondering what
+might be toward in the fellow's mind, watched him closely.
+
+Suddenly the little man--he was a short, bowlegged, sinewy
+fellow--heaved a great sigh as he plucked idly at a weed that grew
+between two stones of the inner courtyard, where they were seated on the
+chapel steps.
+
+"You are a dull comrade to-day, compatriot," said Garnache, clapping him
+on the shoulder.
+
+"It is the Day of the Dead," the fellow answered him, as though that
+were an ample explanation. Garnache laughed.
+
+"To those that are dead it no doubt is; so was yesterday, so will
+to-morrow be. But to us who sit here it is the day of the living."
+
+"You are a scoffer," the other reproached him, and his rascally face was
+oddly grave. "You don't understand."
+
+"Enlighten me, then. Convert me."
+
+"It is the day when our thoughts turn naturally to the dead, and mine
+are with my mother, who has lain in her grave these three years. I am
+thinking of what she reared me and of what I am."
+
+Garnache made a grimace which the other did not observe. He stared at
+the little cut-throat, and there was some dismay in his glance. What
+ailed the rogue? Was he about to repent him of his sins, and to have
+done with villainy and treachery; was he minded to slit no more gullets
+in the future, be faithful to the hand that paid him, and lead a
+godlier life? Peste! That was a thing that would nowise suit Monsieur
+de Garnache's ends just then. If Arsenio had a mind to reform, let him
+postpone that reformation until Garnache should have done with him. So
+he opened his lips and let out a deep guffaw of mockery.
+
+"We shall have you turning monk," said he, "a candidate for canonization
+going barefoot, with flagellated back and shaven head. No more wine, no
+more dice, no more wenches, no more--"
+
+"Peace!" snapped the other.
+
+"Say 'Pax,"' suggested Garnache, "'Pax tecum,' or 'vobiscum.' It is thus
+you will be saying it later."
+
+"If my conscience pricks me, is it aught to you? Have you no conscience
+of your own?"
+
+"None. Men wax lean on it in this vale of tears. It is a thing invented
+by the great to enable them to pursue the grinding and oppression of the
+small. If your master pays you ill for the dirty work you do for him
+and another comes along to offer you some rich reward for an omission in
+that same service, you are warned that if you let yourself be tempted,
+your conscience will plague you afterwards. Pish! A clumsy, childish
+device that, to keep you faithful."
+
+Arsenio looked up. Words that defamed the great were ever welcome to
+him; arguments that showed him he was oppressed and imposed upon sounded
+ever gratefully in his ears. He nodded his approval of "Battista's"
+dictum.
+
+"Body of Bacchus!" he swore, "you are right in that, compatriot. But my
+case is different. I am thinking of the curse that Mother Church has
+put upon this house. Yesterday was All Saints, and never a Mass heard I.
+To-day is All Souls, and never a prayer may I offer up in this place of
+sin for the rest of my mother's soul."
+
+"How so?" quoth Garnache, looking in wonder at this religiously minded
+cut-throat.
+
+"How so? Is not the House of Condillac under excommunication, and every
+man who stays in it of his own free will? Prayers and Sacraments are
+alike forbidden here."
+
+Garnache received a sudden inspiration. He leapt to his feet, his face
+convulsed as if at the horror of learning of a hitherto undreamt-of
+state of things. He never paused to give a moment's consideration to the
+cut-throat's mind, so wonderfully constituted as to enable him to break
+with impunity every one of the commandments every day of the week for
+the matter of a louis d'or or two, and yet be afflicted by qualms of
+conscience at living under a roof upon which the Church had hurled her
+malediction.
+
+"What are you saying, compatriot? What is it that you tell me?"
+
+"The truth," said Arsenio, with a shrug. "Any man who wilfully abides in
+the services of Condillac"--and instinctively he lowered his voice
+lest the Captain or the Marquise should be within earshot--, "is
+excommunicate."
+
+"By the Host!" swore the false Piedmontese. "I am a Christian man
+myself, Arsenio, and I have lived in ignorance of this thing?"
+
+"That ignorance may be your excuse. But now that you know--" Arsenio
+shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Now that I know, I had best have a care of my soul and look about me
+for other employment."
+
+"Alas!" sighed Arsenio; "it is none so easy to find."
+
+Garnache looked at him. Garnache began to have in his luck a still
+greater faith than hitherto. He glanced stealthily around; then he sat
+down again, so that his mouth was close to Arsenio's ear.
+
+"The pay is beggarly here, yet I have refused a fortune offered me by
+another that I might remain loyal to my masters at Condillac. But this
+thing that you tell me alters everything. By the Host! yes."
+
+"A fortune?" sneered Arsenio.
+
+"Aye, a fortune--at least, fifty pistoles. That is a fortune to some of
+us."
+
+Arsenio whistled. "Tell me more," said he.
+
+Garnache rose with the air of one about to depart.
+
+"I must think of it," said he, and he made shift to go. But the other's
+hand fell with a clenching grip upon his arm.
+
+"Of what must you think, fool?" said he. "Tell me this service you have
+been offered. I have a conscience that upbraids me. If you refuse these
+fifty pistoles, why should not I profit by your folly?"
+
+"There would not be the need. Two men are required for the thing I speak
+of, and there are fifty pistoles for each. If I decide to undertake the
+task, I'll speak of you as a likely second."
+
+He nodded gloomily to his companion, and shaking off his hold he set out
+to cross the yard. But Arsenio was after him and had fastened again upon
+his arm, detaining him.
+
+"You fool!" said he; "you'd not refuse this fortune?"
+
+"It would mean treachery," whispered Garnache.
+
+"That is bad," the other agreed, and his face fell. But remembering what
+Garnache had said, he was quick to brighten again. "Is it to these
+folk here at Condillac?" he asked. Garnache nodded. "And they would
+pay--these people that seek our service would pay you fifty pistoles?"
+
+"They seek my service only, as yet. They might seek yours were I to
+speak for you."
+
+"And you will, compatriot. You will, will you not? We are comrades, we
+are friends, and we are fellow-countrymen in a strange land. There is
+nothing I would not do for you, Battista. Look, I would die for you if
+there should come the need! Body of Bacchus! I would. I am like that
+when I love a man."
+
+Garnache patted his shoulder. "You are a good fellow, Arsenio."
+
+"And you will speak for me?"
+
+"But you do not know the nature of the service," said Garnache. "You may
+refuse it when it is definitely offered you."
+
+"Refuse fifty pistoles? I should deserve to be the pauper that I am
+if such had been my habits. Be the service what it may, my conscience
+pricks me for serving Condillac. Tell me how the fifty pistoles are to
+be earned, and you may count upon me to put my hand to anything."
+
+Garnache was satisfied. But he told Arsenio no more that day, beyond
+assuring him he would speak for him and let him know upon the morrow.
+Nor on the morrow, when they returned to the subject at Arsenio's
+eager demand, did Garnache tell him all, or even that the service was
+mademoiselle's. Instead he pretended that it was some one in Grenoble
+who needed two such men as they.
+
+"Word has been brought me," he said mysteriously. "You must not ask me
+how."
+
+"But how the devil are we to reach Grenoble? The Captain will never let
+us go," said Arsenio, in an ill-humour.
+
+"On the night that you are of the watch, Arsenio, we will depart
+together without asking the Captain's leave. You shall open the postern
+when I come to join you here in the courtyard."
+
+"But what of the man at the door yonder?" And he jerked his thumb
+towards the tower where mademoiselle was a captive, and where at night
+"Battista" was locked in with her. At the door leading to the courtyard
+a sentry was always posted for greater security. That door and that
+sentry were obstacles which Garnache saw the futility of attempting
+to overcome without aid. That was why he had been forced to enlist
+Arsenio's assistance.
+
+"You must account for him, Arsenio," said he.
+
+"Thus?" inquired Arsenio coolly, and he passed the edge of his hand
+significantly across his throat. Garnache shook his head.
+
+"No," said he; "there will be no need for that. A blow over the head
+will suffice. Besides, it may be quieter. You will find the key of the
+tower in his belt. When you have felled him, get it and unlock the door;
+then whistle for me. The rest will be easy."
+
+"You are sure he has the key?"
+
+"I have it from madame herself. They were forced to leave it with him to
+provide for emergencies. Mademoiselle's attempted escape by the window
+showed them the necessity for it." He did not add that it was the
+implicit confidence they reposed in "Battista" himself that had overcome
+their reluctance to leave the key with the sentry.
+
+To seal the bargain, and in earnest of all the gold to come, Garnache
+gave Arsenio a couple of gold louis as a loan to be repaid him when
+their nameless employer should pay him his fifty pistoles in Grenoble.
+
+The sight and touch of the gold convinced Arsenio that the thing was no
+dream. He told Garnache that he believed he would be on guard-duty
+on the night of the following Wednesday--this was Friday--and so for
+Wednesday next they left the execution of their plans unless, meantime,
+a change should be effected in the disposition of the sentries.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII. THE COURIER
+
+Monsieur de Garnache was pleased with the issue of his little affair
+with Arsenio.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he told Valerie that evening, "I was right to have faith
+in my luck, right to believe that the tide of it is flowing. All we need
+now is a little patience; everything has become easy."
+
+It was the hour of supper. Valerie was at table in her anteroom, and
+"Battista" was in attendance. It was an added duty they had imposed upon
+him, for, since her attempt to escape, mademoiselle's imprisonment had
+been rendered more rigorous than ever. No servant of the chateau was
+allowed past the door of the outer anteroom, now commonly spoken of as
+the guardroom of the tower. Valerie dined daily in the salon with Madame
+de Condillac and Marius, but her other meals were served her in her
+own apartments. The servants who brought the meals from the kitchen
+delivered them to "Battista" in the guardroom, and he it was who laid
+the cloth and waited upon mademoiselle. At first this added duty had
+irritated him more than all that he had so far endured. Had he Martin
+Marie Rigobert de Garnache lived to discharge the duties of a lackey,
+to bear dishes to a lady's table and to remain at hand to serve her?
+The very thought had all but set him in a rage. But presently he grew
+reconciled to it. It afforded him particular opportunities of being in
+mademoiselle's presence and of conferring with her; and for the sake
+of such an advantage he might well belittle the unsavoury part of the
+affair.
+
+A half-dozen candles burned in two gleaming silver sconces on the table;
+in her tall-backed leather chair mademoiselle sat, and ate and drank but
+little, while Garnache told her of the preparations he had made.
+
+"If my luck but holds until Wednesday next," he concluded, "you may
+count upon being well out of Condillac. Arsenio does not dream that you
+come with us, so that even should he change his mind, at least we
+have no cause to fear a betrayal. But he will not change his mind. The
+prospect of fifty pistoles has rendered it immutable."
+
+She looked up at him with eyes brightened by hope and by the
+encouragement to count upon success which she gathered from his
+optimism.
+
+"You have contrived it marvellously well," she praised him. "If we
+succeed--"
+
+"Say when we succeed, mademoiselle," he laughingly corrected her.
+
+"Very well, then--when we shall have succeeded in leaving Condillac,
+whither am I to go?"
+
+"Why, with me, to Paris, as was determined. My man awaits me at Voiron
+with money and horses. No further obstacle shall rise to hamper us once
+our backs are turned upon the ugly walls of Condillac. The Queen shall
+make you welcome and keep you safe until Monsieur Florimond comes to
+claim his bride."
+
+She sipped her wine, then set down the glass and leaned her elbow on the
+table, taking her chin in her fine white hand. "Madame tells me that he
+is dead," said she, and Garnache was shocked at the comparative calmness
+with which she said it. He looked at her sharply from under his sooted
+brows. Was she, after all, he wondered, no different from other women?
+Was she cold and calculating, and had she as little heart as he had come
+to believe was usual with her sex, that she could contemplate so calmly
+the possibility of her lover being dead? He had thought her better, more
+natural, more large-hearted and more pure. That had encouraged him to
+stand by her in these straits of hers, no matter at what loss of dignity
+to himself. It began to seem that his conclusions had been wrong.
+
+His silence caused her to look up, and in his face she read something of
+what was passing in his thoughts. She smiled rather wanly.
+
+"You are thinking me heartless, Monsieur de Garnache?"
+
+"I am thinking you--womanly."
+
+"The same thing, then, to your mind. Tell me, monsieur, do you know much
+of women?"
+
+"God forbid! I have found trouble enough in my life."
+
+"And you pass judgment thus upon a sex with which you have no
+acquaintance?"
+
+"Not by acquaintance only is it that we come to knowledge. There are
+ways of learning other than by the road of experience. One may learn of
+dangers by watching others perish. It is the fool who will be satisfied
+alone with the knowledge that comes to him from what he undergoes
+himself."
+
+"You are very wise, monsieur," said she demurely, so demurely that he
+suspected her of laughing at him. "You were never wed?"
+
+"Never, mademoiselle," he answered stiffly, "nor ever in any danger of
+it."
+
+"Must you, indeed, account it a danger?"
+
+"A deadly peril, mademoiselle," said he; whereupon they both laughed.
+
+She pushed back her chair and rose slowly. Slowly she passed from the
+table and stepped towards the window. Turning she set her back to it,
+and faced him.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache," said she, "you are a good man, a true and noble
+gentleman. I would that you thought a little better of us. All women are
+not contemptible, believe me. I will pray that you may yet mate with one
+who will prove to you the truth of what I say."
+
+He smiled gently, and shook his head.
+
+"My child," said he, "I am not half the noble fellow you account me. I
+have a stubborn pride that stands me at times in the stead of virtue.
+It was pride brought me back here, for instance. I could not brook the
+laughter that would greet me in Paris did I confess that I was beaten by
+the Dowager of Condillac. I tell you this to the end that, thinking
+less well of me, you may spare me prayers which I should dread to see
+fulfilled. I have told you before, mademoiselle, Heaven is likely to
+answer the prayers of such a heart as yours."
+
+"Yet but a moment back you deemed me heartless," she reminded him.
+
+"You seemed so indifferent to the fate of Florimond de Condillac."
+
+"I must have seemed, then, what I am not," she told him, "for I am far
+from indifferent to Florimond's fate. The truth is, monsieur, I do
+not believe Madame de Condillac. Knowing me to be under a promise that
+naught can prevail upon me to break, she would have me believe that
+nature has dissolved the obligation for me. She thinks that were I
+persuaded of Florimond's death, I might turn an ear to the wooing
+of Marius. But she is mistaken, utterly mistaken; and so I sought to
+convince her. My father willed that I should wed Florimond. Florimond's
+father had been his dearest friend. I promised him that I would do his
+will, and by that promise I am bound. But were Florimond indeed dead,
+and were I free to choose, I should not choose Marius were he the only
+man in all the world."
+
+Garnache moved nearer to her.
+
+"You speak," said he, "as if you were indifferent in the matter of
+wedding Florimond, whilst I understand that your letter to the Queen
+professed you eager for the alliance. I may be impertinent, but,
+frankly, your attitude puzzles me."
+
+"I am not indifferent," she answered him, but calmly, without
+enthusiasm. "Florimond and I were playmates, and as a little child I
+loved him and admired him as I might have loved and admired a brother
+perhaps. He is comely, honourable, and true. I believe he would be the
+kindest husband ever woman had, and so I am content to give my life into
+his keeping. What more can be needed?"
+
+"Never ask me, mademoiselle; I am by no means an authority," said
+he. "But you appear to have been well schooled in a most excellent
+philosophy." And he laughed outright. She reddened under his amusement.
+
+"It was thus my father taught me," said she, in quieter tones; "and
+he was the wisest man I ever knew, just as he was the noblest and the
+bravest."
+
+Garnache bowed his head. "God rest his soul!" said he with respectful
+fervour.
+
+"Amen," the girl replied, and they fell silent.
+
+Presently she returned to the subject of her betrothed.
+
+"If Florimond is living, this prolonged absence, this lack of news
+is very strange. It is three months since last we heard of him--four
+months, indeed. Yet he must have been apprised of his father's death,
+and that should have occasioned his return."
+
+"Was he indeed apprised of it?" inquired Garnache. "Did you, yourself,
+communicate the news to him?"
+
+"I?" she cried. "But no, monsieur. We do not correspond."
+
+"That is a pity," said Garnache, "for I believe that the knowledge of
+the Marquis's death was kept from him by his stepmother."
+
+"Mon Dieu!" she exclaimed, in horror. "Do you mean that he may still be
+in ignorance of it?"
+
+"Not that. A month ago a courier was dispatched to him by the
+Queen-Mother. The last news of him some four months old, as you have
+said--reported him at Milan in the service of Spain. Thither was the
+courier sent to find him and to deliver him letters setting forth what
+was toward at Condillac."
+
+"A month ago?" she said. "And still we have no word. I am full of fears
+for him, monsieur."
+
+"And I," said Garnache, "am full of hope that we shall have news of him
+at any moment."
+
+That he was well justified of his hope was to be proven before they were
+many days older. Meanwhile Garnache continued to play his part of gaoler
+to the entire satisfaction and increased confidence of the Condillacs,
+what time he waited patiently for the appointed night when it should be
+his friend Arsenio's turn to take the guard.
+
+On that fateful Wednesday "Battista" sought out--as had now become his
+invariable custom--his compatriot as soon as the time of his noontide
+rest was come, the hour at which they dined at Condillac. He found
+Arsenio sunning himself in the outer courtyard, for it seemed that year
+that as the winter approached the warmth increased. Never could man
+remember such a Saint Martin's Summer as was this.
+
+In so far as the matter of their impending flight was concerned,
+"Battista" was as brief as he could be.
+
+"Is all well?" he asked. "Shall you be on guard to-night?"
+
+"Yes. It is my watch from sunset till dawn. At what hour shall we be
+stirring?"
+
+Garnache pondered a moment, stroking that firm chin of his, on which the
+erstwhile stubble had now grown into a straggling, unkempt beard--and
+it plagued him not a little, for a close observer might have discovered
+that it was of a lighter colour at the roots. His hair, too, was
+beginning to lose its glossy blackness. It was turning dull, and
+presently, no doubt, it would begin to pale, so that it was high time he
+spread his wings and took flight from Condillac.
+
+"We had best wait until midnight. It will give them time to be soundly
+in their slumbers. Though, should there be signs of any one stirring
+even then, you had better wait till later. It were foolish to risk
+having our going prevented for the sake of leaving a half-hour earlier."
+
+"Depend upon me," Arsenio answered him. "When I open the door of your
+tower I shall whistle to you. The key of the postern hangs on the
+guardroom wall. I shall possess myself of that before I come."
+
+"Good," said Garnache, "we understand each other."
+
+And on that they might have parted there and then, but that there
+happened in that moment a commotion at the gate. Men hurried from the
+guardhouse, and Fortunio's voice sounded loud in command. A horseman had
+galloped up to Condillac, walked his horse across the bridge--which
+was raised only at night--and was knocking with the butt of his whip an
+imperative summons upon the timbers of the gate.
+
+By Fortunio's orders it was opened, and a man covered with dust, astride
+a weary, foam-flecked horse, rode under the archway of the keep into the
+first courtyard of the chateau.
+
+Garnache eyed him in surprise and inquiry, and he read in the man's
+appearance that he was a courier. The horseman had halted within a few
+paces of the spot where "Battista" and his companion stood, and seeing
+in the vilely clad Garnache a member of the Condillac household, he
+flung him his reins, then got down stiffly from his horse.
+
+Fortunio, bristling with importance, his left hand on the hilt of his
+rapier, the fingers of his right twirling at his long fair mustachios,
+at once confronted him and craved his business.
+
+"I am the bearer of letters for Madame the Dowager Marquise de
+Condillac," was the reply; whereupon, with an arrogant nod, Fortunio
+bade the fellow go with him, and issued an order that his horse should
+be cared for.
+
+Arsenio was speaking in Garnache's ear. The man's nature was
+inquisitive, and he was indulging idle conjectures as to what might
+be the news this courier brought. Garnache's mind, actuated by very
+different motives, was engaged upon the same task, so much so that not
+a word heard he of what his supposed compatriot was whispering. Whence
+came this courier? Why had not that fool Fortunio asked him, so that
+Garnache might have overheard his answer? Was he from Paris and the
+Queen, or was he, perchance, from Italy and Florimond? These were
+questions to which it imported him to have the answers. He must know
+what letters the fellow brought. The knowledge might guide him now;
+might even cause him to alter the plans he had formed.
+
+He stood in thought whilst, unheeded by him, Arsenio prattled at his
+elbow. He bethought him of the old minstrel's gallery at the end of the
+hall in which the Condillacs were dining and whither the courier would
+be conducted. He knew the way to that gallery, for he had made a very
+close study of the chateau against the time when he might find himself
+in need of the knowledge.
+
+With a hurried excuse to Arsenio he moved away, and, looking round to
+see that he was unobserved, he was on the point of making his way to the
+gallery when suddenly he checked himself. What went he there to do? To
+play the spy? To become fellow to the lackey who listens at keyholes?
+Ah, no! That was something no service could demand of him. He might owe
+a duty to the Queen, but there was also a duty that he owed himself, and
+this duty forbade him from going to such extremes. Thus spake his Pride,
+and he mistook its voice for that of Honour. Betide what might, it was
+not for Garnache to play the eavesdropper. Not that, Pardieu!
+
+And so he turned away, his desires in conflict with that pride of his,
+and gloomily he paced the courtyard, Arsenio marvelling what might have
+come to him. And well was it for him that pride should have detained
+him; well would it seem as if his luck were indeed in the ascendant and
+had prompted his pride to save him from a deadly peril. For suddenly
+some one called "Battista!"
+
+He heard, but for the moment, absorbed as he was in his own musings,
+he overlooked the fact that it was the name to which he answered at
+Condillac.
+
+Not until it was repeated more loudly, and imperatively, did he turn to
+see Fortunio beckoning him. With a sudden dread anxiety, he stepped
+to the captain's side. Was he discovered? But Fortunio's words set his
+doubts to rest at once.
+
+"You are to re-conduct Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to her apartments at
+once."
+
+Garnache bowed and followed the captain up the steps and into the
+chateau that he might carry out the order; and as he went he shrewdly
+guessed that it was the arrival of that courier had occasioned the
+sudden removal of mademoiselle.
+
+When they were alone together--he and she--in her anteroom in the
+Northern Tower, she turned to him before he had time to question her as
+he was intending.
+
+"A courier has arrived," said she.
+
+"I know; I saw him in the courtyard. Whence is he? Did you learn it?"
+
+"From Florimond." She was white with agitation.
+
+"From the Marquis de Condillac?" he cried, and he knew not whether to
+hope or fear. "From Italy?"
+
+"No, monsieur. I do not think from Italy. From what was said I gathered
+that Florimond is already on his way to Condillac. Oh, it made a fine
+stir. It left them no more appetite for dinner, and they seem to have
+thought it could have left me none for mine, for they ordered my instant
+return to my apartments."
+
+"Then you know nothing--save that the courier is from the Marquis?"
+
+"Nothing; nor am I likely to," she answered, and her arms dropped limply
+to her sides, her eyes looked entreatingly up into his gloomy face.
+
+But Garnache could do no more than rap out an oath. Then he stood still
+a moment, his eyes on the window, his chin in his hand, brooding.
+His pride and his desire to know more of that courier's message were
+fighting it out again in his mind, just as they fought it out in the
+courtyard below. Suddenly his glance fell on her, standing there, so
+sweet, so frail, and so disconsolate. For her sake he must do the thing,
+repulsive though it might be.
+
+"I must know more," he exclaimed. "I must learn Florimond's whereabouts,
+if only that we may go to meet him when we leave Condillac to-night."
+
+"You have arranged definitely for that?" she asked, her face lighting.
+
+"All is in readiness," he assured her. Then, lowering his voice without
+apparent reason, and speaking quickly and intently, "I must go find out
+what I can," he said. "There may be a risk, but it is as nothing to
+the risk we run of blundering matters through ignorance of what may be
+afoot. Should any one come--which is unlikely, for all those interested
+will be in the hall until the courier is dealt with--and should they
+inquire into my absence, you are to know nothing of it since you have no
+Italian and I no French. All that you will know will be that you believe
+I went but a moment since to fetch water. You understand?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Then lock yourself in your chamber till I return."
+
+He caught up a large earthenware vessel in which water was kept for his
+own and mademoiselle's use, emptied it through the guard-room window
+into the moat below, then left the room and made his way down the steps
+to the courtyard.
+
+He peered out. Not a soul was in sight. This inner courtyard was little
+tenanted at that time of day, and the sentry at the door of the tower
+was only placed there at nightfall. Alongside this there stood another
+door, opening into a passage from which access might be gained to any
+part of the chateau. Thrusting behind that door the earthenware
+vessel that he carried, Garnache sped swiftly down the corridor on his
+eavesdropping errand. Still his mind was in conflict. At times he cursed
+his slowness, at times his haste and readiness to undertake so dirty a
+business, wishing all women at the devil since by the work of women was
+he put to such a shift as this.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV. FLORIMOND'S LETTER
+
+In the great hall of Condillac, where the Marquise, her son, and
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye had been at dinner, a sudden confusion had
+been spread by the arrival of that courier so soon as it was known that
+he bore letters from Florimond, Marquis de Condillac.
+
+Madame had risen hastily, fear and defiance blending in her face,
+and she had at once commanded mademoiselle's withdrawal. Valerie had
+wondered might there not be letters--or, leastways, messages--for
+herself from her betrothed. But her pride had suppressed the eager
+question that welled up to her lips. She would, too, have questioned the
+courier concerning Florimond's health; she would have asked him how the
+Marquis looked, and where the messenger had left him. But of all this
+that she craved to know, nothing could she bring herself to ask before
+the Marquise.
+
+She rose in silence upon hearing the Dowager order Fortunio to summon
+Battista that he might re-conduct mademoiselle to her apartments,
+and she moved a few paces down the hall, towards the door, in proud,
+submissive readiness to depart. Yet she could not keep her eyes from the
+dust-stained courier, who, having flung his hat and whip upon the floor,
+was now opening his wallet, the Dowager standing before him to receive
+his papers.
+
+Marius, affecting an insouciance he did not feel, remained at table,
+his page behind his chair, his hound stretched at his feet; and he now
+sipped his wine, now held it to the light that he might observe the
+beauty of its deep red colour.
+
+At last Fortunio returned, and mademoiselle took her departure, head in
+the air and outwardly seeming nowise concerned in what was taking place.
+With her went Fortunio. And the Marquise, who now held the package she
+had received from the courier, bade the page depart also.
+
+When the three were at last alone, she paused before opening the letter
+and turned again to the messenger. She made a brave figure in the
+flood of sunlight that poured through the gules and azures of the long
+blazoned windows, her tall, lissome figure clad in a close-fitting robe
+of black velvet, her abundant glossy black hair rolled back under its
+white coif, her black eyes and scarlet lips detaching from the ivory of
+her face, in which no trace of emotion showed, for all the anxiety that
+consumed her.
+
+"Where left you the Marquis de Condillac?" she asked the fellow.
+
+"At La Rochette, madame," the courier answered,' and his answer brought
+Marius to his feet with an oath.
+
+"So near?" he cried out. But the Dowager's glance remained calm and
+untroubled.
+
+"How does it happen that he did not hasten himself, to Condillac?" she
+asked.
+
+"I do not know, madame. I did not see Monsieur le Marquis. It was his
+servant brought me that letter with orders to ride hither."
+
+Marius approached his mother, his brow clouded.
+
+"Let us see what he says," he suggested anxiously. But his mother did
+not heed him. She stood balancing the package in her hand.
+
+"Can you tell us, then, nothing of Monsieur le Marquis?"
+
+"Nothing more than I have told you, madame."
+
+She bade Marius call Fortunio, and then dismissed the courier, bidding
+her captain see to his refreshment.
+
+Then, alone at last with her son, she hastily tore the covering from
+the letter, unfolded it and read. And Marius, moved by anxiety, came to
+stand beside and just behind her, where he too might read. The letter
+ran:
+
+"MY VERY DEAR MARQUISE,--I do not doubt but that it will pleasure you
+to hear that I am on my way home, and that but for a touch of fever that
+has detained us here at La Rochette, I should be at Condillac as soon as
+the messenger who is the bearer of these presents. A courier from Paris
+found me a fortnight since in Milan, with letters setting forth that my
+father had been dead six months, and that it was considered expedient at
+Court that I should return home forthwith to assume the administration
+of Condillac. I am lost in wonder that a communication of this nature
+should have been addressed to me from Paris instead of from you, as
+surely it must have been your duty to advise me of my father's decease
+at the time of that untoward event. I am cast down by grief at this evil
+news, and the summons from Court has brought me in all haste from Milan.
+The lack of news from Condillac has been for months a matter of surprise
+to me. My father's death may be some explanation of this, but scarcely
+explanation enough. However, madame, I count upon it that you will be
+able to dispel such doubts as I am fostering. I count too, upon being
+at Condillac by the end of week, but I beg that neither you nor my
+dear Marius will allow this circumstance to make any difference to
+yourselves, just as, although I am returning to assume the government of
+Condillac as the Court has suggested to me, I hope that yourself and my
+dear brother will continue to make it your home for as long as it shall
+pleasure you. So long shall it pleasure me.
+
+"I am, my dear marquise, your very humble and very affectionate servant
+and stepson,
+
+"FLORIMOND"
+
+When she had read to the end, the Dowager turned back and read aloud
+the passage: "However, madame, I count upon it that you will be able to
+dispel such doubts as I am fostering." She looked at her son, who had
+shifted his position, so that he was now confronting her.
+
+"He has his suspicions that all is not as it should be," sneered Marius.
+
+"Yet his tone is amiable throughout. It cannot be that they said too
+much in that letter from Paris." A little trill of bitter laughter
+escaped her. "We are to continue to make this our home for as long as it
+shall pleasure us. So long shall it pleasure him!"
+
+Then, with a sudden seriousness, she folded the letter and, putting her
+hands behind her, looked up into her son's face.
+
+"Well?" she asked. "What are you going to do?"
+
+"Strange that he makes no mention of Valerie" said Marius pensively.
+
+"Pooh! A Condillac thinks lightly of his women. What are you going to
+do?"
+
+His handsome countenance, so marvellously like her own, was overcast. He
+looked gloomily at his mother for a moment; then with a slight twitch
+of the shoulders he turned and moved past her slowly in the direction
+of the hearth. He leaned his elbow on the overmantel and rested his brow
+against his clenched right hand, and stood so awhile in moody thought.
+She watched him, a frown between her arrogant eyes.
+
+"Aye, ponder it," said she. "He is at La Rochette, within a day's ride,
+and only detained there by a touch of fever. In any case he promises to
+be here by the end of the week. By Saturday, then, Condillac will have
+passed out of our power; it will be lost to you irretrievably. Will you
+lose La Vauvraye as well?"
+
+He let his hand fall to his side, and turned, fully to face her.
+
+"What can I do? What can we do?" he asked, a shade of petulance in his
+question.
+
+She stepped close up to him and rested her hand lightly upon his
+shoulder.
+
+"You have had three months in which to woo that girl, and you have
+tarried sadly over it, Marius. You have now at most three days in which
+to accomplish it. What will you do?"
+
+"I have been maladroit perhaps," he said, with bitterness. "I have
+been over-patient with her. I have counted too much upon the chance of
+Florimond's being dead, as seemed from the utter lack of news of him.
+Yet what could I do? Carry her off by force and compel at the dagger's
+point some priest to marry us?"
+
+She moved her hand from his shoulder and smiled, as if she derided him
+and his heat.
+
+"You want for invention, Marius," said she. "And yet I beg that you will
+exert your mind, or Sunday next shall find us well-nigh homeless. I'll
+take no charity from the Marquis de Condillac, nor, I think, will you."
+
+"If all fails," said he, "we have still your house in Touraine."
+
+"My house?" she echoed, her voice shrill with scorn. "My hovel, you
+would say. Could you abide there--in such a sty?"
+
+"_Vertudieu_! If all else failed, we might be glad of it."
+
+"Glad of it? Not I, for one. Yet all else will fail unless you bestir
+yourself in the next three days. Condillac is as good as lost to
+you already, since Florimond is upon the threshold. La Vauvraye most
+certainly will be lost to you as well unless you make haste to snatch it
+in the little moment that is left you."
+
+"Can I achieve the impossible, madame?" he cried, and his impatience
+waxed beneath this unreasonable insistence of his mother's.
+
+"Who asks it of you?"
+
+"Do not you, madame?"
+
+"I? Pish! All that I urge is that you take Valerie across the border
+into Savoy where you can find a priest to marry you, and get it done
+this side of Saturday."
+
+"And is not that the impossible? She will not go with me, as you well
+know, madame."
+
+There was a moment's silence. The Dowager shot him a glance; then her
+eyes fell. Her bosom stirred as if some strange excitement moved
+her. Fear and shame were her emotions; for a way she knew by which
+mademoiselle might be induced to go with him--not only willingly, but
+eagerly, she thought--to the altar. But she was his mother, and even her
+harsh nature shuddered before the task of instructing him in this vile
+thing. Why had the fool not wit enough to see it for himself?
+
+Observing her silence Marius smiled sardonically.
+
+"You may well ponder it," said he. "It is an easy matter to tell me what
+I should do. Tell me, rather, how it should be done."
+
+His blindness stirred her anger, and her anger whelmed her hesitation.
+
+"Were I in your place, Marius, I should find a way," said she, in a
+voice utterly expressionless, her eyes averted ever from his own.
+
+He scanned her curiously. Her agitation was plain to him, and it puzzled
+him, as did the downcast glance of eyes usually so bold and insolent in
+their gaze. Then he pondered her tone, so laden with expression by its
+very expressionlessness, and suddenly a flood of light broke upon his
+mind, revealing very clearly and hideously her meaning. He caught his
+breath with a sudden gasp and blenched a little. Then his lips tightened
+suddenly.
+
+"In that case, madame," he said, after a pause, and speaking as if he
+were still without revelation of her meaning, "I can but regret that you
+are not in my place. For, as it is, I am thinking we shall have to make
+the best of the hovel in Touraine."
+
+She bit her lip in the intensity of her chagrin and shame. She was no
+fool, nor did she imagine from his words that her meaning had been lost
+upon him. She knew that he had understood, and that he chose to pretend
+that he had not. She looked up suddenly, her dark eyes blazing, a splash
+of colour in either cheek.
+
+"Fool!" she snapped at him; "you lily-livered fool! Are you indeed
+my son? Are you--by God!--that you talk so lightly of yielding?" She
+advanced a step in his direction. "Through your cowardice you may be
+content to spend your days in beggary; not so am I; nor shall I be,
+so long as I have an arm and a voice. You may go hence if your courage
+fails you outright; but I'll throw up the bridge and entrench myself
+within these walls. Florimond de Condillac sets no foot in here while I
+live; and if he should come within range of musket-shot, it will be the
+worse for him."
+
+"I think you are mad, madame--mad so to talk of resisting him, as you
+are mad to call me coward. I'll leave you till you are come to a more
+tranquil frame of mind." And turning upon his heel, his face on fire
+from the lash of her contempt, he strode down the hall and passed out,
+leaving her alone.
+
+White again, with heaving bosom and clenched hands, she stood a moment
+where he had left her, then dropped into a chair, and taking her chin
+in her hand she rested her elbow on her knee. Thus she remained, the
+firelight tinting her perfect profile, on which little might be read of
+the storm that was raging in her soul. Another woman in her place would
+have sought relief in tears, but tears came rarely to the beautiful eyes
+of the Marquise de Condillac.
+
+She sat there until the sun had passed from the windows behind her and
+the corners of the room were lost in the quickening shadows. At last she
+was disturbed by the entrance of a lackey, who announced that Monsieur
+le Comte de Tressan, Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny, was come to Condillac.
+
+She bade the fellow call help to clear the board, where still was set
+their interrupted noontide meal, and then to admit the Seneschal.
+With her back to the stirring, bustling servants she stood, pensively
+regarding the flames, and a smile that was mocking rather than aught
+else spread upon her face.
+
+If all else failed her, she told herself, there would be no Touraine
+hovel for her. She could always be Comtesse de Tressan. Let Marius work
+out alone the punishment of his cowardice.
+
+Away in the Northern Tower, where mademoiselle was lodged, she sat in
+eager talk with Garnache, who had returned unobserved and successful
+from his journey of espionage.
+
+He had told her what from the conversation of Marius and his mother he
+had learned touching the contents of that letter. Florimond lay as near
+as La Rochette, detained there by a touch of fever, but promising to be
+at Condillac by the end of the week. Since that was so, Valerie opined
+there was no longer the need to put themselves to the trouble of the
+escape they had planned. Let them wait until Florimond came.
+
+But Garnache shook his head. He had heard more; and for all that he
+accounted her at present safe from Marius, yet he made no false estimate
+of that supple gentleman's character, was not deluded by his momentary
+show of niceness. As the time of Florimond's arrival grew nearer, he
+thought it very possible that Marius might be rendered desperate. There
+was grave danger in remaining. He said naught of this, yet he convinced
+mademoiselle that it were best to go.
+
+"Though there will no longer be the need of a toilsome journey as far
+as Paris," he concluded. "A four hours' ride to La Rochette, and you may
+embrace your betrothed."
+
+"Did he speak of me in his letter, know you, monsieur?" she inquired.
+
+"I heard them say that he did not," Garnache replied. "But it may well
+be that he had good reason. He may suspect more than he has written."
+
+"In that case," she asked--and there was a wounded note in her
+voice--"Why should a touch of fever keep him at La Rochette? Would a
+touch of fever keep you from the woman you loved, monsieur, if you knew,
+or even suspected, that she was in durance?"
+
+"I do not know, mademoiselle. I am an old man who has never loved, and
+so it would be unfair of me to pass judgment upon lovers. That they
+think not as other folk is notorious; their minds are for the time
+disordered."
+
+Nevertheless he looked at her where she sat by the window, so gentle, so
+lissome, so sweet, and so frail, and he had a shrewd notion that were he
+Florimond de Condillac, whether he feared her in durance or not, not the
+fever, nor the plague itself should keep him for the best part of a week
+at La Rochette within easy ride of her.
+
+She smiled gently at his words, and turned the conversation to the
+matter that imported most.
+
+"Tonight then, it is determined that we are to go?"
+
+"At midnight or a little after. Be in readiness, mademoiselle, and
+do not keep me waiting when I rap upon your door. Haste may be of
+importance."
+
+"You may count upon me, my friend," she answered him, and stirred by a
+sudden impulse she held out her hand. "You have been very good to me,
+Monsieur de Garnache. You have made life very different for me since
+your coming. I had it in my mind to blame you once for your rashness in
+returning alone. I was a little fool. You can never know the peace that
+has come to me from having you at hand. The fears, the terrors that
+possessed me before you came have all been dispelled in this last week
+that you have been my sentry in two senses."
+
+He took the hand she held out to him, and looked down at her out of his
+grimy, disfigured face, an odd tenderness stirring him. He felt as might
+have felt a father towards his daughter--at least, so thought he then.
+
+"Child," he answered her, "you overrate it. I have done no less than I
+could do, no more than any other would have done."
+
+"Yet more than Florimond has done--and he my betrothed. A touch of fever
+was excuse enough to keep him at La Rochette, whilst the peril of death
+did not suffice to deter you from coming hither."
+
+"You forget, mademoiselle, that, maybe, he does not know your
+circumstances."
+
+"Maybe he does not," said she, with a half-sigh. Then she looked up
+into his face again. "I am sad at the thought of going, monsieur," she
+surprised him by saying.
+
+"Sad?" he cried. Then he laughed. "But what can there be to sadden you?"
+
+"This, monsieur: that after to-night it is odds I shall never see you
+more." She said it without hesitation and without coquetry, for her
+upbringing had been simple and natural in an atmosphere different far
+from that in which had been reared the courtly women he had known. "You
+will return to Paris and the great world, and I shall live out my life
+in this, little corner of Dauphiny. You will forget me in the bustle of
+your career, monsieur; but I shall always hold your memory very dear
+and very gratefully. You are the only friend I have ever known since my
+father died excepting Florimond, though it is so long since I have seen
+him, and he never came to me in times of stress as you have done."
+
+"Mademoiselle," he answered, touched despite himself more touched than
+he could have believed possible to his callous, world-worn nature--"you
+make me very proud; you make me feel a little better than I am, for if
+I have earned your regard and friendship, there must be some good in old
+Garnache. Believe me, mademoiselle, I too shall not forget."
+
+And thereafter they remained a spell in silence, she sitting by the
+window, gazing out into the bright October sky, he standing by her
+chair, thoughtfully considering her brown head so gracefully set upon
+her little shoulders. A feeling came to him that was odd and unusual; he
+sought to interpret it, and he supposed it to mean that he wished that
+at some time in the dim past he might have married some woman who would
+have borne him for daughter such a one as this.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV. THE CONFERENCE
+
+The matter that brought Monsieur de Tressan to Condillac--and brought
+him in most fearful haste--was the matter of the courier who had that
+day arrived at the chateau.
+
+News of it had reached the ears of my Lord Seneschal. His mind had been
+a prey to uneasiness concerning this business of rebellion in which he
+had so rashly lent a hand, and he was anxious to know whence came
+this courier and what news he brought. But for all his haste he had
+paused--remembering it was the Marquise he went to visit--to don the
+gorgeous yellow suit with the hanging sleeves which he had had from
+Paris, and the crimson sash he had bought at Taillemant's, all in the
+very latest mode.
+
+Thus arrayed, his wig well curled and a clump of it caught in ribbon of
+flame-coloured silk on the left side, his sword hanging from belt and
+carriages richly wrought with gold, and the general courtier-like effect
+rather marred by the heavy riding-boots which he would have liked to
+leave behind yet was constrained to wear, he presented himself before
+the Dowager, hiding his anxiety in a melting smile, and the latter in
+the profoundest of bows.
+
+The graciousness of his reception overwhelmed him almost, for in his
+supreme vanity he lacked the wit to see that this cordiality might be
+dictated by no more than the need they had of him at Condillac. A lackey
+placed a great chair for him by the fire that he might warm himself
+after his evening ride, and the Dowager, having ordered lights, sat
+herself opposite him with the hearth between them.
+
+He simpered awhile and toyed with trivialities of speech before he gave
+utterance to the matter that absorbed him. Then, at last, when they were
+alone, he loosed the question that was bubbling on his lips.
+
+"I hear a courier came to Condillac to-day."
+
+For answer she told him what he sought to learn, whence came that
+courier, and what the message that he brought.
+
+"And so, Monsieur de Tressan," she ended, "my days at Condillac are
+numbered."
+
+"Why so?" he asked, "since you say that Florimond has adopted towards
+you a friendly tone. Surely he would not drive his father's widow
+hence?"
+
+She smiled at the fire in a dreamy, pensive manner.
+
+"No," said she, "he would not drive me hence. He has offered me the
+shelter of Condillac for as long as it may pleasure me to make it my
+home."
+
+"Excellent!" he exclaimed, rubbing his little fat hands and screwing the
+little features of his huge red face into the grotesque semblance of a
+smile. "What need to talk of going, then?"
+
+"What need?" she echoed, in a voice dull and concentrated. "Do you ask
+that, Tressan? Do you think I should elect to live upon the charity of
+this man?"
+
+For all that the Lord Seneschal may have been dull-witted, yet he had
+wit enough to penetrate to the very marrow of her meaning.
+
+"You must hate Florimond very bitterly," said he. She shrugged her
+shoulders.
+
+"I possess, I think, the faculty of feeling strongly. I can love well,
+monsieur, and I can hate well. It is one or the other with me. And as
+cordially as I love my own son Marius, as cordially do I detest this
+coxcomb Florimond."
+
+She expressed no reasons for her hatred of her late husband's elder son.
+Hers were not reasons that could easily be put into words. They were
+little reasons, trivial grains of offence which through long years had
+accumulated into a mountain. They had their beginning in the foolish
+grievance that had its birth with her own son, when she had realized
+that but for that rosy-cheeked, well-grown boy borne to the Marquis by
+his first wife, Marius would have been heir to Condillac. Her love of
+her own child and her ambitions for him, her keen desire to see him fill
+an exalted position in the world, caused her a thousand times a day to
+wish his half-brother dead. Yet Florimond had flourished and grown, and
+as he grew he manifested a character which, with all its imperfections,
+was more lovable than the nature of her own offspring. And their common
+father had never seen aught but the faults of Marius and the virtues
+of Florimond. She had resented this, and Marius had resented it; and
+Marius, having inherited with his mother's beauty his mother's arrogant,
+dominant spirit, had returned with insolence such admonitions as from
+time to time his father gave him, and thus the breach had grown. Later,
+since he could not be heir to Condillac, the Marquise's eyes, greedy of
+advancement for him, had fallen covetously upon the richer La Vauvraye,
+whose lord had then no son, whose heiress was a little girl.
+
+By an alliance easy to compass, since the lords of Condillac and La
+Vauvraye were lifelong friends, Marius's fortunes might handsomely
+have been mended. Yet when she herself bore the suggestion of it to
+the Marquis, he had seized upon it, approved it, but adopted it for
+Florimond's benefit instead.
+
+Thereafter war had raged fiercely in the family of Condillac--a war
+between the Marquis and Florimond on the one side, and the Marquise and
+Marius on the other. And so bitterly was it waged that it was by the old
+Marquis's suggestion that at last Florimond had gone upon his travels to
+see the world and carry arms in foreign service.
+
+Her hopes that he would take his death, as was a common thing when
+warring, rose high--so high as to become almost assurance, a thing to be
+reckoned with. Florimond would return no more, and her son should fill
+the place to which he was entitled by his beauty of person and the high
+mental gifts his doting mother saw in him.
+
+Yet the months grew into years, and at long intervals full of hope for
+the Marquise news came of Florimond, and the news was ever that he was
+well and thriving, gathering honours and drinking deep of life.
+
+And now, at last, when matters seemed to have been tumbled into her lap
+that she might dispose of them as she listed; now, when in her anxiety
+to see her son supplant his step-brother in the possession of La
+Vauvraye--if not, perhaps, in that of Condillac as well she had done
+a rashness which might end in making her and Marius outlaws, news
+came that this hated Florimond was at the door; tardily returned, yet
+returned in time to overthrow her schemes and to make her son the pauper
+that her husband's will had seemed to aim at rendering him.
+
+Her mind skimmed lightly over all these matters, seeking somewhere some
+wrong that should stand out stark and glaring, upon which she might
+seize, and offer it to the Seneschal as an explanation of her hatred.
+But nowhere could she find the thing she sought. Her hatred had for
+foundation a material too impalpable to be fashioned into words.
+Tressan's voice aroused her from her thoughts.
+
+"Have you laid no plans, madame?" he asked her. "It were surely a
+madness now to attempt to withstand the Marquis."
+
+"The Marquis? Ah yes--Florimond." She sat forward out of the shadows in
+which her great chair enveloped her, and let candle and firelight play
+about the matchless beauty of her perfect face. There was a flush upon
+it, the flush of battle; and she was about to tell the Seneschal that
+not while one stone of Condillac should stand upon another, not while a
+gasp of breath remained in her frail body, would she surrender. But
+she checked her rashness. Well might it be that in the end she should
+abandon such a purpose. Tressan was ugly as a toad, the most absurd,
+ridiculous bridegroom that ever led woman to the altar. Yet rumour
+ran that he was rich, and as a last resource, for the sake of his
+possessions she might bring herself to endure his signal shortcomings.
+
+"I have taken no resolve as yet," said she, in a wistful voice. "I
+founded hopes upon Marius which Marius threatens to frustrate. I think I
+had best resign myself to the poverty of my Touraine home."
+
+And then the Seneschal realized that the time was now. The opportunity
+he might have sought in vain was almost thrust upon him. In the spirit
+he blessed Florimond for returning so opportunely; in the flesh he rose
+from the chair and, without more ado, he cast himself upon his knees
+before the Dowager. He cast himself down, and the Dowager experienced
+a faint stirring of surprise that she heard no flop such as must attend
+the violent falling of so fat a body. But the next instant, realizing
+the purpose of his absurd posture, she shrank back with a faint gasp,
+and her face was mercifully blurred to his sight once more amid the
+shadows of her chair. Thus was he spared the look of utter loathing, of
+unconquerable, irrepressible disgust that leapt into her countenance.
+
+His voice quivered with ridiculous emotion, his little fat red fingers
+trembled as he outheld them in a theatrical gesture of supplication.
+
+"Never contemplate poverty, madame, until you have discarded me," he
+implored her. "Say but that you will, and you shall be lady of Tressan.
+All that I have would prove but poor adornment to a beauty such as
+yours, and I should shrink from offering it you, were it not that, with
+it all, I can offer you the fondest heart in France. Marquise--Clotilde,
+I cast myself humbly at your feet. Do with me as you will. I love you."
+
+By an effort she crushed down her loathing of him--a loathing that grew
+a hundredfold as she beheld him now transformed by his amorousness into
+the semblance almost of a satyr--and listened to his foolish rantings.
+
+As Marquise de Condillac it hurt her pride to listen and not have him
+whipped for his audacity; as a woman it insulted her. Yet the Marquise
+and the woman she alike repressed. She would give him no answer--she
+could not, so near was she to fainting with disdain of him--yet must
+she give him hope against the time when, should all else fail, she might
+have to swallow the bitter draught he was now holding to her lips. So
+she temporized.
+
+She controlled her voice into a tone of gentle sadness; she set a mask
+of sorrow upon her insolent face.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," she sighed, and so far overcame her nausea as for
+an instant to touch his hand in a little gesture of caress, "you must
+not speak so to a widow of six months, nor must I listen."
+
+The quivering grew in his hands and voice; but no longer did they shake
+through fear of a rebuff: they trembled now in the eager strength of the
+hope he gathered from her words. She was so beautiful, so peerless, so
+noble, so proud--and he so utterly unworthy--that naught but her plight
+had given him courage to utter his proposal. And she answered him in
+such terms!
+
+"You give me hope, Marquise? If I come again--?"
+
+She sighed, and her face, which was once more within the light, showed a
+look of sad inquiry.
+
+"If I thought that what you have said, you have said out of pity,
+because you fear lest my necessities should hurt me, I could give you
+no hope at all. I have my pride, mon ami. But if what you have said
+you would still have said though I had continued mistress of Condillac,
+then, Tressan, you may repeat it to me hereafter, at a season when I may
+listen."
+
+His joy welled up and overflowed in him as overflows a river in time of
+spate.
+
+He bent forward, caught her hand, and bore it to his lips.
+
+"Clotilde!" he cried, in a smothered voice; then the door opened, and
+Marius stepped into the long chamber.
+
+At the creaking sound of the opening door the Seneschal bestirred
+himself to rise. Even the very young care not so to be surprised,
+how much less, then, a man well past the prime of life? He came up
+laboriously--the more laboriously by virtue of his very efforts to show
+himself still nimble in his mistress's eyes. Upon the intruder he turned
+a crimson, furious face, perspiration gleaming like varnish on brow and
+nose. At sight of Marius, who stood arrested, scowling villainously upon
+the pair, the fire died suddenly from his glance.
+
+"Ah, my dear Marius," said he, with a flourish and an air of being
+mightily at his ease. But the young man's eyes went over and beyond him
+to rest in a look of scrutiny upon his mother. She had risen too, and he
+had been in time to see the startled manner of her rising. In her cheeks
+there was a guilty flush, but her eyes boldly met and threw back her
+son's regard.
+
+Marius came slowly down the room, and no word was spoken. The Seneschal
+cleared his throat with noisy nervousness. Madame stood hand on hip, the
+flush fading slowly, her glance resuming its habitual lazy insolence. By
+the fire Marius paused and kicked the logs into a blaze, regardless of
+the delicate fabric of his rosetted shoes.
+
+"Monsieur le Seneschal," said madame calmly, "came to see us in the
+matter of the courier."
+
+"Ah!" said Marius, with an insolent lifting of his brows and a sidelong
+look at Tressan; and Tressan registered in his heart a vow that when he
+should have come to wed the mother, he would not forget to take payment
+for that glance from her pert son.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte will remain and sup with us before riding back to
+Grenoble," she added.
+
+"Ah!" said he again, in the same tone. And that for the moment was all
+he said. He remained by the fire, standing between them where he
+had planted himself in the flesh, as if to symbolize the attitude he
+intended in the spirit.
+
+But one chance he had, before supper was laid, of a word alone with his
+mother, in her own closet.
+
+"Madame," he said, his sternness mingling with alarm, "are you mad that
+you encourage the suit of this hedgehog Tressan?"
+
+She looked him up and down with a deliberate eye, her lip curling a
+little.
+
+"Surely, Marius, it is my own concern."
+
+"Not so," he answered her, and his grasp fastened almost viciously on
+her wrist. "I think that it is mine as well. Mother, bethink you," and
+his tone changed to an imploring key, "bethink you what you would do!
+Would you--you--mate with such a thing as that?"
+
+His emphasis of the pronoun was very eloquent. Not in all the words of
+the French language could he have told her better how high he placed her
+in his thoughts, how utterly she must fall, how unutterably be soiled by
+an alliance with Tressan.
+
+"I had hoped you would have saved me from it, Marius," she answered him,
+her eyes seeming to gaze down into the depths of his. "At La Vauvraye I
+had hoped to live out my widowhood in tranquil dignity. But--" She let
+her arms fall sharply to her sides, and uttered a little sneering laugh.
+
+"But, mother," he cried, "between the dignity of La Vauvraye and the
+indignity of Tressan, surely there is some middle course?"
+
+"Aye," she answered scornfully, "starvation on a dunghill in
+Touraine--or something near akin to it, for which I have no stomach."
+
+He released her wrist and stood with bent head, clenching and
+unclenching his long white hands, and she watched him, watching in him
+the working of his proud and stubborn spirit.
+
+"Mother," he cried at last, and the word sounded absurd between them, by
+so little did he seem the younger of the twain, "mother, you shall not
+do it you must not!"
+
+"You leave me little alternative--alas!" sighed she. "Had you been more
+adroit you had been wed by now, Marius, and the future would give us no
+concern. As it is, Florimond comes home, and we--" She spread her hands
+and thrust out her nether lip in a grimace that was almost ugly. Then:
+"Come," she said briskly. "Supper is laid, and my Lord Seneschal will be
+awaiting us."
+
+And before he could reply she had swept past him and taken her way
+below. He followed gloomily, and in gloom sat he at table, never
+heeding the reckless gaiety of the Seneschal and the forced mirth of the
+Marquise. He well understood the sort of tacit bargain that his mother
+had made with him. She had seen her advantage in his loathing of the
+proposed union with Tressan, and she had used it to the full. Either he
+must compel Valerie to wed him this side of Saturday or resign himself
+to see his mother--his beautiful, peerless mother--married to this skin
+of lard that called itself a man.
+
+Living, he had never entertained for his father a son's respect, nor,
+dead, did he now reverence his memory as becomes a son. But in that
+hour, as he sat at table, facing this gross wooer of his mother's, his
+eyes were raised to the portrait of the florid-visaged haughty Marquis
+de Condillac, where it looked down upon them from the panelled wall, and
+from his soul he offered up to that portrait of his dead sire an apology
+for the successor whom his widow destined him.
+
+He ate little, but drank great draughts, as men will when their mood
+is sullen and dejected, and the heat of the wine, warming his veins and
+lifting from him some of the gloom that had settled over him, lent him
+anon a certain recklessness very different from the manner of his sober
+moments.
+
+Chancing suddenly to raise his eyes from the cup into which he had been
+gazing, absorbed as gazes a seer into his crystal, he caught on the
+Seneschal's lips so odious a smile, in the man's eyes so greedy, hateful
+a leer as he bent them on the Marquise, that he had much ado not to
+alter the expression of that flabby face by hurling at it the cup he
+held.
+
+He curbed himself; he smiled sardonically upon the pair; and in that
+moment he swore that be the cost what it might, he would frustrate the
+union of those two. His thoughts flew to Valerie, and the road they took
+was fouled with the mud of ugly deeds. A despair, grim at first, then
+mocking, took possession of him. He loved Valerie to distraction. Loved
+her for herself, apart from all worldly advantages that must accrue to
+him from an alliance with her. His mother saw in that projected marriage
+no more than the acquisition of the lands of La Vauvraye, and she may
+even have thought that he himself saw no more. In that she was wrong;
+but because of it she may have been justified of her impatience with him
+at the tardiness, the very clumsiness with which he urged his suit. How
+was she to know that it was just the sincerity of his passion made
+him clumsy? For like many another, normally glib, self-assured, and
+graceful, Marius grew halting, shy, and clumsy only where he loved.
+
+But in the despair that took him now the quality of his passion seemed
+to change. Partly it was the wine, partly the sight of this other
+lover--of whom there must be an end--whose very glance seemed to him an
+insult to his mother. His imagination had taken fire that night, and it
+had ripened him for any villainy. The Seneschal and the wine, between
+them, had opened the floodgates of all that was evil in his nature, and
+that evil thundered out in a great torrent that bid fair to sweep all
+before it.
+
+And suddenly, unexpectedly for the others, who were by now resigned to
+his moody silence, the evil found expression. The Marquise had spoken
+of something--something of slight importance--that must be done before
+Florimond returned. Abruptly Marius swung round in his seat to face
+his mother. "Must this Florimond return?" he asked, and for all that he
+uttered no more words, so ample in their expression were those four that
+he had uttered and the tone of them, that his meaning left little work
+to the imagination.
+
+Madame turned to stare at him, surprise ineffable in her glance--not
+at the thing that he suggested, but at the abruptness with which the
+suggestion came. The cynical, sneering tone rang in her ears after the
+words were spoken, and she looked in his face for a confirmation of
+their full purport.
+
+She observed the wine-flush on his cheek, the wine-glitter in his eye,
+and she remarked the slight smile on his lips and the cynical assumption
+of nonchalance with which he fingered the jewel in his ear as he
+returned her gaze. She beheld now in her son a man more purposeful than
+she had ever known before.
+
+A tense silence had followed his words, and the Lord Seneschal gaped
+at him, some of the colour fading from his plethoric countenance,
+suspecting as he did the true drift of Marius's suggestion. At last it
+was madame who spoke--very softly, with a narrowing of the eyes.
+
+"Call Fortunio," was all she said, but Marius understood full well the
+purpose for which she would have Fortunio called.
+
+With a half-smile he rose, and going to the door he bade his page who
+was idling in the anteroom go summon the captain. Then he paced slowly
+back, not to the place he had lately occupied at table, but to the
+hearth, where he took his stand with his shoulders squared to the
+overmantel.
+
+Fortunio came, fair-haired and fresh-complexioned as a babe, his supple,
+not ungraceful figure tawdrily clad in showy clothes of poor material
+the worse for hard usage and spilt wine. The Countess bade him sit, and
+with her own hands she poured a cup of Anjou for him.
+
+In some wonder, and, for all his ordinary self-possession, with a little
+awkwardness, the captain did her bidding, and with an apologetic air he
+took the seat she offered him.
+
+He drank this wine, and here was a spell of silence till Marius, grown
+impatient, brutally put the thing for which the Marquise sought delicate
+words.
+
+"We have sent for you, Fortunio," said he, in a blustering tone, "to
+inquire of you what price you'd ask to cut the throat of my brother, the
+Marquis de Condillac."
+
+The Seneschal sank back in his chair with a gasp. The captain, a frown
+between his frank-seeming, wide-set eyes, started round to look at the
+boy. The business was by no means too strong for the ruffler's stomach,
+but the words in which it was conveyed to him most emphatically were.
+
+"Monsieur de Condillac," said he, with an odd assumption of dignity, "I
+think you have mistaken your man. I am a soldier, not a cut-throat."
+
+"But yes," the Marquise soothed him, throwing herself instantly into the
+breach, and laying a long, slender hand upon the frayed green velvet
+of the captain's sleeve. "What my son means and what he says are vastly
+different things."
+
+"It will sorely tax your wits, madame," laughed Marius brutally, "to
+make clear that difference."
+
+And then the Seneschal nervously cleared his throat and muttering that
+it waxed late and he must be riding home, made shift to rise. Him, too,
+the Marquise at once subdued. She was not minded that he should go just
+yet. It might be useful to her hereafter to have had him present at this
+conference, into which she meant to draw him until she should have made
+him one with them, a party to their guilt. For the task she needed not
+over many words: just one or two and a melting glance or so, and the
+rebellion in his bosom was quelled at once.
+
+But with the captain her wiles were not so readily successful. He had no
+hopes of winning her to wife--haply no desire, since he was not a man
+of very great ambitions. On the other hand, he had against him the
+very worst record in France, and for all that he might embark upon this
+business under the auspices of the Lord Seneschal himself, he knew not
+how far the Lord Seneschal might dare to go thereafter to save him from
+a hanging, should it come to that.
+
+He said as much in words. In a business of this kind, he knew from
+experience, the more difficulties he advanced, the better a bargain
+he drove in the end; and if he was to be persuaded to risk his neck in
+this, he should want good payment. But even for good payment on this
+occasion he was none too sure as yet that he would let himself be
+persuaded.
+
+"Monsieur Fortunio," the Marquise said, very softly, "heed not Monsieur
+Marius's words. Attend to me. The Marquis de Condillac, as no doubt you
+will have learned for yourself, is lying at La Rochette. Now it happens
+that he is noxious to us--let the reasons be what they may. We need a
+friend to put him out of our way. Will you be that friend?"
+
+"You will observe," sneered Marius, "how wide a difference there is
+between what the Marquise suggests and my own frank question of what
+price you would take to cut my brother's throat."
+
+"I observe no difference, which is what you would say," Fortunio
+answered truculently, his head well back, his brown eyes resentful
+of offence--for none can be so resentful of imputed villainy as your
+villain who is thorough-paced. "And," he concluded, "I return you the
+same answer, madame--that I am no cut-throat."
+
+She repressed her anger at Marius's sneering interference, and made a
+little gesture of dismay with her eloquent white hands.
+
+"But we do not ask you to cut a throat."
+
+"I have heard amiss, then," said he, his insolence abating nothing.
+
+"You have heard aright, but you have understood amiss. There are other
+ways of doing these things. If it were but the cutting of a throat,
+should we have sent for you? There are a dozen in the garrison would
+have sufficed for our purpose."
+
+"What is it, then, you need?" quoth he.
+
+"We want an affair contrived with all decency. The Marquis is at the
+Sanglier Noir at La Rochette. You can have no difficulty in finding
+him, and having found him, less difficulty still in giving or provoking
+insult."
+
+"Excellent," murmured Marius from the background. "It is such an
+enterprise as should please a ready swordsman of your calibre,
+Fortunio."
+
+"A duel?" quoth the fellow, and his insolence went out of him, thrust
+out by sheer dismay; his mouth fell open. A duel was another affair
+altogether. "But, Sangdieu! what if he should slay me? Have you thought
+of that?"
+
+"Slay you?" cried the Marquise, her eyes resting on his face with an
+expression as of wonder at such a question. "You jest, Fortunio."
+
+"And he with the fever," put in Marius, sneering.
+
+"Ah!" muttered Fortunio. "He has the fever? The fever is something.
+But--but--accidents will happen."
+
+"Florimond was ever an indifferent swordsman," murmured Marius dreamily,
+as if communing with himself.
+
+The captain wheeled upon him once more.
+
+"Why, then, Monsieur Marius," said he, "since that is so and you are
+skilled--as skilled as am I, or more--and he has a fever, where is the
+need to hire me to the task?"
+
+"Where?" echoed Marius. "What affair may that be of yours? We ask you
+to name a price on which you will do this thing. Have done with
+counter-questions."
+
+Marius was skilled with the foils, as Fortunio said, but he cared not
+for unbaited steel, and he was conscious of it, so that the captain's
+half-sneer had touched him on the raw. But he was foolish to take that
+tone in answer. There was a truculent, Southern pride in the ruffler
+which sprang immediately into life and which naught that they could say
+thereafter would stamp out.
+
+"Must I say again that you mistake your man?" was his retort, and as
+he spoke he rose, as though to signify that the subject wearied him and
+that his remaining to pursue it must be idle. "I am not of those to
+whom you can say: 'I need such a one killed, name me the price at which
+you'll be his butcher'."
+
+The Marquise wrung her hands in pretty mimicry of despair, and poured
+out soothing words, as one might pour oil upon stormy waters. The
+Seneschal sat in stolid silence, a half-scared spectator of this odd
+scene, what time the Marquise talked and talked until she had brought
+Fortunio back to some measure of subjection.
+
+Such reasoning as she made use of she climaxed by an offer of no less a
+sum than a hundred pistoles. The captain licked his lips and pulled at
+his mustachios. For all his vaunted scorn of being a butcher at a price,
+now that he heard the price he seemed not half so scornful.
+
+"Tell me again the thing that you need doing and the manner of it," said
+he, as one who was moved to reconsider. She told him, and when she had
+done he made a compromise.
+
+"If I go upon this business, madame, I go not alone."
+
+"Oh, as for that," said Marius, "it shall be as you will. Take what men
+you want with you."
+
+"And hang with them afterwards, maybe," he sneered, his insolence
+returning. "The hundred pistoles would avail me little then. Look you,
+Monsieur de Condillac, and you, madame, if I go, I'll need to take with
+me a better hostage than the whole garrison of this place. I'll need for
+shield some one who will see to it that he is not hurt himself, just as
+I shall see to it that he is hurt before I am."
+
+"What do you mean? Speak out, Fortunio," the Marquise bade him.
+
+"I mean, madame, that I will go, not to do this thing, but to stand by
+and render help if help be needed. Let Monsieur de Condillac go, and
+I will go with him, and I will undertake to see to it that he returns
+unhurt and that we leave the other stark."
+
+Both started, and the Seneschal leaned heavily upon the table. He was
+not, with all his faults, a man of blood, and this talk of butchery
+turned him sick and faint.
+
+Vainly now did the Marquise seek to alter the captain's resolution; but
+in this she received a sudden check from Marius himself. He cut in upon
+her arguments to ask the captain:
+
+"How can you promise so much? Do you mean that you and I must fall upon
+him? You forget that he will have men about him. A duel is one thing,
+a rough-and-tumble another, and we shall fare none so well in this, I'm
+thinking."
+
+The captain closed one eye, and a leer of subtle cunning overspread his
+face.
+
+"I've thought of that," said he. "Neither a duel nor a rough-and-tumble
+do I propose, but something between the two; something that shall seem a
+duel yet be a rough-and-tumble."
+
+"Explain yourself."
+
+"What further explanation does it ask? We come upon Monsieur le Marquis
+where his men are not. We penetrate, let us say, into his chamber. I
+turn the key in the door. We are alone with him and you provoke him. He
+is angry, and must fight you there and then. I am your friend; I must
+fill the office of second for both sides. You engage, and I stand aside
+and let you fight it out. You say he is indifferently skilled with the
+sword, and, in addition, that he has a fever. Thus you should contrive
+to put your steel through him, and a duel it will have been. But if by
+luck or skill he should have you in danger, I shall be at hand to flick
+in my sword at the right moment and make an opening through which you
+may send yours home."
+
+"Believe me it were better--" began the Dowager. But Marius, who of a
+sudden was much taken with the notion, again broke in.
+
+"Are you to be depended upon to make no mistake, Fortunio?"
+
+"Per Bacco!" swore the ruffler. "A mistake must cost me a hundred
+pistoles. I think you may depend upon me there. If I err at all, it will
+be on the side of eagerness to see you make short work of him. You have
+my answer now, monsieur. If we talk all night, you shall not move me
+further. But if my proposal suits you, I am your man."
+
+"And I yours, Fortunio," answered Marius, and there was a ring almost of
+exultation in his voice.
+
+The Dowager looked from one to the other, as if she were weighing the
+men and satisfying herself that Marius ran no risk. She put a question
+or two to her son, another to the captain; then, seeming satisfied with
+what had been agreed, she nodded her head and told them they had best be
+stirring with the dawn.
+
+"You will have light enough by half-past six. Do not delay later in
+taking the road. And see that you are back here by nightfall; I shall be
+anxious till you are returned."
+
+She poured wine again for the captain, and Marius coming up to the table
+filled himself a glass, which he tossed off. The Marquise was speaking
+to Tressan.
+
+"Will you not drink to the success of the venture?" she asked him, in a
+coaxing tone, her eyes upon his own. "I think we are like to see the
+end of our troubles now, monsieur, and Marius shall be lord both of
+Condillac and La Vauvraye."
+
+And the gross, foolish Seneschal, under the spell of her magnificent
+eyes, slowly raised his cup to his lips and drank to the success of that
+murderous business. Marius stood still, a frown between his eyes haled
+thither by the mention of La Vauvraye. He might be winning it, as his
+mother said, but he would have preferred to have won it differently.
+Then the frown was smoothed away; a sardonic smile replaced it; another
+cup of wine he poured himself. Then, without word to any there, he
+turned on his heel and went from the room, a trifle unsteady in his
+gait, yet with such lines of purposefulness in the way he bore himself
+that the three of them stared after him in dull surprise.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI. THE UNEXPECTED
+
+In her apartments in the Northern Tower Valerie had supped, and--to
+spare Monsieur de Garnache the full indignity of that part of the
+offices he was charged with--she had herself removed the cloth and set
+the things in the guard-room, where they might lie till morning. When
+that was done--and despite her protests, Garnache had insisted upon
+lending a hand--the Parisian reminded her that it was already after
+nine, and urged her to make such preparations as incumbed her for their
+journey.
+
+"My preparations are soon made," she assured him with a smile. "I need
+but what I may carry in a cloak."
+
+They fell to talking of their impending flight, and they laughed
+together at the discomfiture that would be the Dowager's and her son's
+when, in the morning, they came to discover the empty cage. From that
+they passed on to talk of Valerie herself, of her earlier life at
+La Vauvraye, and later the conversation shifted to Garnache, and she
+questioned him touching the warring he had seen in early youth, and
+afterwards asked him for particulars of Paris--that wonderful city which
+to her mind was the only earthly parallel of Paradise--and of the life
+at Court.
+
+Thus in intimate talk did they while away the time of waiting, and in
+the hour that sped they came, perhaps, to know more of each other than
+they had done hitherto. Intimate, indeed, had they unconsciously become
+already. Their singular position, locked together in that tower--a
+position utterly impossible under any but the conditions that attended
+it--had conduced to that good-fellowship, whilst the girl's trust and
+dependence upon the man, the man's observance of that trust, and his
+determination to show her that it had not been misplaced, had done the
+rest.
+
+But to-night they seemed to have drawn nearer in spirit to each other,
+and that, maybe, it was that prompted Valerie to sigh, and in her sweet,
+unthinking innocence to say again:
+
+"I am truly sorry, Monsieur de Garnache, that our sojourn here is coming
+to an end."
+
+He was no coxcomb, and he set no false value on the words. He laughed
+for answer, as he rejoined:
+
+"Not so am I, mademoiselle. Nor shall I know peace of mind again until
+this ill-omened chateau is a good three leagues or so behind us. Sh!
+What was that?"
+
+He came instantly to his feet, his face intent and serious. He had been
+sitting at his ease in an armchair, over the back of which he had tossed
+the baldric from which his sword depended. The clang of the heavy door
+below, striking the wall as it was pushed open, had reached his ears.
+
+"Can it be time already?" asked mademoiselle; yet a panic took her, and
+she blenched a little.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Impossible," said he; "it is not more than ten o'clock. Unless that
+fool Arsenio has blundered--" He stopped. "Sh!" he whispered. "Some one
+is coming here."
+
+And suddenly he realized the peril that might lie in being found thus in
+her company. It alarmed him more than did the visit itself, so unusual
+at this hour. He saw that he had not time to reach the guard-room;
+he would be caught in the act of coming forth, and that might be
+interpreted by the Dowager or her son--if it should happen to be one
+or the other of them--as a hurried act of flight such as guilt might
+prompt. Perhaps he exaggerated the risk; but their fortunes at Condillac
+had reached a point where they must not be jeopardized by any chance
+however slight.
+
+"To your chamber, mademoiselle," he whispered fearfully, and he pointed
+to the door of the inner room. "Lock yourself in. Quick! Sh!" And he
+signed frantically to her to go silently.
+
+Swift and quietly as a mouse she glided from the room and softly closed
+the door of her chamber and turned the key in a lock, which Garnache had
+had the foresight to keep well oiled. He breathed more freely when it
+was done.
+
+A step sounded in the guard-room. He sank without a rustle into the
+chair from which he had risen, rested his head against the back of it,
+closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and dissembled sleep.
+
+The steps came swiftly across the guard-room floor, soft, as of one
+lightly shod; and Garnache wondered was it the mother or the son, just
+as he wondered what this ill-come visitor might be seeking.
+
+The door of the antechamber was pushed gently open--it had stood
+ajar--and under the lintel appeared the slender figure of Marius, still
+in his brown velvet suit as Garnache last had seen him. He paused a
+moment to peer into the chamber. Then he stepped forward, frowning to
+behold "Battista" so cosily ensconced.
+
+"Ola there!" he cried, and kicked the sentry's outstretched legs, the
+more speedily to wake him. "Is this the watch you keep?"
+
+Garnache opened his eyes and stared a second dully at the disturber
+of his feigned slumbers. Then, as if being more fully awakened he
+recognized his master, he heaved himself suddenly to his feet and bowed.
+
+"Is this the watch you keep?" quoth Marius again, and Garnache, scanning
+the youth's face with foolishly smiling eyes, noted the flush on his
+cheek, the odd glitter in his handsome eyes, and even caught a whiff
+of wine upon his breath. Alarm grew in Garnache's mind, but his face
+maintained its foolish vacancy, its inane smile. He bowed again and,
+with a wave of the hands towards the inner chamber,
+
+"La damigella a la," said he.
+
+For all that Marius had no Italian he understood the drift of the
+words, assisted as they were by the man's expressive gesture. He sneered
+cruelly.
+
+"It would be an ugly thing for you, my ugly friend, if she were not,"
+he answered. "Away with you. I shall call you when I need you." And he
+pointed to the door.
+
+Garnache experienced some dismay, some fear even. He plied his wits,
+and he determined that he had best seem to apprehend from his gestures
+Marius's meaning; but apprehend it in part only, and go no further than
+the other side of that door.
+
+He bowed, therefore, for the third time, and with another of his foolish
+grins he shuffled out of the chamber, pulling the door after him, so
+that Marius should not see how near at hand he stayed.
+
+Marius, without further heeding him, stepped to mademoiselle's door and
+rapped on a panel with brisk knuckles.
+
+"Who is there?" she inquired from within.
+
+"It is I--Marius. Open, I have something I must say to you."
+
+"Will it not keep till morning?"
+
+"I shall be gone by then," he answered impatiently, "and much depends
+upon my seeing you ere I go. So open. Come!"
+
+There followed a pause, and Garnache in the outer room set his teeth and
+prayed she might not anger Marius. He must be handled skillfully, lest
+their flight should be frustrated at the last moment. He prayed, too,
+that there might be no need for his intervention. That would indeed be
+the end of all--a shipwreck within sight of harbour. He promised himself
+that he would not lightly intervene. For the rest this news of Marius's
+intended departure filled him with a desire to know something of the
+journey on which he was bound:
+
+Slowly mademoiselle's door opened. White and timid she appeared.
+
+"What do you want, Marius?"
+
+"Now and always and above all things the sight of you, Valerie," said
+he, and the flushed cheek, the glittering eye, and wine-laden breath
+were as plain to her as they had been to Garnache, and they filled her
+with a deeper terror. Nevertheless she came forth at his bidding.
+
+"I see that you were not yet abed," said he. "It is as well. We must
+have a talk." He set a chair for her and begged her to be seated; then
+he perched himself on the table, his hands gripping the edges of it on
+either side of him, and he turned his eyes upon her.
+
+"Valerie," he said slowly, "the Marquis de Condillac, my brother, is at
+La Rochette."
+
+"He is coming home!" she cried, clasping her hands and feigning surprise
+in word and glance.
+
+Marius shook his head and smiled grimly.
+
+"No," said he. "He is not coming home. That is--not unless you wish it."
+
+"Not unless I wish it? But naturally I wish it!"
+
+"Then, Valerie, if you would have what you wish, so must I. If Florimond
+is ever to come to Condillac again, you must be my wife."
+
+He leaned towards her now, supported by his elbow, so that his face was
+close to hers, a deeper flush upon it, a brighter glitter in his black
+eyes, his vinous breath enveloping and suffocating her. She shrank back,
+her hands locking themselves one in the other till the knuckles showed
+white.
+
+"What--what is it you mean?" she faltered.
+
+"No more than I have said; no less. If you love him well enough to
+sacrifice yourself," and his lips curled sardonically at the word, "then
+marry me and save him from his doom."
+
+"What doom?" Her voice came mechanically, her lips seeming scarce to
+move.
+
+He swung down from the table and stood before her.
+
+"I will tell you," he said, in a voice very full of promise. "I love
+you, Valerie, above all else on earth or, I think, in heaven; and I'll
+not yield you to him. Say 'No' to me now, and at daybreak I start for La
+Rochette to win you from him at point of sword."
+
+Despite her fears she could not repress a little smile of scorn.
+
+"Is that all?" said she. "Why, if you are so rash, it is yourself,
+assuredly, will be slain."
+
+He smiled tranquilly at that reflection upon his courage and his skill.
+
+"So might it befall if I went alone," said he. She understood. Her eyes
+dilated with horror, with loathing of him. The angry words that sprang
+to her lips were not to be denied.
+
+"You cur, you cowardly assassin!" she blazed at him. "I might have
+guessed that in some such cutthroat manner would your vaunt of winning
+me at the sword-point be accomplished."
+
+She watched the colour fade from his cheeks, and the ugly, livid hue
+that spread in its room to his very lips. Yet it did not daunt her. She
+was on her feet, confronting him ere he had time to speak again. Her
+eyes flashed, and her arm pointed quivering to the door.
+
+"Go!" she bade him, her voice harsh for once. "Out of my sight! Go! Do
+your worst, so that you leave me. I'll hold no traffic with you."
+
+"Will you not?" said he, through setting teeth, and suddenly he caught
+the wrist of that outstretched arm. But she saw nothing of immediate
+danger. The only danger that she knew was the danger that threatened
+Florimond, and little did that matter since at midnight she was to
+leave Condillac to reach La Rochette in time to warn her betrothed. The
+knowledge gave her confidence and an added courage.
+
+"You have offered me your bargain," she told him. "You have named your
+price and you have heard my refusal. Now go."
+
+"Not yet awhile," said he, in a voice so odiously sweet that Garnache
+caught his breath.
+
+He drew her towards him. Despite her wild struggles he held her fast
+against his breast. Do what she would, he rained his hot kisses on her
+face and hair, till at last, freeing a hand, she smote him with all her
+might across the face.
+
+He let her go then. He fell back with an oath, a patch of fingermarks
+showing red on his white countenance.
+
+"That blow has killed Florimond de Condillac," he told her viciously.
+"He dies at noon to-morrow. Ponder it, my pretty."
+
+"I care not what you do so that you leave me," she answered defiantly,
+restraining by a brave effort the tears of angry distress that welled
+up from her stricken heart. And no less stricken, no less angry was
+Garnache where he listened. It was by an effort that he had restrained
+himself from bursting in upon them when Marius had seized her. The
+reflection that were he to do so all would irretrievably be ruined alone
+had stayed him.
+
+Marius eyed the girl a moment, his face distorted by the rage that was
+in him.
+
+"By God!" he swore, "if I cannot have your love, I'll give you cause
+enough to hate me."
+
+"Already have you done that most thoroughly," said she. And Garnache
+cursed this pertness of hers which was serving to dare him on.
+
+The next moment there broke from her a startled cry. Marius had seized
+her again and was crushing her frail body in his arms.
+
+"I shall kiss your lips before I go, ma mie," said he, his voice thick
+now with a passion that was not all of anger. And then, while he still
+struggled to have his way with her, a pair of arms took him about the
+waist like hoops of steel.
+
+In his surprise he let her free, and in that moment he was swung back
+and round and cast a good six paces down the room.
+
+He came to a standstill by the table, at which he clutched to save
+himself from falling, and turned bewildered, furious eyes upon
+"Battista," by whom he now dimly realized that he had been assailed.
+
+Garnache's senses had all left him in that moment when Valerie had cried
+out. He cast discretion to the winds; reason went out of him, and only
+blind anger remained to drive him into immediate action. And as suddenly
+as that flood of rage had leaped, as suddenly did it ebb now that he
+found himself face to face with the outraged Condillac and began to
+understand the magnitude of the folly he had committed.
+
+Everything was lost now, utterly and irretrievably--lost as a dozen
+other fine emprises had been by his sudden and ungoverned frenzy. God!
+What a fool he was! What a cursed, drivelling fool! What, after all, was
+a kiss or two, compared with all the evil that might now result from his
+interference? Haply Marius would have taken them and departed, and at
+midnight they would have been free to go from Condillac.
+
+The future would not have been lacking in opportunities to seek out and
+kill Marius for that insult.
+
+Why could he not have left the matter to the future? But now, with
+Florimond to be murdered on the morrow at La Rochette, himself likely
+to be murdered within the hour at Condillac, Valerie was at their mercy
+utterly.
+
+Wildly and vainly did he strive even then to cover up the foolish thing
+that he had done. He bowed apologetically to Marius; he waved his hands
+and filled the air with Italian phrases, frenziedly uttered, as if by
+the very vigour of them he sought to drive explanation into his master's
+brain. Marius watched and listened, but his rage nowise abated; it grew,
+instead, as if that farrago of a language he did not understand were
+but an added insult. An oath was all he uttered. Then he swung round
+and caught Garnache's sword from the chair beside him, where it still
+rested, and Garnache in that moment cursed the oversight. Whipping
+the long, keen blade from its sheath, Marius bore down upon the rash
+meddler.
+
+"Par Dieu!" he swore between his teeth. "We'll see the colour of your
+dirty blood, you that lay hands upon a gentleman."
+
+But before he could send home the weapon, before Garnache could move to
+defend himself, Valerie had slipped between them. Marius looked into
+her white, determined face, and was smitten with surprise. What was this
+hind to her that she should interfere at the risk of taking the sword
+herself?
+
+Then a slow smile spread upon his face. He was smarting still under
+her disdain and resistance, as well as under a certain sense of the
+discomfiture this fellow had put upon him. He saw a way to hurt her, to
+abase her pride, and cut her to the very soul with shame.
+
+"You are singularly concerned in this man's life," said he, an odious
+undercurrent of meaning in his voice.
+
+"I would not have you murder him," she answered, "for doing no more than
+madame your mother bade him."
+
+"I make no doubt he has proved a very excellent guard," he sneered.
+
+Even now all might have been well. With that insult Marius might
+consider that he had taken payment for the discomfiture he had suffered.
+He might have bethought him that, perhaps, as she said, "Battista"
+had done no more than observe the orders he had received--a trifle
+excessively, maybe, yet faithfully nevertheless. Thinking thus, he might
+even have been content to go his ways and take his fill of vengeance by
+slaying Florimond upon the morrow. But Garnache's rash temper, rising
+anew, tore that last flimsy chance to shreds.
+
+The insult that mademoiselle might overlook might even not have fully
+understood--set him afire with indignation for her sake. He forgot his
+role, forgot even that he had no French.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he cried, and she gasped in her affright at this ruinous
+indiscretion, "I beg that you will stand aside." His voice was low and
+threatening, but his words were woefully distinct.
+
+"Par la mort Dieu!" swore Marius, taken utterly aback. "What may your
+name be--you who hitherto have had no French?"
+
+Almost thrusting mademoiselle aside, Garnache stood out to face him, the
+flush of hot anger showing through the dye on his cheeks.
+
+"My name," said he, "is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache, and my
+business now to make an end of one at least of this obscene brood of
+Condillac."
+
+And, without more ado, he caught up a chair and held it before him in
+readiness to receive the other's onslaught.
+
+But Marius hung back an instant--at first in sheer surprise, later in
+fear. He had some knowledge of the fellow's methods. Even the sword he
+wielded gave him little confidence opposed to Garnache with a chair. He
+must have help. His eyes sought the door, measuring the distance. Ere he
+could reach it Garnache would cut him off. There was nothing for it
+but to attempt to drive the Parisian back. And so with a sudden rush he
+advanced to the attack. Garnache fell back and raised his chair, and in
+that instant mademoiselle once more intervened between them.
+
+"Stand aside, mademoiselle," cried Garnache, who now, grown cool, as was
+his way when once he was engaged, saw clearly through the purpose formed
+by Marius. "Stand aside, or we shall have him giving the alarm."
+
+He leapt clear of her to stop Marius's sudden rush for the door. On the
+very threshold the young man was forced to turn and defend himself, lest
+his brains be dashed out by that ponderous weapon Garnache was handling
+with a rare facility. But the mischief was done, in that he had reached
+the threshold. Backing, he defended himself and gained the anteroom.
+Garnache followed, but the clumsy chair was defensive rather than
+offensive, and Marius's sword meanwhile darted above it and below it,
+forcing him to keep a certain distance.
+
+And now Marius raised his voice and shouted with all the power of his
+lungs:
+
+"To me! To me! Fortunio! Abdon! To me, you dogs! I am beset."
+
+From the courtyard below rose an echo of his words, repeated in a shout
+by the sentinel, who had overheard them, and they caught the swift fall
+of the fellow's feet as he ran for help. Furious, picturing to himself
+how the alarm would spread like a conflagration through the chateau,
+cursing his headstrong folly yet determined that Marius at least should
+not escape him, Garnache put forth his energies to hinder him from
+gaining the door that opened on to the stairs. From the doorway of the
+antechamber mademoiselle, with a white face and terrified eyes, watched
+the unequal combat and heard the shouts for help. Anon despair might
+whelm her at the thought of how they had lost their opportunity of
+escaping; but for the present she had no thought save for the life of
+that brave man who was defending himself with an unwieldy chair.
+
+Garnache leapt suddenly aside to take his opponent in the flank and
+thus turn him from his backward progress towards the outer door. The
+manoeuvre succeeded, and gradually, always defending himself, Garnache
+circled farther round him until he was between Marius and the threshold.
+
+And now there came a sound of running feet on the uneven stones of the
+courtyard. Light gleamed on the staircase, and breathless voices were
+wafted up to the two men. Garnache bethought him that his last hour was
+assuredly at hand. Well, if he must take his death, he might as well
+take it here upon Marius's sword as upon another's. So he would risk
+it for the sake of leaving upon Marius some token by which he might
+remember him. He swung his chair aloft, uncovering himself for a second.
+The young man's sword darted in like a shaft of light. Nimbly Garnache
+stepped aside to avoid it, and moved nearer his opponent. Down crashed
+the chair, and down went Marius, stunned and bleeding, under its
+terrific blow. The sword clattered from his hand and rolled, with a
+pendulum-like movement, to the feet of Garnache.
+
+The Parisian flung aside his chair and stooped to seize that very
+welcome blade. He rose, grasping the hilt and gathering confidence from
+the touch of that excellently balanced weapon, and he swung round even
+as Fortunio and two of his braves appeared in the doorway.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII. HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+
+Never was there a man with a better stomach for a fight than Martin de
+Garnache, nor did he stop to consider that here his appetite in that
+direction was likely to be indulged to a surfeit. The sight of those
+three men opposing him, swords drawn and Fortunio armed in addition
+with a dagger, drove from his mind every other thought, every other
+consideration but that of the impending battle.
+
+He fell on guard to receive their onslaught, his eyes alert, his lips
+tight set, his knees like springs of steel, slightly flexed to support
+his well-poised body.
+
+But they paused a moment in the extremity of their surprise, and
+Fortunio called to him in Italian to know the meaning of this attitude
+of his as well as that of Marius, who lay huddled where he had fallen.
+
+Garnache, reckless now, disdaining further subterfuge nor seeking to
+have recourse to subtleties that could avail him nothing, retorted in
+French with the announcement of his true name. At that, perceiving that
+here was some deep treachery at work, they hesitated no longer.
+
+Led by Fortunio they attacked him, and the din they made in the next few
+minutes with their heavy breathing, their frequent oaths, their stamping
+and springing this way and that, and, ringing above all, the clash and
+clatter of sword on sword, filled the chamber and could be heard in the
+courtyard below.
+
+Minutes sped, yet they gained no advantage on this single man; not one,
+but a dozen swords did he appear to wield, so rapid were his passes, so
+ubiquitous his point. Had he but stood his ground there might have been
+a speedy end to him, but he retreated slowly towards the door of the
+antechamber. Valerie still stood there, watching with fearful eyes and
+bated breath that tremendous struggle which at any moment she expected
+to see terminate in the death of her only friend.
+
+In her way she was helping Garnache, though she little realized it. The
+six tapers in the candle-branch she held aloft afforded the only light
+for that stormy scene, and that light was in the eyes of Garnache's
+assailants, showing him their faces yet leaving his own in shadow.
+
+He fell back steadily towards that door. He could not see it; but there
+was not the need. He knew that it was in a direct line with the one
+that opened upon the stairs, and by the latter he steered his backward
+course. His aim was to gain the antechamber, although they guessed it
+not, thinking that he did but retreat through inability to stand his
+ground. His reasons were that here in this guardroom the best he could
+do would be to put his back to the wall, where he might pick off one or
+two before they made an end of him. The place was too bare to suit
+his urgent, fearful need. Within the inner room there was furniture to
+spare, with which he might contrive to hamper his opponents and give
+them such a lusty fight as would live in the memory of those who might
+survive it for as long as they should chance to live thereafter.
+
+He had no thought of perishing himself, although, to any less concerned,
+his death, sooner or later, must seem inevitable--the only possible
+conclusion to this affray, taken as he was. His mind was concerned only
+with this fight; his business to kill, and not himself to be slain. He
+knew that presently others would come to support these three. Already,
+perhaps, they were on their way, and he husbanded his strength against
+their coming. He was proudly conscious of his own superior skill, for
+he had studied the art of fence in Italy--its home--during his earlier
+years, and there was no trick of sword-play with which he was not
+acquainted, no ruse of service in a rough-and-tumble in which he was
+unversed. He was proudly conscious, too, of his supple strength, his
+endurance, and his great length of reach, and upon all these he counted
+to help him make a decent fight.
+
+Valerie, watching him, guessed his purpose to be the gaining of the
+inner chamber, the crossing of the threshold on which she was standing.
+She drew back a pace or two, almost mechanically, to give him room. The
+movement went near to costing him his life. The light no longer falling
+so pitilessly upon Fortunio's eyes, the captain saw more clearly than
+hitherto, and shot a swift, deadly stroke straight at the region of
+Garnache's heart. The Parisian leapt back when it was within an inch of
+his breast; one of the bravoes followed up, springing a pace in advance
+of his companions and lengthening his arm in a powerful lunge. Garnache
+caught the blade almost on his hilt, and by the slightest turn of
+the wrist made a simultaneous presentment of his point at the other's
+outstretched throat. It took the fellow just above the Adam's apple, and
+with a horrid, gurgling cry he sank, stretched as he still was in the
+attitude of that murderous lunge that had proved fatal only to himself.
+
+Garnache had come on guard again upon the instant. Yet in the briefest
+of seconds during which his sword had been about its work of death,
+Fortunio's rapier came at him a second time. He beat the blade aside
+with his bare left hand and stopped with his point the rush of the
+other bravo. Then he leapt back again, and his leap brought him to
+the threshold of the anteroom. He retreated quickly a pace, and then
+another. He was a sword's length within the chamber, and now he stood,
+firm as a rock and engaged Fortunio's blade which had followed him
+through the doorway. But he was more at his ease. The doorway was
+narrow. Two men abreast could not beset him, since one must cumber the
+movements of the other. If they came at him one at a time, he felt that
+he could continue that fight till morning, should there still by then be
+any left to face him.
+
+A wild exultation took him, an insane desire to laugh. Surely
+was sword-play the merriest game that was ever devised for man's
+entertainment. He straightened his arm, and his steel went out like a
+streak of lightning. But for the dagger on which he caught its edge,
+the blade had assuredly pierced the captain's heart. And now, fighting
+still, Garnache called to Valerie. He had need of her assistance to make
+his preparations ere others came.
+
+"Set down your tapers, mademoiselle," he bade her, "on the mantel shelf
+at my back. Place the other candle branch there too."
+
+Swiftly, yet with half-swimming senses, everything dim to her as to one
+in a nightmare, she ran to do his bidding; and now the light placed so
+at his back, gave him over his opponents the same slight advantage that
+he had enjoyed before. In brisk tones he issued his fresh orders.
+
+"Can you move the table, mademoiselle?" he asked her. "Try to drag it
+here, to the wall on my left, as close to the door as you can bring it."
+
+"I will try, monsieur," she panted through dry lips; and again she moved
+to do his bidding. Quickened by the need there was, her limbs, which
+awhile ago had seemed on the point of refusing their office, appeared to
+gather more than ordinary strength. She was unconsciously sobbing in her
+passionate anxiety to render him what help was possible. Frenziedly she
+caught at the heavy oaken table, and began to drag it across the room as
+Garnache had begged her. And now, Fortunio seeing what was toward, and
+guessing Garnache's intentions, sought by a rush to force his way into
+the Chamber. But Garnache was ready for him. There was a harsh grind of
+steel on steel, culminating in a resounding rush, and Fortunio was back
+in the guard-room, whither he had leapt to save his skin. A pause fell
+at that, and Garnache lowered his point to rest his arm until they
+should again come at him. From beyond the doorway the captain called
+upon him to yield. He took the summons as an insult, and flew into a
+momentary passion.
+
+"Yield?" he roared. "Yield to you, you cut-throat scum? You shall have
+my sword if you will come for it, but you shall have it in your throat."
+
+Angered in his turn, Fortunio inclined his head to his companion's ear,
+issuing an order. In obedience to it, it was the bravo now who advanced
+and engaged Garnache. Suddenly he dropped on to his knees, and over his
+head Garnache found his blade suddenly opposed by Fortunio's. It was a
+clever trick, and it all but did Garnache's business then. Yet together
+with the surprise of it there came to him the understanding of what was
+intended. Under his guard the kneeling man's sword was to be thrust up
+into his vitals. As a cry of alarm broke from mademoiselle, he leapt
+aside and towards the wall, where he was covered from Fortunio's weapon,
+and turning suddenly he passed his sword from side to side through the
+body of the kneeling mercenary.
+
+The whole thing he had performed mechanically, more by instinct than
+by reason; and when it was done, and the tables were thus effectively
+turned upon his assailants, he scarcely realized how he had accomplished
+it.
+
+The man's body cumbered now the doorway, and behind him Fortunio stood,
+never daring to advance lest a thrust of that sword which he could not
+see--Garnache still standing close against the wall--should serve him
+likewise.
+
+Garnache leaned there, in that friendly shelter, to breathe, and he
+smiled grimly under cover of his mustache. So long as he had to deal
+with a single assailant he saw no need to move from so excellent a
+position. Close beside him, leaning heavily against the table she had
+dragged thus far, stood Valerie, her face livid as death, her heart
+sick within her at the horror inspired her by that thing lying on the
+threshold. She could not take her eyes from the crimson stain that
+spread slowly on the floor, coming from under that limply huddled mass
+of arms and legs.
+
+"Do not look, mademoiselle," Garnache implored her softly. "Be brave,
+child; try to be brave."
+
+She sought to brace her flagging courage, and by an effort she averted
+her eyes from that horrid heap and fixed them upon Garnache's calm,
+intrepid face. The sight of his quietly watchful eyes, his grimly
+smiling lips, seemed to infuse courage into her anew.
+
+"I have the table, monsieur," she told him. "I can bring it no nearer to
+the wall."
+
+He understood that this was not because her courage or her strength
+might be exhausted, but because he now occupied the spot where he had
+bidden her place it. He motioned her away, and when she had moved he
+darted suddenly and swiftly aside and caught the table, his sword still
+fast in his two first fingers, which he had locked over the quillons.
+He had pushed its massive weight halfway across the door before Fortunio
+grasped the situation. Instantly the captain sought to take advantage of
+it, thinking to catch Garnache unawares. But no sooner did he show his
+nose inside the doorpost than Garnache's sword flashed before his eyes,
+driving him back with a bloody furrow in his cheek.
+
+"Have a care, Monsieur le Capitaine," Garnache mocked him. "Had you come
+an inch farther it might have been the death of you."
+
+A clatter of steps sounded upon the stairs, and the Parisian bent once
+more to his task, and thrust the table across the open doorway. He had a
+moment's respite now, for Fortunio stung--though lightly--was not likely
+to come again until he had others to support him. And while the others
+came, while the hum of their voices rose higher, and finally their steps
+clattered over the bare boards of the guard-room floor, Garnache had
+caught up and flung a chair under the table to protect him from an
+attack from below, while he had piled another on top to increase and
+further strengthen the barricade.
+
+Valerie watched him agonizedly, leaning now against the wall, her hands
+pressed across her bosom, as if to keep down its tempestuous heaving.
+Yet her anguish was tempered by a great wonder and a great admiration of
+this man who could keep such calm eyes and such smiling lips in the face
+of the dreadful odds by which he was beset, in the face of the certain
+death that must ultimately reach him before he was many minutes older.
+And in her imagination she conjured up a picture of him lying there torn
+by their angry swords and drenched in blood, his life gone out of him,
+his brave spirit, quenched for ever--and all for her unworthy sake.
+Because she-- little, worthless thing that she was--would not marry
+as they listed, this fine, chivalrous soul was to be driven from its
+stalwart body.
+
+An agony of grief took her now, and she fell once more to those awful
+sobs that awhile ago had shaken her. She had refused to marry Marius
+that Florimond's life should be spared, knowing that before Marius could
+reach him she herself would have warned her betrothed. Yet even had that
+circumstance not existed, she was sure that still she would have refused
+to do the will of Marius. But equally sure was she that she would not so
+refuse him were he now to offer as the price of her compliance the life
+of Garnache, which she accounted irrevocably doomed.
+
+Suddenly his steady, soothing voice penetrated her anguished musings.
+
+"Calm yourself, mademoiselle; all is far from lost as yet."
+
+She thought that he but spoke so to comfort her; she did not follow the
+working of his warlike mind, concentrated entirely upon the business
+of the moment, with little thought--or care, for that matter--for what
+might betide anon. Yet she made an effort to repress her sobs. She
+would be brave, if only to show herself worthy of the companionship and
+friendship of so brave a man.
+
+Across his barricade he peered into the outer room to ascertain with
+what fresh opponents he might have to reckon, and he was surprised to
+see but four men standing by Fortunio, whilst behind them among the
+thicker shadows, he dimly made out a woman's figure and, beside her,
+another man who was short and squat.
+
+He bethought him that the hour, and the circumstance that most of the
+mercenaries would be in their beds, accounted for the reinforcement not
+being greater.
+
+The woman moved forward, and he saw as he had suspected, that it was the
+Dowager herself. The squat figure beside her, moving with her into the
+shaft of light that fell from the doorway Garnache defended, revealed
+to him the features of Monsieur de Tressan. If any doubt he had still
+entertained concerning the Seneschal's loyalty, that doubt was now
+dispelled.
+
+And now the Dowager uttered a sudden cry of fear. She had caught sight
+of the fallen Marius, and she hurried to his side. Tressan sped after
+her and between them they raised the boy and helped him to a chair,
+where he now sat, passing a heavy hand across his no doubt aching brow.
+Clearly he was recovering, from which Garnache opined with regret that
+his blow had been too light. The Dowager turned to Fortunio, who had
+approached her, and her eyes seemed to take fire at something that he
+told her.
+
+"Garnache?" the Parisian heard her say, and he saw Fortunio jerk his
+thumb in the direction of the barricade.
+
+She appeared to forget her son; she stepped suddenly from his side, and
+peered through the doorway at the stalwart figure of Garnache, dimly to
+be seen through the pile of furniture that protected him to the height
+of his breast. No word said she to the Parisian. She stood regarding him
+a moment with lips compressed and a white, startled, angry face. Then:
+
+"It was by Marius's contrivance that he was placed sentry over the
+girl," he heard her tell Fortunio, and he thought she sneered.
+
+She looked at the two bodies on the floor, one almost at her feet, the
+other just inside the doorway, now almost hidden in the shadows of the
+table. Then she issued her commands to the men, and fiercely she bade
+them pull down that barricade and take the dog alive.
+
+But before they could move to do her bidding, Garnache's voice rang
+imperatively through the chamber.
+
+"A word with you ere they begin, Monsieur de Tressan," he shouted, and
+such was the note of command he assumed that the men stood arrested,
+looking to the Dowager for fresh orders. Tressan changed colour, for
+all that there was surely naught to fear, and he fingered his beard
+perplexedly, looking to the Marquise for direction. She flashed him a
+glance, lifted one shoulder disdainfully, and to the men:
+
+"Fetch him out," said she, and she pointed to Garnache. But again
+Garnache stayed them.
+
+"Monsieur de Tressan," he called impressively, "to your dying day--and
+that will be none so distant--shall you regret it if you do not hear
+me."
+
+The Seneschal was stirred by those words and the half-threat,
+half-warning; they seemed to cover. He paused a moment, and this time
+his eyes avoided the Marquise's. At last, taking a step forward,
+
+"Knave," said he, "I do not know you."
+
+"You know me well enough. You have heard my name. I am Martin Marie
+Rigobert de Garnache, Her Majesty's emissary into Dauphiny to procure
+the enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the Chateau de
+Condillac, where she is detained by force and for the serving of
+unscrupulous ends. Now you know me and my quality."
+
+The Dowager stamped her foot.
+
+"Fetch him out!" she commanded harshly.
+
+"Hear me first, Monsieur le Seneschal, or it will be the worse for
+you." And the Seneschal, moved by that confident promise of evil, threw
+himself before the men-at-arms.
+
+"A moment, I beseech you, Marquise," he cried, and the men, seeing his
+earnestness and knowing his quality, stood undecided, buffeted as they
+were between his will and the Marquise's. "What have you to say to me?"
+Tressan demanded, seeking to render arrogant his tone.
+
+"This: That my servant knows where I am, and that should I fail within a
+very few days to come forth safe and sound from Condillac to rejoin
+him, he is to ride to Paris with certain letters I have given him. Those
+letters incriminate you to the full in this infamous matter here at
+Condillac. I have set forth in them how you refused me help, how you
+ignored the Queen's commands of which I was the bearer; and should it be
+proved, in addition, that through your treachery and insubordination my
+life has been lost, I promise you that nothing in all this world will
+save you from a hanging."
+
+"Never listen, monsieur," cried the Dowager, seeing Tressan start back
+like a man in sudden fear. "It is no more than the ruse of a desperate
+man."
+
+"Heed me or not, at your choice," Garnache retorted, addressing himself
+ever to Tressan. "You have had your warning. I little thought to see you
+here to-night. But seeing you confirms my worst suspicions, and if I
+am to die, I can die easy in my conscience at the thought that in
+sacrificing you to Her Majesty's wrath I have certainly not sacrificed
+an innocent man."
+
+"Madame--" the Seneschal began, turning to the Dowager. But she broke in
+impatiently upon his intended words, upon the prayer that bubbled to his
+lips that she should pause a while ere she made an end of this Parisian.
+
+"Monsieur," said she, "you may bargain with him when he is taken. We
+will have him alive. Go in," she bade her men, her voice so resolute now
+that none dared tarry longer. "Fetch the knave out--alive."
+
+Garnache smiled at mademoiselle as the words were uttered.
+
+"They want me alive," said he. "That is a hopeful state of things. Bear
+up, child; I may need your help ere we are through."
+
+"You shall find me ready, monsieur," she assured him for all her
+tremors. He looked at the pale face, composed now by an effort of her
+will, and at the beautiful hazel eyes which strove to meet his with calm
+and to reflect his smile, and he marvelled at her courage as much as did
+she at his.
+
+Then the assault began, and he could have laughed at the way in which
+a couple of those cut-throats--neither wishing to have the honour of
+meeting him singly--hindered each other by seeking to attack him at
+once.
+
+At last the Dowager commanded one of them to go in. The fellow came,
+and he was driven back by the sword that darted at him from above the
+barricade.
+
+There matters might have come to a deadlock, but that Fortunio came
+forward with one of his men to repeat the tactics which had cost him
+a life already. His fellow went down on his knees, and drove his sword
+under the table and through the frame of the chair, seeking to prick
+Garnache in the legs. Simultaneously the captain laid hold of an arm
+of the chair above and sought to engage Garnache across it. The ruse
+succeeded to the extent of compelling the Parisian to retreat. The table
+seemed likely to be his undoing instead of helping him. He dropped like
+lightning to one knee, seeking to force the fellow out from underneath.
+But the obstacles which should have hindered his assailants hindered
+Garnache even more at this juncture. In that instant Fortunio whipped
+the chair from the table-top, and flung it forward. One of its legs
+caught Garnache on the sword arm, deadening it for a second. The sword
+fell from his hand, and Valerie shrieked aloud, thinking the battle
+at an end. But the next moment he was on his feet, his rapier firmly
+gripped once more, for all that his arm still felt a trifle numbed. As
+seconds passed the numbness wore away, but before that had taken place
+the table had been thrust forward, and the man beneath it had made it
+impossible for Garnache to hinder this. Suddenly he called to Valerie.
+
+"A cloak, mademoiselle! Get me a cloak!" he begged. And she, stemming
+her fears once more, ran to do his bidding.
+
+She caught up a cloak that lay on a chair by the door of her
+bed-chamber, and brought it to him. He twisted it twice round his left
+arm, letting its folds hang loose, and advanced again to try conclusions
+with the gentleman underneath. He cast the garment so that it enmeshed
+the sword when next it was advanced. Stepping briskly aside, he was up
+to the table, and his busy blade drove back the man who assailed him
+across it. He threw his weight against it, and thrust it back till it
+was jammed hard once more against the doorposts, leaving the chair at
+his very feet. The man beneath had recovered his sword by this, and
+again he sought to use it. That was the end of him. Again Garnache
+enmeshed it, kicked away the chair, or, rather, thrust it aside with his
+foot, stooped suddenly, and driving his blade under the table felt it
+sink into the body of his tormentor.
+
+There was a groan and a spluttering cough, and then before Garnache
+could recover he heard mademoiselle crying out to him to beware. The
+table was thrust suddenly forward almost on top of him; its edge caught
+his left shoulder, and sent him back a full yard, sprawling upon the
+ground.
+
+To rise again, gasping for air--for the fall had shaken him--was the
+work of an instant. But in that instant Fortunio had thrust the table
+clear of the doorway, and his men were pouring into the room.
+
+They came at Garnache in a body, with wild shouts and fierce mockery,
+and he hurriedly fell on guard and gave way before them until his
+shoulders were against the wainscot and he had at least the assurance
+that none could take him in the rear. Three blades engaged his own.
+Fortunio had come no farther than the doorway, where he stood his torn
+cheek drenched in blood, watching the scene the Marquise beside him, and
+Tressan standing just behind them, very pale and scared.
+
+Yet Garnache's first thought even in that moment of dire peril was for
+Valerie. He would spare her the sight that must before many moments be
+spread to view within that shambles.
+
+"To your chamber, mademoiselle," he cried to her. "You hinder me," he
+added by way of compelling her obedience. She did his bidding, but only
+in part. No farther went she than the doorway of her room, where she
+remained standing, watching the fray as earlier she had stood and
+watched it from the door of the antechamber.
+
+Suddenly she was moved by inspiration. He had gained an advantage
+before, by retreating through a doorway into an inner room. Might he not
+do the same again, and be in better case if he were to retreat now to
+her own chamber? Impulsively she called to him.
+
+"In here, Monsieur de Garnache. In here."
+
+The Marquise looked across at her, and smiled in mockery. Garnache was
+too well occupied, she thought, to attempt any such rashness. If he but
+dared remove his shoulders from the wall there would be a speedier end
+to him than as things were.
+
+Not so, however, thought Garnache. The cloak twisted about his left
+arm gave him some advantage, and he used it to the full. He flicked
+the slack of it in the face of one, and followed it up by stabbing the
+fellow in the stomach before he could recover guard, whilst with another
+wave of that cloak he enmeshed the sword that shot readily into the
+opening he had left.
+
+Madame cursed, and Fortunio echoed her imprecations. The Seneschal
+gasped, his fears lost in amazement at so much valour and dexterity.
+
+Garnache swung away from the wall now, and set his back to mademoiselle,
+determined to act upon her advice. But even in that moment he asked
+himself for the first time since the commencement of that carnage--to
+what purpose? His arms were growing heavy with fatigue, his mouth was
+parched, and great beads of perspiration stood upon his brow. Soon he
+would be spent, and they would not fail to take a very full advantage of
+it.
+
+Hitherto his mind had been taken up with the battle only, and if he
+had thought of retreating, it was but to the end that he might gain a
+position of some vantage. Now, conscious of his growing fatigue, his
+thoughts turned them at last to the consideration of flight. Was there
+no way out of it? Must he kill every man in Condillac before he could
+hope to escape?
+
+Whimsically, and almost mechanically, he set himself, in his mind,
+to count the men. There were twenty mercenaries all told, excluding
+Fortunio and himself. On Arsenio he might rely not to attack him,
+perhaps even to come to his assistance at the finish. That left
+nineteen. Four he had already either killed outright or effectively
+disabled; so that fifteen remained him. The task of dealing with those
+other fifteen was utterly beyond him. Presently, no doubt, the two now
+opposing him would be reinforced by others. So that if any possible way
+out existed, he had best set about finding it at once.
+
+He wondered could he cut down these two, make an end of Fortunio, and,
+running for it, attempt to escape through the postern before the rest of
+the garrison had time to come up with him or guess his purpose. But the
+notion was too wild, its accomplishment too impossible.
+
+He was fighting now with his back to mademoiselle and his face to the
+tall window, through the leaded panes of which he caught the distorted
+shape of a crescent moon. Suddenly the idea came to him. Through that
+window must lie his way. It was a good fifty feet above the moat, he
+knew, and if he essayed to leap it, it must be an even chance that he
+would be killed in leaping. But the chance of death was a certain one
+if he tarried where he was until others came to support his present
+opponents. And so he briskly determined upon the lesser risk.
+
+He remembered that the window was nailed down, as it had remained since
+mademoiselle's pretended attempt at flight. But surely that should prove
+no formidable obstacle.
+
+And now that his resolve was taken his tactics abruptly changed.
+Hitherto he had been sparing of his movements, husbanding his strength
+against the long battle that seemed promised him. Suddenly he assumed
+the offensive where hitherto he had but acted in self-defence, and a
+most deadly offensive was it. He plied his cloak, untwisting it from his
+arm and flinging it over the head and body of one of his assailants, so
+that he was enmeshed and blinded by it. Leaping to the fellow's flank,
+Garnache, with a terrific kick, knocked his legs from under him so that
+he fell heavily. Then, stooping suddenly, the Parisian ran his blade
+under the other brave's guard and through the fellow's thigh. The man
+cried out, staggered, and then went down utterly disabled.
+
+One swift downward thrust Garnache made at the mass that wriggled
+under his cloak. The activity of its wriggles increased in the next few
+seconds, then ceased altogether.
+
+Tressan felt wet from head to foot with a sweat provoked by horror of
+what he saw. The Dowager's lips were pouring forth a horrid litany
+of guard-room oaths, and meanwhile Garnache had swung round to meet
+Fortunio, the last of all who had stood with him.
+
+The captain came on boldly, armed with sword and dagger, and in that
+moment, feeling himself spent, Garnache bitterly repented having
+relinquished his cloak. Yet he made a stubborn fight, and whilst
+they fenced and stamped about that room, Marius came to watch them,
+staggering to his mother's side and leaning heavily upon Tressan's
+shoulder. The Marquise turned to him, her face livid to the lips.
+
+"That man must be the very fiend," Garnache heard her tell her son. "Run
+for help, Tressan, or, God knows, he may escape us yet. Go for men, or
+we shall have Fortunio killed as well. Bid them bring muskets."
+
+Tressan, moving like one bereft of wits, went her errand, while the two
+men fought on, stamping and panting, circling and lunging, their breath
+coming in gasps, their swords grinding and clashing till sparks leapt
+from them.
+
+The dust rose up to envelop and almost choke them, and more than once
+they slipped in the blood with which the floor was spattered, whilst
+presently Garnache barely recovered and saved himself from stumbling
+over the body of one of his victims against which his swiftly moving
+feet had hurtled.
+
+And the Dowager, who watched the conflict and who knew something of
+sword-play, realized that, tired though Garnache might be, unless
+help came soon or some strange chance gave the captain the advantage,
+Fortunio would be laid low with the others.
+
+His circling had brought the Parisian round, so that his back was now to
+the window, his face to the door of the bedchamber, where mademoiselle
+still watched in ever-growing horror. His right shoulder was in line
+with the door of the antechamber, which madame occupied, and he never
+saw her quit Marius's side and creep slyly into the room to speed
+swiftly round behind him.
+
+The only one from whom he thought that he might have cause to fear
+treachery was the man whom he had dropped with a thigh wound, and he was
+careful to keep beyond the reach of any sudden sword-thrust from that
+fellow.
+
+But if he did not see the woman's movements, mademoiselle saw them,
+and the sight set her eyes dilating with a new fear. She guessed the
+Dowager's treacherous purpose. And no sooner had she guessed it than,
+with a choking sob, she told herself that what madame could do that
+could she also.
+
+Suddenly Garnache saw an opening; Fortunio's eyes, caught by the
+Dowager's movements, strayed for a moment past his opponent, and the
+thing would have been fatal to the captain but that in that moment,
+as Garnache was on the point of lunging, he felt himself caught from
+behind, his arms pinioned to his sides by a pair of slender ones that
+twined themselves about him, and over his shoulder, the breath of it
+fanning his hot cheek, came a vicious voice--
+
+"Stab now, Fortunio!"
+
+The captain asked nothing better. He raised his weary sword-arm and
+brought his point to the level of Garnache's breast, but in that instant
+its weight became leaden. Imitating the Marquise, Valerie had been in
+time. She seized Fortunio's half-lifted arm and flung all her weight
+upon it.
+
+The captain cursed her horridly in a frenzy of fear, for he saw that
+did Garnache shake off the Marquise there would be an end of himself. He
+sought to wrench himself free of her detaining grasp, and the exertion
+brought him down, weary as he was, and with her weight hanging to him.
+He sank to his knees, and the girl, still clinging valiantly, sank with
+him, calling to Garnache that she held the captain fast.
+
+Putting forth all his remaining strength, the Parisian twisted from the
+Dowager's encircling grasp and hurled her from him with a violence he
+nowise intended.
+
+"Yours, madame, are the first woman's arms that ever Martin de Garnache
+has known," said he. "And never could embrace of beauty have been less
+welcome."
+
+Panting, he caught up one of the overturned chairs. Holding it by the
+back he made for the window. He had dropped his sword, and he called
+to mademoiselle to hold the captain yet an instant longer. He swung his
+chair aloft and dashed it against the window. There was a thundering
+crash of shivered glass and a cool draught of that November night came
+to sweeten the air that had been fouled by the stamping of the fighters.
+
+Again he swung up his chair and dashed it at the window, and yet again,
+until no window remained, but a great, gaping opening with a fringe of
+ragged glass and twisted leadwork.
+
+In that moment Fortunio struggled to his feet, free of the girl, who
+sank, almost in a swoon. He sprang towards Garnache. The Parisian turned
+and flung his now shattered chair toward the advancing captain. It
+dropped at his feet, and his flying shins struck against an edge of
+it, bringing him, hurt and sprawling, to the ground. Before he could
+recover, a figure was flying through the open gap that lately had been a
+window.
+
+Mademoiselle sat up and screamed.
+
+"You will be killed, Monsieur de Garnache! Dear God, you will be
+killed!" and the anguish in her voice was awful.
+
+It was the last thing that reached the ears of Monsieur de Garnache as
+he tumbled headlong through the darkness of the chill November night.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. IN THE MOAT
+
+Fortunio and the Marquise reached the window side by side, and they were
+in time to hear a dull splash in the waters fifty feet below them. There
+was a cloud over the little sickle of moon, and to their eyes, fresh
+from the blaze of candle-light, the darkness was impenetrable.
+
+"He is in the moat," cried the Marquise excitedly, and Valerie, who sat
+on the floor whither she had slipped when Fortunio shook her off, rocked
+herself in an agony of fear.
+
+To the horrors about her--the huddled bodies lying so still upon the
+floor, the bloody footprints everywhere, the shattered furniture,
+and the groans of the man with the wounded thigh--to all this she was
+insensible. Garnache was dead, she told herself; he was surely dead; and
+it seemed as if the very thought of it were killing, too, a part of her
+own self.
+
+Unconsciously she sobbed her fears aloud. "He is dead," she moaned; "he
+is dead."
+
+The Marquise overheard that piteous cry, and turned to survey the girl,
+her brows lifting, her lips parting in an astonishment that for a second
+effaced the horrors of that night. Suspicion spread like an oil stain
+in her evil mind. She stepped forward and caught the girl by one of her
+limp arms. Marius, paler than his stunning had left him, leaned more
+heavily against the door-post, and looked on with bloodshot eyes.
+If ever maiden avowed the secret of her heart, it seemed to him that
+Valerie avowed it then.
+
+The Marquise shook her angrily.
+
+"What was he to you, girl? What was he to you?" she demanded shrilly.
+
+And the girl, no more than half conscious of what she was saying, made
+answer:
+
+"The bravest gentleman, the noblest friend I have ever known."
+
+Pah! The Dowager dropped her arm and turned to issue a command to
+Fortunio. But already the fellow had departed. His concern was not with
+women, but with the man who had escaped him. He must make certain that
+the fall had killed Garnache.
+
+Breathless and worn as he was, all spattered now with blood from the
+scratch in his cheek, which lent him a terrific aspect, he dashed
+from that shambles and across the guard-room. He snatched up a lighted
+lantern that had been left in the doorway and leapt down the stairs
+and into the courtyard. Here he came upon Monsieur de Tressan with a
+half-dozen fellows at his heels, all more or less half clad, but all
+very fully armed with swords and knives, and one or two with muskets.
+
+Roughly, with little thought for the dignity of his high office, he
+thrust the Lord Seneschal aside and turned the men. Some he ordered off
+to the stables to get horses, for if Garnache had survived his leap and
+swum the moat, they must give chase. Whatever betide, the Parisian must
+not get away. He feared the consequences of that as much for himself as
+for Condillac. Some five or six of the men he bade follow him, and never
+pausing to answer any of Tressan's fearful questions, he sped across
+the courtyard, through the kitchens--which was the nearest way--into the
+outer quadrangle. Never pausing to draw breath, spent though he was, he
+pursued his flight under the great archway of the keep and across the
+drawbridge, the raising of which had been that night postponed to await
+the Lord Seneschal's departure.
+
+Here on the bridge he paused and turned in a frenzy to scream to his
+followers that they should fetch more torches. Meanwhile he snatched the
+only one at hand from the man-at-arms that carried it.
+
+His men sprang into the guard-room of the keep, realizing from his
+almost hysterical manner the urgent need for haste. And while he waited
+for them, standing there on the bridge, his torch held high, he scanned
+by its lurid red light the water as far as eye could reach on either
+side of him.
+
+There was a faint movement on the dark, oily surface for all that no
+wind stirred. Not more than four or five minutes could have elapsed
+since Garnache's leap, and it would seem as if the last ripple from the
+disturbance of his plunge had not yet rolled itself out. But otherwise
+there was nothing here, nor did Fortunio expect aught. The window of the
+Northern Tower abutted on to the other side of the chateau, and it was
+there he must look for traces of the fugitive or for his body.
+
+"Hasten!" he shouted over his shoulder. "Follow me!" And without waiting
+for them he ran across the bridge and darted round the building, his
+torch scattering a shower of sparks behind him on the night, and sending
+little rills of blood-red light down the sword which he still carried.
+
+He gained the spot where Garnache must have fallen, and he stood below
+the radiance that clove the night from the shattered window fifty feet
+above, casting the light of his torch this way and that over the
+black bosom of the moat. Not a ripple moved now upon that even, steely
+surface. Voices sounded behind him, and with them a great glare of
+ruddy light came to herald the arrival of his men. He turned to them and
+pointed with his sword away from the chateau.
+
+"Spread yourselves!" he shouted. "Make search yonder. He cannot have
+gone far."
+
+And they, but dimly realizing whom they sought, yet realizing that they
+sought a man, dashed off and spread themselves as he had bidden them,
+to search the stretch of meadowland, where ill must betide any fugitive,
+since no cover offered.
+
+Fortunio remained where he was at the edge of the moat. He stooped,
+and waving his torch along the ground he moved to the far angle of the
+chateau, examining the soft, oozy clay. It was impossible that a man
+could have clambered out over that without leaving some impression. He
+reached the corner and found the clay intact; at least, nowhere could
+he discover a mark of hands or a footprint set as would be that of a man
+emerging from the water.
+
+He retraced his steps and went back until he had reached the eastern
+angle of the chateau, yet always with the same result. He straightened
+himself at last, and his manner was more calm; his frenzied haste was
+gone, and deliberately he now raised his torch and let its light shine
+again over the waters. He pondered them a moment, his dark eyes musing
+almost regretfully.
+
+"Drowned!" he said aloud, and sheathed his sword.
+
+From the window overhead a voice hailed him. He looked up and saw the
+Dowager, and, behind her, the figure of her son. Away in the meadows
+the lights of his men's torches darted hither and thither like playful
+jack-o'-lanterns.
+
+"Have you got him, Fortunio?"
+
+"Yes, madame," he answered with assurance. "You may have his body when
+you will. He is underneath here." And he pointed to the water.
+
+They appeared to take his word for it, for they questioned him no
+further. The Marquise turned to mademoiselle, who was still sitting on
+the floor.
+
+"He is drowned, Valerie," she said slowly, watching the girl's face.
+
+Valerie looked up. Her eyes were very wide, and her lips moved for a
+second. Then she fell forward without a word. This last horror, treading
+on the heels of all those that already had assailed her, proved too
+great a strain for her brave spirit. She had swooned.
+
+Tressan entered at that moment, full of questions as to what might be
+toward, for he had understood nothing in the courtyard. The Marquise
+called to him to help her with the girl, Marius being still too faint,
+and between them they bore her to her chamber, laid her on the bed, and,
+withdrawing, closed the door upon her. Then she signed to Marius and the
+Seneschal.
+
+"Come," she said; "let us go. The sight and smell of the place are
+turning me sick, although my stomach is strong enough to endure most
+horrors."
+
+She took up one of the candle-branches to light them, and they went
+below and made their way to the hall, where they found Marius's page,
+Gaston, looking very pale and scared at the din that had filled the
+chateau during the past half-hour or so. With him was Marius's hound,
+which the poor boy had kept by him for company and protection in that
+dreadful time.
+
+The Marquise spoke to him kindly, and she stooped to pat the dog's
+glossy head. Then she bade Gaston set wine for them, and when it was
+fetched the three of them drank in brooding, gloomy silence.
+
+The draught invigorated Marius, it cheered Tressan's drooping spirits,
+and it quenched the Dowager's thirst. The Seneschal turned to her
+again with his unanswered questions touching the end of that butchery
+above-stairs. She told him what Fortunio had said that Garnache was
+drowned as a consequence of his mad leap from the window.
+
+Into Tressan's mind there sprang the memory of the thing Garnache had
+promised should befall him in such a case. It drove the colour from his
+cheeks and brought great lines of fearful care into sharp relief about
+his mouth and eyes.
+
+"Madame, we are ruined!" he groaned.
+
+"Tressan," she answered him contemptuously, "you are chicken-hearted.
+Listen to me. Did he not say that he had left his man behind him when he
+came to Condillac? Where think you that he left his man?"
+
+"Maybe in Grenoble," answered the Seneschal, staring.
+
+"Find out," she told him impressively, her eyes on his, and calm as
+though they had never looked upon such sights as that very night had
+offered them. "If not in Grenoble, certainly, at least, somewhere in
+this Dauphiny of which you are the King's Lord Seneschal. Turn the whole
+province inside out, man, but find the fellow. Yours is the power to
+do it. Do it, then, and you will have no consequences to fear. You have
+seen the man?"
+
+"Ay, I have seen him. I remember him; and his name, I bethink me, is
+Rabecque."
+
+He took courage; his face looked less dejected.
+
+"You overlook nothing, madame," he murmured. "You are truly wonderful.
+I will start the search this very night. My men are almost all at
+Montelimar awaiting my commands. I'll dispatch a messenger with orders
+that they are to spread themselves throughout Dauphiny upon this quest."
+
+The door opened, and Fortunio entered. He was still unwashed and
+terrible to look upon, all blood-bespattered. The sight of him drove a
+shudder through Tressan. The Marquise grew solicitous.
+
+"How is your wound, Fortunio?" was her first question.
+
+He made a gesture that dismissed the matter.
+
+"It is nothing. I am over full-blooded, and if I am scratched, I bleed,
+without perceiving it, enough to drain another man."
+
+"Here, drink, mon capitaine," she urged him, very friendly, filling
+him a cup with her own hands. "And you, Marius?" she asked. "Are you
+recovering strength?"
+
+"I am well," answered Marius sullenly. His defeat that evening had
+left him glum and morose. He felt that he had cut a sorry figure in the
+affair, and his vanity was wounded. "I deplore I had so little share in
+the fight," he muttered.
+
+"The lustiest fight ever I or any man beheld," swore Fortunio. "Dieu!
+But he was a fighter, that Monsieur de Garnache, and he deserved a
+better end than drowning."
+
+"You are quite sure that he is drowned?"
+
+Fortunio replied by giving his reasons for that conclusion, and they
+convinced both the Marquise and her son indeed they had never deemed
+it possible that the Parisian could have survived that awful leap. The
+Dowager looked at Marius, and from him to the captain.
+
+"Do you think, you two, that you will be fit for tomorrow's business?"
+
+"For myself," laughed Fortunio, "I am ready for it now."
+
+"And I shall be when I have rested," answered Marius grimly.
+
+"Then get you both to rest, you will be needing it," she bade them.
+
+"And I, too, madame," said the Seneschal, bending over the hand she held
+out to him. "Good-night to you all." He would have added a word to wish
+them luck in the morrow's venture; but for the life of him he dared not.
+He turned, made another of his bows, and rolled out of the room.
+
+Five minutes later the drawbridge was being raised after his departure,
+and Fortunio was issuing orders to the men he had recalled from their
+futile search to go clear the guard-room and antechamber of the Northern
+Tower, and to bear the dead to the chapel, which must serve as a
+mortuary for the time. That done he went off to bed, and soon after the
+lights were extinguished in Condillac; and save for Arsenio, who was, on
+guard, sorely perturbed by all that had befallen and marvelling at the
+rashness of his friend "Battista"--for he had no full particulars of the
+business--the place was wrapped in sleep.
+
+Had they been less sure that Garnache was drowned, maybe they had
+slumbered less tranquilly that night at Condillac. Fortunio had been
+shrewd in his conclusions, yet a trifle hasty; for whilst, as a matter
+of fact, he was correct in assuming that the Parisian had not
+crawled out of the moat--neither at the point he had searched, nor
+elsewhere--yet was he utterly wrong to assume him at the bottom of it.
+
+Garnache had gone through that window prepared to leap into
+another--and, he hoped, a better world. He had spun round twice in the
+air and shot feet foremost through the chill waters of the moat, and
+down until his toes came in contact with a less yielding substance, yet
+yielding nevertheless. Marvelling that he should have retained until now
+his senses, he realized betimes that he was touching mud--that he was
+really ankle deep in it. A vigorous, frantic kick with both legs at once
+released him, and he felt himself slowly re-ascending to the surface.
+
+It has been often said that a drowning man in his struggles sees his
+whole life mirrored before him. In the instants of Garnache's ascent
+through the half stagnant waters of that moat he had reviewed the entire
+situation and determined upon the course he should pursue. When he
+reached the surface, he must see to it that he broke it gently, for at
+the window above were sure to be watchers, looking to see how he had
+fared. Madame, he remembered, had sent Tressan for muskets. If he had
+returned with them and they should perceive him from above, a bullet
+would be sent to dispose of him, and it were a pity to be shot now after
+having come through so much.
+
+His head broke the surface and emerged into the chill darkness of the
+night. He took a deep breath of cold but very welcome air, and moving
+his arms gently under water, he swam quietly, not to the edge of the
+moat but to the chateau wall, close under which he thought he would be
+secure from observation. He found by good fortune a crevice between two
+stones; he did not see it, his fingers found it for him as they groped
+along that granite surface. He clung there a moment and pondered the
+situation. He heard voices above, and looking up he saw the glare of
+light through the opening he had battered.
+
+And now he was surprised to feel new vigour running through him. He had
+hurled himself from that window with scarce the power to leap, bathed in
+perspiration and deeming his strength utterly spent. The ice-cold waters
+of the moat had served, it would seem, to brace him, to wash away his
+fatigue, and to renew his energies. His mind was singularly clear and
+his senses rendered superacute, and he set himself to consider what he
+had best do.
+
+Swim to the edge of the moat and, clambering out, take to his legs was
+naturally the first impulse. But, reflecting upon the open nature of the
+ground, he realized that that must mean his ruin. Presently they would
+come to see how he had fared, and failing to find him in the water they
+would search the country round about. He set himself in their place. He
+tried to think as they would think, the better that he might realize
+how they would act, and then an idea came to him that might be worth
+heeding. In any case his situation was still very desperate; on that
+score he allowed himself no illusions. That they would take his drowning
+for granted, and never come to satisfy themselves, he was not optimist
+enough to assume.
+
+He abandoned his grip of the wall and began to swim gently toward the
+eastern angle. If they came out, they must lower the bridge; he would
+place himself so that in falling it should cover him and screen him from
+their sight. He rounded the angle of the building, and now the friendly
+cloud that had hung across the moon moved by, and a faint, silver
+radiance was upon the water under his eyes. But yonder, ahead of him,
+something black lay athwart the moat. At once he knew it for the bridge.
+It was down. And he had the explanation in that he remembered that the
+Lord Seneschal had not yet left Condillac. It mattered little to him one
+way or the other. The bridge was there, and he made the best of it.
+
+A few swift, silent strokes brought him to it. He hesitated a moment
+before venturing into the darkness underneath; then, bethinking him that
+it was that or discovery, he passed under. He made for the wall, and as
+he groped along he found a chain depending and reaching down into the
+water. He caught at it with both hands and hung by it to await events.
+
+And now, for the first time that night, his pulses really quickened.
+There in the dark he waited, and the moments that sped seemed very long
+to him, and they were very anxious. He had no good sword wherewith to
+defend himself were he attacked, no good, solid ground on which to take
+his stand. If he were discovered, he was helpless, at their mercy, to
+shoot, or take, or beat to death as best they listed. And so he waited,
+his pulses throbbing, his breath coming short and fast. The cold water
+that had invigorated him some minutes ago was numbing him now, and
+seemed to be freezing his courage as it froze the blood in his veins,
+the very marrow in his bones.
+
+Presently his ears caught a rush of feet, a sound of voices, and
+Fortunio's raised above the others. Heavy steps rang on the bridge
+over his head, and the thud of their fall was like thunder to the man
+beneath. A crimson splash of light fell on the moat on either side of
+him. The fellow on the bridge had halted. Then the steps went on. The
+light flared this way and that, and Garnache almost trembled, expecting
+at every moment that its rays would penetrate the spot where he was
+hanging and reveal him cowering there like a frightened water-rat. But
+the man moved on, and his light flared no longer.
+
+Then others followed him. Garnache heard the sounds of their search. So
+overwrought was he that there was a moment when he thought of swimming
+to the edge and making across the country to the north while they were
+hunting the meadows to the east; but he repressed the impulse and stayed
+on. An eternity did it seem before those men returned and marched once
+more over his head. A further eternity was it until the clatter of
+hoofs on the courtyard stones and their thunder on the planks above him
+brought him the news that Tressan was riding home. He heard the hoofs
+quicken, and their loud rattle on the road that led down to the Isere,
+a half-mile away; and then, when the hoof-beats grew more distant, there
+came again the echo of voices up above.
+
+Was it not over yet? Dear God! would it never end? He felt that a few
+moments more of this immersion and he should be done for utterly; his
+numbness must rob him of the power to cross the moat.
+
+Suddenly the first welcome sound he had heard that night came to his
+ears. Chains creaked, hinges groaned, and the great black pall above
+him began gradually to rise. Faster it went, till, at last, it fell back
+into position, flat with the wall of the chateau, and such little light
+as there was from the moon was beating down upon his frozen face.
+
+He let the chain go, and, with strokes swift and silent as he could
+contrive, he crossed the water. He clambered up the bank, almost bereft
+of strength. A moment he crouched there listening. Had he moved too
+soon? Had he been incautious?
+
+Nothing stirred behind him to confirm his fears. He crept softly
+across the hard ground of the road where he had landed. Then, when the
+yielding, silent turf was under his feet, he gave not another thought
+for his numbness, but started to run as a man runs in a nightmare, so
+little did the speed of his movements match the pace of his desire to
+set a distance between himself and Condillac.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX. THROUGH THE NIGHT
+
+It wanted something over an hour to midnight when Monsieur de Garnache
+started out in his sodden clothes to run from Condillac. He bore away to
+the north, and continued running until he had covered a mile or so, when
+perforce he must slacken his pace lest presently he should have to give
+way to utter exhaustion. He trudged on bravely thereafter, at a good,
+swinging pace, realizing that in moving briskly lay his salvation from
+such ill effects as might otherwise attend his too long immersion. His
+run had set a pleasant glow upon his skin and seemed to have thawed the
+frozen condition of his joints. Yet he could not disguise from himself
+that he was sorely worn by that night's happenings, and that, if he
+would reach his goal, he must carefully husband such strength as yet
+remained him.
+
+That goal of his was Voiron, some four leagues distant to the north,
+where, at the inn of the Beau Paon, his man, Rabecque, should be lodged,
+ready for his coming at any time. Once already, when repairing to
+Condillac, he had travelled by that road, and it was so direct that
+there seemed scant fear of his mistaking it. On he plodded through the
+night, his way lighted for him by the crescent moon, the air so still
+that, despite his wet garments, being warmed as he was by his brisk
+movements, he never felt the cold of it.
+
+He had overheard enough of what had been said by Marius to Valerie to
+understand the business that was afoot for the morrow, and he doubted
+him that he had not sufficiently injured the Dowager's son to make him
+refrain from or adjourn his murderous ride across the border into Savoy.
+
+Garnache's purpose now was to reach Voiron, there to snatch a brief
+rest, and then, equipped anew to set out with his man for La Rochette
+and anticipate the fell plans of Marius and Fortunio.
+
+He might have experienced elation at his almost miraculous escape and at
+the circumstance that he was still at large to carry this duel with the
+Condillacs to a fitting finish, were it not for the reflection that but
+for his besetting sin of hastiness he might now be travelling in dry
+garments toward La Rochette, with mademoiselle beside him. Once again
+that rash temper of his had marred an enterprise that was on the point
+of succeeding. And yet, even as he regretted his rashness, rage stirred
+him again at the thought of Marius crushing that slender shape against
+him and seeking to force his odious kisses upon her pure, immaculate
+lips. And then the thought of her, left behind at Condillac at the
+mercy of Marius and that she-devil the Marquise, and the fears that of
+a sudden leapt up in his mind, brought him to a standstill, as though he
+were contemplating the incomparable folly of a return. He beat his hands
+together for a moment in a frenzy of anguish; he threw back his head
+and raised his eyes to the sky above with a burst of imprecations on his
+lips. And then reflection brought him peace. No, no; they dare offer
+her no hurt. To do so must irrevocably lose them La Vauvraye; and it was
+their covetousness had made them villains. Upon that covetousness did
+their villainy rest, and he need fear from them no wanton ruthlessness
+that should endanger their chance of profit.
+
+He trudged on, reassured. He had been a fool so to give way to fear; as
+great a fool as he had been when he had laid hands on Marius to quell
+his excessive amorousness. Dieu! Was he bewitched? What ailed him? Again
+he paused there in the night to think the situation out.
+
+A dozen thoughts, all centering about Valerie, came crowding in upon
+his brain, till in the end a great burst of laughter--the laughter of a
+madman almost, eerie and terrific as it rang upon the silent night broke
+from his parted lips. That brief moment of introspection had revealed
+him to himself, and the revelation had fetched that peal of mocking
+laughter from him.
+
+He realized now, at last, that not because the Queen had ordered him to
+procure Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye's enlargement had he submitted
+to assume a filthy travesty, to set his neck in jeopardy, to play
+the lackey and the spy. It was because something in Valerie's eyes,
+something in her pure, lily face had moved him to it; and simultaneously
+had come the thought of the relation in which she stood to that man at
+La Rochette whose life he now sought to save for her, and it had stabbed
+him with a bitterness no misfortune, no failure yet had brought him.
+
+He trudged on, knowing himself for what he was a fool who, after close
+upon forty years of a strenuous life in which no petticoat had played a
+part, was come under the spell of a pair of innocent eyes belonging to a
+child almost young enough to have been his daughter.
+
+He despised himself a little for his weakness; he despised himself for
+his apostasy from the faith that had governed his life--the faith to
+keep himself immune from the folly to which womanhood had driven so many
+a stout man.
+
+And yet, mock himself, despise himself as he would, a great tenderness,
+a great desire grew strong in his soul that night as he trudged on
+toward distant Voiron. Mile after mile her image kept him company, and
+once, when he had left Voreppe behind him, the greater portion of his
+journey done, some devil whispered in his ear that he was weary; that
+he would be over-weary on the morrow for any ride to La Rochette. He had
+done all that mortal man could do; let him rest to-morrow whilst Marius
+and Fortunio accomplished by Florimond what the fever had begun.
+
+A cold perspiration broke on him as he wrestled with that grim
+temptation. Valerie was his; she belonged to him by the right of dangers
+shared; never had mother in her labours been nearer death for the
+offspring's sake than had he for Valerie during the days that were sped
+and the hours that were but gone. She belonged to him by the title of
+those dangers he had been through. What had Florimond done to establish
+his claim to her? He had remained absent during long years, a-warring in
+a foreign land. With how many banal loves might not the fellow in that
+time have strewn his soldier's path! Garnache knew well how close does
+Cupid stalk in the wake of Mars, knew well the way of these gay soldiers
+and the lightness of their loves.
+
+Was, then, this fellow to come now and claim her, when perils were past,
+when there was naught left to do but lead her to the altar? Could he be
+worthy of such a pearl of womanhood, this laggard who, because a fever
+touched him, sat him down in an inn within a few hours' ride of her to
+rest him, as though the world held no such woman as Valerie?
+
+And she, herself, by what ties was she bound to him? By the ties of an
+old promise, given at an age when she knew not what love meant. He
+had talked of it with her, and he knew how dispassionately she awaited
+Florimond's return. Florimond might be betrothed to her--her father and
+his had encompassed that between them--but no lover of hers was he.
+
+Thus far did his thoughts journey, and temptation gripped him ever more
+and more strongly. And then his manhood and his honour awoke with a
+shudder, as awakens a man from an ugly dream. What manner of fool was
+he? he asked himself again. Upon what presumptions did he base his silly
+musings? Did he suppose that even were there no Florimond, it would be
+left for a harsh, war-worn old greybeard such as he to awaken tenderness
+in the bosom of that child? The tenderness of friendship perhaps--she
+had confessed to that; but the tenderness of her sweet love must be won
+by a younger, comelier man.
+
+If love had indeed touched him at last, let him be worthy of it and of
+her who inspired it. Let him strain every sinew in her service, asking
+no guerdon; let him save the life of the man to whom she was affianced;
+let him save her from the clutches of the Marquise de Condillac and her
+beautiful, unscrupulous son.
+
+He put his folly from him and-went on, seeking to hold his mind to the
+planning of his to-morrow's journey and its business. He had no means to
+know that at that very hour Valerie was on her knees by her little white
+bed, in the Northern Tower of Condillac, praying for the repose of the
+soul of Monsieur de Garnache--the bravest gentleman, the noblest friend
+she had ever known. For she accounted him dead, and she thought with
+horror of his body lying in the slime under the cold waters of the moat
+beneath the window of her antechamber. A change seemed to have come upon
+her. Her soul was numb, her courage seemed dead, and little care had she
+in that hour of what might betide her now.
+
+Florimond was coming, she remembered: coming to wed her. Ah, well! It
+mattered little, since Monsieur de Garnache was dead--as though it could
+have mattered had he been living!
+
+Three hours of his long striding brought Garnache at last to Voiron, and
+the echo of his footsteps rang through the silent streets and scared a
+stray cat or two that were preying out of doors. There was no watch
+in the little township and no lights, but by the moon's faint glimmer
+Garnache sought the inn of the Beau Paon, and found it at the end of a
+little wandering. A gaudy peacock, with tail spread wide, was the sign
+above the door on which he thumped and kicked as if he would have beaten
+it down.
+
+It opened after some delay, and a man, half clad, candle in hand, a
+night-cap on his hoary locks, showed an angry face at the opening.
+
+At sight of the gaunt, bedraggled figure that craved admittance, the
+landlord would have shut the door again, fearing that he had to do with
+some wild bandit from the hills. But Garnache thrust his foot in the
+way.
+
+"There is a man named Rabecque, from Paris, lodging here. I must have
+instant speech with him," said he; and his words, together with the
+crisp, commanding tones in which they were uttered, had their effect
+upon the host.
+
+Rabecque had been playing the great lord during the week he had spent
+at Voiron, and had known how to command a certain deference and regard.
+That this tatterdemalion, with the haughty voice, should demand to see
+him at that hour of the night, with such scant unconcern of how far
+he might incommode the great Monsieur Rabecque, earned for him too a
+certain measure of regard, though still alloyed with some suspicion.
+
+The landlord bade him enter. He did not know whether Monsieur Rabecque
+would forgive him for being disturbed; he could not say whether Monsieur
+Rabecque would consent to see this visitor at such an hour; very
+probably he would not. Still, monsieur might enter.
+
+Garnache cut him short before he had half done, announced his name
+and bade him convey it to Rabecque. The alacrity with which the lackey
+stirred from his bed upon hearing who it was that had arrived impressed
+the host not a little, but not half so much as it impressed him
+presently to observe the deference with which this great Monsieur
+Rabecque of Paris confronted the scarecrow below stairs when he was
+brought into its presence.
+
+"You are safe and sound, monsieur?" he cried, in deferential joy.
+
+"Aye, by a miracle, mon fils," Garnache answered him, with a short
+laugh. "Help me to bed; then bring me a cup of spiced wine. I have swum
+a moat and done other wonders in these clothes."
+
+The host and Rabecque bustled now to minister to his wants between them,
+and when, jaded and worn, Garnache lay at last between good-smelling
+sheets with the feeling in him that he was like to sleep until the day
+of judgment, he issued his final orders.
+
+"Awake me at daybreak, Rabecque," said he drowsily. "We must be stirring
+then. Have horse ready and clothes for me. I shall need you to wash me
+clean and shave me and make me what I was before your tricks and dyes
+turned me into what I have been this week and more. Take away the light.
+At daybreak! Don't let me sleep beyond that as you value your place with
+me. We shall have brisk work to-morrow. At--daybreak--Rabecque!"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX. FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+
+It was noon of the next day when two horsemen gained the heights above
+La Rochette and paused to breathe their nags and take a survey of the
+little township in the plain at their feet. One of these was Monsieur
+de Garnache, the other was his man Rabecque. But it was no longer the
+travestied Garnache that Condillac had known as "Battista" during the
+past days, it was that gentleman as he had been when first he presented
+himself at the chateau. Rabecque had shaved him, and by means of certain
+unguents had cleansed his skin and hair of the dyes with which he had
+earlier overlaid them.
+
+That metamorphosis, of itself, was enough to set Garnache in a good
+humour; he felt himself again, and the feeling gave him confidence.
+His mustachios bristled as fiercely as of old, his skin was clear and
+healthy, and his dark brown hair showed ashen at the temples. He
+was becomingly arrayed in a suit of dark brown camlet, with rows of
+close-set gold buttons running up his hanging sleeves; a leather jerkin
+hid much of his finery, and his great boots encased his legs. He wore a
+brown hat, with a tallish crown and a red feather, and Rabecque carried
+his cloak for him, for the persistent Saint Martin's summer rendered
+that day of November rather as one of early autumn.
+
+A flood of sunshine descended from a cloudless sky to drench the country
+at their feet, and all about them the trees preserved a green that was
+but little touched by autumnal browning.
+
+Awhile he paused there on the heights; then he gave his horse a touch
+of the spur, and they started down the winding road that led into La
+Rochette. A half-hour later they were riding under the porte cochere of
+the inn of the Black Boar. Of the ostler who hastened forward to take
+their reins Monsieur de Garnache inquired if the Marquis de Condillac
+were lodged there. He was answered in the affirmative, and he got down
+at once from his horse. Indeed, but for the formality of the thing, he
+might have spared himself the question, for lounging about the
+courtyard were a score of stalwart weather-tanned fellows, whose air and
+accoutrements proclaimed them soldiers. It required little shrewdness
+to guess in them the personal followers of the Marquis, the remainder of
+the little troop that had followed the young seigneur to the wars when,
+some three years ago, he had set out from Condillac.
+
+Garnache gave orders for the horses to be cared for, and bade Rabecque
+get himself fed in the common room. Heralded by the host, the Parisian
+then mounted the stairs to Monsieur de Condillac's apartments.
+
+The landlord led the way to the inn's best room, turned the handle, and,
+throwing wide the door, stood aside for Monsieur de Garnache to enter.
+
+From within the chamber came the sounds of a scuffle, a man's soft
+laugh, and a girl's softer intercession.
+
+"Let me go, monsieur. Of your pity, let me go. Some one is coming."
+
+"And what care I who comes?" answered a voice that seemed oppressed by
+laughter.
+
+Garnache strode into the chamber--spacious and handsomely furnished as
+became the best room of the Auberge du Sanglier Noir--to find a meal
+spread on the table, steaming with an odour promising of good things,
+but neglected by the guest for the charms of the serving-wench, whose
+waist he had imprisoned. As Garnache's tall figure loomed before him he
+let the girl go and turned a half-laughing, half-startled face upon the
+intruder.
+
+"Who the devil may you be?" he inquired, and a brown eye, rakish and
+roving in its glance, played briskly over the Parisian, whilst Garnache
+himself returned the compliment, and calmly surveyed this florid
+gentleman of middle height with the fair hair and regular features.
+
+The girl scurried by and darted from the room, dodging the smiting hand
+which the host raised as she flew past him. The Parisian felt his gorge
+rising. Was this the sort of fever that had kept Monsieur le Marquis at
+La Rochette, whilst mademoiselle was suffering in durance at Condillac?
+His last night's jealous speculations touching a man he did not know had
+leastways led him into no exaggeration. He found just such a man as he
+had pictured--a lightly-loving, pleasure-taking roysterer, with never a
+thought beyond the amusement which the hour afforded him.
+
+With curling lip Garnache bowed stiffly, and in a cold, formal voice he
+announced himself.
+
+"My name is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache. I am an emissary
+dispatched from Paris by her Majesty the Queen-mother to procure the
+enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the durance in which she
+is held by madame your stepmother."
+
+The pleasant gentleman's eyebrows went up; a smile that was almost
+insolent broke on his face.
+
+"That being so, monsieur, why the devil are you here?"
+
+"I am here, monsieur," answered him Garnache, throwing back his head,
+his nostrils quivering, "because you are not at Condillac."
+
+The tone was truculent to the point of defiance, for despite the firm
+resolve he had taken last night never again to let his temper overmaster
+him, already Garnache's self-control was slipping away.
+
+The Marquis noted the tone, and observed the man. In their way he
+liked both; in their way he disliked both. But he clearly saw that this
+peppery gentleman must be treated less cavalierly, or trouble would come
+of it. So he waved him gracefully to the table, where a brace of flagons
+stood amid the steaming viands.
+
+"You will dine with me, monsieur," said he, the utmost politeness
+marking his utterance now. "I take it that since you have come here in
+quest of me you have something to tell me. Shall we talk as we eat? I
+detest a lonely meal."
+
+The florid gentleman's tone and manner were mollifying in the extreme.
+Garnache had risen early and ridden far; the smell of the viands had
+quickened an appetite already very keen; moreover, since he and this
+gentleman were to be allies, it was as well they should not begin by
+quarrelling.
+
+He bowed less stiffly, expressed his willingness and his thanks, laid
+hat and whip and cloak aside, unbuckled and set down his sword, and,
+that done, took at table the place which his host himself prepared him.
+
+Garnache took more careful stock of the Marquis now. He found much to
+like in his countenance. It was frank and jovial; obviously that of
+a sensualist, but, leastways, an honest sensualist. He was dressed
+in black, as became a man who mourned his father, yet with a striking
+richness of material, whilst his broad collar of fine point and the lace
+cuffs of his doublet were worth a fortune.
+
+What time they ate Monsieur de Garnache told of his journey from Paris
+and of his dealings with Tressan and his subsequent adventures at
+Condillac. He dwelt passingly upon the manner in which they had treated
+him, and found it difficult to choose words to express the reason for
+his returning in disguise to play the knight-errant to Valerie. He
+passed on to speak of last night's happenings and of his escape.
+Throughout, the Marquis heard him with a grave countenance and a sober,
+attentive glance, yet, when he had finished a smile crept round the
+sensual lips.
+
+"The letter that I had at Milan prepared me for some such trouble as
+this," said he, and Garnache was amazed at the lightness of his tone,
+just as he had been amazed to see the fellow keep his countenance at
+the narrative of mademoiselle's position. "I guessed that my beautiful
+stepmother intended me some such scurviness from the circumstance of her
+having kept me in ignorance of my father's death. But frankly, sir, your
+tale by far outstrips my wildest imaginings. You have behaved very--very
+bravely in this affair. You seem, in fact, to have taken a greater
+interest in Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye's enlargement than the Queen
+could have a right to expect of you." And he smiled, a world of
+suggestion in his eyes. Garnache sat back in his chair and stared at the
+man.
+
+"This levity, monsieur, on such a subject, leaves me thunderstruck," he
+said at last.
+
+"Diable!" laughed the other. "You are too prone, after your trials; to
+view its tragic rather than its comic side. Forgive me if I am smitten
+only with the humour of the thing."
+
+"The humour of the thing!" gurgled Garnache, his eyes starting from his
+head. Then out leapt that temper of his like an eager hound that has
+been suddenly unleashed. He brought down his clenched hand upon the
+table, caught in passing a flagon, and sent it crashing to the floor. If
+there was a table near at hand when his temper went, he never failed to
+treat it so.
+
+"Par la mort Dieu! monsieur, you see but the humour of it, do you? And
+what of that poor child who is lying there, suffering this incarceration
+because of her fidelity to a promise given you?"
+
+The statement was hardly fully accurate. But it served its purpose. The
+other's face became instantly, grave.
+
+"Calm yourself, I beg, monsieur," he cried, raising a soothing hand. "I
+have offended you somewhere; that is plain. There is something here that
+I do not altogether understand. You say that Valerie has suffered on
+account of a promise given me? To what are you referring?"
+
+"They hold her a prisoner, monsieur, because they wish to wed her to
+Marius," answered Garnache, striving hard to cool his anger.
+
+"Parfaitement! That much I understood."
+
+"Well, then, monsieur, is the rest not plain? Because she is betrothed
+to you--" He paused. He saw, at last, that he was stating something not
+altogether accurate. But the other took his meaning there and then, lay
+back in his chair, and burst out laughing.
+
+The blood hummed through Garnache's head as he tightened his lips and
+watched this gentleman indulge his inexplicable mirth. Surely Monsieur
+de Condillac was possessed of the keenest sense of humour in all France.
+He laughed with a will, and Garnache sent up a devout prayer that the
+laugh might choke him. The noise of it filled the hostelry.
+
+"Sir," said Garnache, with an ever-increasing tartness, "there is a
+by-word has it 'Much laughter, little wit.' In confidence won, is that
+your case, monsieur?"
+
+The other looked at him soberly a moment, then went off again.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur!" he gasped, "you'll be the death of me. For the
+love of Heaven look less fierce. Is it my fault that I must laugh? The
+folly of it all is so colossal. Three years from home, yet there is
+a woman keeps faithful and holds to a promise given for her. Come,
+monsieur, you who have seen the world, you must agree that there is in
+this something that is passing singular, extravagantly amusing. My poor
+little Valerie!" he spluttered through his half-checked mirth, "does she
+wait for me still? does she count me still betrothed to her? And because
+of that, says 'No' to brother Marius! Death of my life! I shall die of
+it."
+
+"I have a notion that you may, monsieur," rasped Garnache's voice, and
+with it rasped Garnache's chair upon the boards. He had risen, and he
+was confronting his merry host very fiercely, white to the lips, his
+eyes aflame. There was no mistaking his attitude, no mistaking his
+words.
+
+"Eh?" gasped the other, recovering himself at last to envisage what
+appeared to develop into a serious situation.
+
+"Monsieur," said Garnache, his voice very cold, "do I understand that
+you no longer intend to carry out your engagement and wed Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye?"
+
+A dull flush spread upon the Marquis's face. He rose too, and across the
+table he confronted his guest, his mien haughty, his eyes imperious.
+
+"I thought, monsieur," said he, with a great dignity, "I thought when
+I invited you to sit at my table that your business was to serve me,
+however little I might be conscious of having merited the honour. It
+seems instead that you are come hither to affront me. You are my guest,
+monsieur. Let me beg that you will depart before I resent a question on
+a matter which concerns myself alone."
+
+The man was right, and Garnache was wrong. He had no title to take up
+the affairs of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye. But he was past reason now,
+and he was not the man to brook haughtiness, however courteously it
+might be cloaked. He eyed the Marquis's flushed ace across the board,
+and his lip curled.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, "I take your meaning very fully. Half a word with
+me is as good as a whole sentence with another. You have dubbed me
+in polite phrases an impertinent. That I am not; and I resent the
+imputation."
+
+"Oh, that!" said the Marquis, with a half-laugh and a shrug. "If you
+resent it--" His smile and his gesture made the rest plain.
+
+"Exactly, monsieur," was Garnache's answer. "But I do not fight sick
+men."
+
+Florimond's brows grew wrinkled, his eyes puzzled.
+
+"Sick men!" he echoed. "Awhile ago, monsieur, you appeared to cast a
+doubt upon my sanity. Is it a case of the drunkard who thinks all the
+world drunk but himself?"
+
+Garnache gazed at him. That doubt he had entertained grew now into
+something like assurance.
+
+"I know not whether it is the fever makes your tongue run so--" he
+began, when the other broke in, a sudden light of understanding in his
+eyes.
+
+"You are at fault," he cried. "I have no fever."
+
+"But then your letter to Condillac?" demanded Garnache, lost now in
+utter amazement.
+
+"What of it? I'll swear I never said I had a fever."
+
+"I'll swear you did."
+
+"You give me the lie, then?"
+
+But Garnache waved his hands as if he implored the other, to have
+done with giving and taking offence. There was some misunderstanding
+somewhere, he realized, and sheer astonishment had cooled his anger. His
+only aim now was to have this obscure thing made clear.
+
+"No, no," he cried. "I am seeking enlightenment."
+
+Florimond smiled.
+
+"I may have said that we were detained by a fever; but I never said the
+patient was myself."
+
+"Who then? Who else?" cried Garnache.
+
+"Why, now I understand, monsieur. But it is my wife who has the fever."
+
+"Your--!" Garnache dared not trust himself to utter the word.
+
+"My wife, monsieur," the Marquis repeated. "The journey proved too much
+for her, travelling at the rate she did."
+
+A silence fell. Garnache's long chin sank on to his breast, and he stood
+there, his eyes upon the tablecloth, his thoughts with the poor innocent
+child who waited at Condillac, so full of trust and faith and loyalty to
+this betrothed of hers who had come home with a wife out of Italy.
+
+And then, while he stood so and Florimond was regarding him curiously,
+the door opened, and the host appeared.
+
+"Monsieur le Marquis," said he, "there are two gentlemen below asking to
+see you. One of them is Monsieur Marius de Condillac."
+
+"Marius?" cried the Marquis, and he started round with a frown.
+
+"Marius?" breathed Garnache, and then, realizing that the assassins
+had followed so close upon his heels, he put all thoughts from his mind
+other than that of the immediate business. He had, himself, a score
+to settle with them. The time was now. He swung round on his heel, and
+before he knew what he had said the words were out:
+
+"Bring them up, Monsieur l'Hote."
+
+Florimond looked at him in surprise.
+
+"Oh, by all means, if monsieur wishes it," said he, with a fine irony.
+
+Garnache looked at him, then back at the hesitating host.
+
+"You have heard," said he coolly. "Bring them up."
+
+"Bien, monsieur," replied the host, withdrawing and closing the door
+after him.
+
+"Your interference in my affairs grows really droll, monsieur," said the
+Marquis tartly.
+
+"When you shall have learned to what purpose I am interfering, you'll
+find it, possibly, not quite so droll," was the answer, no less tart.
+"We have but a moment, monsieur. Listen while I tell you the nature of
+their errand."
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+
+Garnache had but a few minutes in which to unfold his story, and he
+needed, in addition, a second or two in which to ponder the situation as
+he now found it.
+
+His first reflection was that Florimond, since he was now married, might
+perhaps, instead of proving Valerie's saviour from Marius, join forces
+with his brother in coercing her into this alliance with him. But
+from what Valerie herself had told him he was inclined to think more
+favourably of Florimond and to suppress such doubts as these. Still
+he could incur no risks; his business was to serve Valerie and Valerie
+only; to procure at all costs her permanent liberation from the power
+of the Condillacs. To make sure of this he must play upon Florimond's
+anger, letting him know that Marius had journeyed to La Rochette for the
+purpose of murdering his half-brother. That he but sought to murder
+him to the end that he might be removed from his path to Valerie, was
+a circumstance that need not too prominently be presented. Still,
+presented it must be, for Florimond would require to know by what
+motive his brother was impelled ere he could credit him capable of such
+villainy.
+
+Succinctly, but tellingly, Garnache brought out the story of the plot
+that had been laid for Florimond's assassination, and it joyed him to
+see the anger rising in the Marquis's face and flashing from his eyes.
+
+"What reason have they for so damnable a deed?" he cried, between
+incredulity and indignation.
+
+"Their overweening ambition. Marius covets Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye's
+estates."
+
+"And to gain his ends he would not stop at murdering me? Is it, indeed,
+the truth you tell me?"
+
+"I pledge my honour for the truth of it," answered Garnache, watching
+him closely. Florimond looked at him a moment. The steady glance of
+those blue eyes and the steady tone of that crisp voice scattered his
+last doubt.
+
+"The villains!" cried the Marquis. "The fools!" he added. "For me,
+Marius had been welcome to Valerie. He might have found in me an ally
+to aid him in the urging of his suit. But now--" He raised his clenched
+hand and shook it in the air, as if in promise of the battle he would
+deliver.
+
+"Good," said Garnache, reassured. "I hear their steps upon the stairs.
+They must not find me with you."
+
+A moment later the door opened, and Marius, very bravely arrayed,
+entered the room, followed closely by Fortunio. Neither showed much ill
+effects of last night's happenings, save for a long dark-brown scar that
+ran athwart the captain's cheek, where Garnache's sword had ploughed it.
+
+They found Florimond seated quietly at table, and as they entered he
+rose and came forward with a friendly smile to greet his brother. His
+sense of humour was being excited; he was something of an actor, and the
+role he had adopted in the comedy to be played gave him a certain grim
+satisfaction. He would test for himself the truth of what Monsieur
+de Garnache had told him concerning his brother's intentions. Marius
+received his advances very coolly. He took his brother's hand, submitted
+to his brother's kiss; but neither kiss nor hand-pressure did he return.
+Florimond affected not to notice this.
+
+"You are well, my dear Marius, I hope," said he, and thrusting him
+out at arms' length, he held him by the shoulders and regarded him
+critically. "Ma foi, but you are changed into a comely well-grown man.
+And your mother--she is well, too, I trust."
+
+"I thank you, Florimond, she is well," said Marius stiffly.
+
+The Marquis took his hands from his brother's shoulders; his florid,
+good-natured face smiling ever, as if this were the happiest moment of
+his life.
+
+"It is good to see France again, my dear Marius," he told his brother.
+"I was a fool to have remained away so long. I am pining to be at
+Condillac once more."
+
+Marius eyeing him, looked in vain for signs of the fever. He had
+expected to find a debilitated, emaciated man; instead, he saw a very
+lusty, healthy, hearty fellow, full of good humour, and seemingly
+full of strength. He began to like his purpose less, despite such
+encouragement as he gathered from the support of Fortunio. Still, it
+must be gone through with.
+
+"You wrote us that you had the fever," he said, half inquiringly.
+
+"Pooh! That is naught." And Florimond snapped a strong finger against
+a stronger thumb. "But whom have you with you?" he asked, and his eyes
+took the measure of Fortunio, standing a pace or two behind his master.
+
+Marius presented his bravo.
+
+"This is Captain Fortunio, the commander of our garrison of Condillac."
+
+The Marquis nodded good-humouredly towards the captain.
+
+"Captain Fortunio? He is well named for a soldier of fortune. My
+brother, no doubt, will have family matters to tell me of. If you will
+step below, Monsieur le Capitaine, and drink a health or so while you
+wait, I shall be honoured."
+
+The captain, nonplussed, looked at Marius, and Florimond surprised the
+look. But Marius's manner became still chillier.
+
+"Fortunio here," said he, and he half turned and let his hand fall on
+the captain's shoulder, "is my very good friend. I have no secrets from
+him."
+
+The instant lift of Florimond's eyebrows was full of insolent,
+supercilious disdain. Yet Marius did not fasten his quarrel upon that.
+He had come to La Rochette resolved that any pretext would serve his
+turn. But the sight of his brother so inflamed his jealousy that he had
+now determined that the quarrel should be picked on the actual ground in
+which it had its roots.
+
+"Oh, as you will," said the Marquis coolly. "Perhaps your friend will
+be seated, and you, too, my dear Marius." And he played the host to them
+with a brisk charm. Setting chairs, he forced them to sit, and pressed
+wine upon them.
+
+Marius cast his hat and cloak on the chair where Garnache's had been
+left. The Parisian's hat and cloak, he naturally assumed to belong to
+his brother. The smashed flagon and the mess of wine upon the floor
+he scarce observed, setting it down to some clumsiness, either his
+brother's or a servant's. They both drank, Marius in silence, the
+captain with a toast.
+
+"Your good return, Monsieur le Marquis," said he, and Florimond thanked
+him by an inclination of the head. Then, turning to Marius:
+
+"And so," he said, "you have a garrison at Condillac. What the devil
+has been taking place there? I have had some odd news of you. It would
+almost seem as if you were setting up as rebels in our quiet little
+corner of Dauphiny."
+
+Marius shrugged his shoulders; his face suggested that he was
+ill-humoured.
+
+"Madame the Queen-Regent has seen fit to interfere in our concerns. We
+Condillacs do not lightly brook interference."
+
+Florimond showed his teeth in a pleasant smile.
+
+"That is true, that is very true, Pardieu! But what warranted this
+action of Her Majesty's?"
+
+Marius felt that the time for deeds was come. This fatuous conversation
+was but a futile waste of time. He set down his glass, and sitting back
+in his chair he fixed his sullen black eyes full upon his half-brother's
+smiling brown ones.
+
+"I think we have exchanged compliments enough," said he, and Fortunio
+wagged his head approvingly. There were too many men in the courtyard
+for his liking, and the more time they waited, the more likely were they
+to suffer interruption. Their aim must be to get the thing done quickly,
+and then quickly to depart before an alarm could be raised. "Our trouble
+at Condillac concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye."
+
+Florimond started forward, with a ready assumption of lover-like
+solicitude.
+
+"No harm has come to her?" he cried. "Tell me that no harm has come to
+her."
+
+"Reassure yourself," answered Marius, with a sneer, a greyness that
+was of jealous rage overspreading his face. "No harm has come to her
+whatever. The trouble was that I sought to wed her, and she, because
+she is betrothed to you, would have none of me. So we brought her to
+Condillac, hoping always to persuade her. You will remember that she was
+under my mother's tutelage. The girl, however, could not be constrained.
+She suborned one of our men to bear a letter to Paris for her, and
+in answer to it the Queen sent a hot-headed, rash blunderer down to
+Dauphiny to procure her liberation. He lies now at the bottom of the
+moat of Condillac."
+
+Florimond's face had assumed a look of horror and indignation.
+
+"Do you dare tell me this?" he cried.
+
+"Dare?" answered Marius, with an ugly laugh. "Men enough have died over
+this affair already. That fellow Garnache left some bodies on our hands
+last night before he set out for another world himself. You little dream
+how far my daring goes in this matter. I'll add as many more as need
+be to the death roll that we have already, before you set foot in
+Condillac."
+
+"Ah!" said Florimond, as one upon whose mind a light breaks suddenly.
+"So, that is the business on which you come to me. I doubted your
+brotherliness, I must confess, my dear Marius. But tell me, brother
+mine, what of our father's wishes in this matter? Have you no respect
+for those?"
+
+"What respect had you?" flashed back Marius, his voice now raised in
+anger. "Was it like a lover to remain away for three years--to let all
+that time go by without ever a word from you to your betrothed? What
+have you done to make good your claim to her?"
+
+"Nothing, I confess; yet--"
+
+"Well, you shall do something now," exclaimed Marius, rising. "I am here
+to afford you the opportunity. If you would still win Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye, you shall win her from me--at point of sword. Fortunio, see to
+the door."
+
+"Wait, Marius!" cried Florimond, and he looked genuinely aghast. "Do not
+forget that we are brothers, men of the same blood; that my father was
+your father."
+
+"I choose to remember rather that we are rivals," answered Marius, and
+he drew his rapier. Fortunio turned the key in the lock. Florimond gave
+his brother a long searching look, then with a sigh he picked up his
+sword where it lay ready to his hand and thoughtfully unsheathed it.
+Holding the hilt in one hand and the blade in the other he stood,
+bending the weapon like a whip, whilst again he searchingly regarded his
+brother.
+
+"Hear me a moment," said he. "If you will force this unnatural quarrel
+upon me, at least let the thing be decently done. Not here, not in these
+cramped quarters, but out in the open let our meeting take place. If the
+captain, there, will act for you, I'll find a friend to do me the like
+service."
+
+"We settle this matter here and now," Marius answered him, in a tone of
+calm finality.
+
+"But if I were to kill you--" Florimond began.
+
+"Reassure yourself," said Marius with an ugly smile.
+
+"Very well, then; either alternative will suit the case I wish to put.
+If you were to kill me--it may be ranked as murder. The irregularity of
+it could not be overlooked."
+
+"The captain, here, will act for both of us."
+
+"I am entirely at your service, gentlemen," replied Fortunio pleasantly,
+bowing to each in turn.
+
+Florimond considered him. "I do not like his looks," he objected. "He
+may be the friend of your bosom, Marius; you may have no secrets from
+him; but for my part, frankly, I should prefer the presence of some
+friend of my own to keep his blade engaged."
+
+The Marquis's manner was affable in the extreme. Now that it was settled
+that they must fight, he appeared to have cast aside all scruples based
+upon their consanguinity, and he discussed the affair with the greatest
+bonhomie, as though he were disposing of a matter of how they should sit
+down to table.
+
+It gave them pause. The change was too abrupt. They did not like it.
+It was as the calm that screens some surprise. Yet it was impossible he
+should have been forewarned; impossible he could have had word of how
+they proposed to deal with him.
+
+Marius shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"There is reason in what you say," he acknowledged; "but I am in haste.
+I cannot wait while you go in search of a friend."
+
+"Why then," he answered, with a careless laugh, "I must raise one from
+the dead."
+
+Both stared at him. Was he mad? Had the fever touched his brain?
+Was that healthy colour but the brand of a malady that rendered him
+delirious?
+
+"Dieu! How you stare!" he continued, laughing in their faces. "You shall
+see something to compensate you for your journey, messieurs. I have
+learnt some odd tricks in Italy; they are a curious people beyond the
+Alps. What did you say was the name of the man the Queen had sent from
+Paris?--he who lies at the bottom of the moat of Condillac?"
+
+"Let there be an end to this jesting," growled Marius. "On guard,
+Monsieur le Marquis!"
+
+"Patience! patience!" Florimond implored him. "You shall have your way
+with me, I promise you. But of your charity, messieurs, tell me first
+the name of that man."
+
+"It was Garnache," said Fortunio, "and if the information will serve
+you, it was I who slew him."
+
+"You?" cried Florimond. "Tell me of it, I beg you."
+
+"Do you fool us?" questioned Marius in a rage that overmastered his
+astonishment, his growing suspicion that here all was not quite as it
+seemed.
+
+"Fool you? But no. I do but wish to show you something that I learned in
+Italy. Tell me how you slew him, Monsieur le Capitaine."
+
+"I think we are wasting time," said the captain, angry too. He felt that
+this smiling gentleman was deriding the pair of them; it crossed his
+mind that for some purpose of his own the Marquis was seeking to gain
+time. He drew his sword.
+
+Florimond saw the act, watched it, and his eyes twinkled. Suddenly
+Marius's sword shot out at him. He leapt back beyond the table, and
+threw himself on guard, his lips still wreathed in their mysterious
+smile.
+
+"The time has come, messieurs," said he. "I should have preferred to
+know more of how you slew that Monsieur de Garnache; but since you deny
+me the information, I shall do my best without it. I'll try to conjure
+up his ghost, to keep you entertained, Monsieur le Capitaine." And then,
+raising his voice, his sword, engaging now his brother's:
+
+"Ola, Monsieur de Garnache!" he cried. "To me!"
+
+And then it seemed to those assassins that the Marquis had been neither
+mad nor boastful when he had spoken of strange things he had
+learned beyond the Alps, or else it was they themselves were turned
+light-headed, for the doors of a cupboard at the far end of the room
+flew open suddenly, and from between them stepped the stalwart figure of
+Martin de Garnache, a grim smile lifting the corners of his mustachios,
+a naked sword in his hand flashing back the sunlight that flooded
+through the window.
+
+They paused, aghast, and they turned ashen; and then in the mind of each
+arose the same explanation of this phenomenon. This Garnache wore the
+appearance of the man who had announced himself by that name when he
+came to Condillac a fortnight ago. Then, the sallow, black-haired knave
+who had last night proclaimed himself as Garnache in disguise was some
+impostor. That was the conclusion they promptly arrived at, and however
+greatly they might be dismayed by the appearance of this ally of
+Florimond's, yet the conclusion heartened them anew. But scarce had they
+arrived at it when Monsieur de Garnache's crisp voice came swiftly to
+dispel it.
+
+"Monsieur le Capitaine," it said, and Fortunio shivered at the sound,
+for it was the voice he had heard but a few hours ago, "I welcome the
+opportunity of resuming our last night's interrupted sword-play." And he
+advanced deliberately.
+
+Marius's sword had fallen away from his brother's, and the two
+combatants stood pausing. Fortunio without more ado made for the door.
+But Garnache crossed the intervening space in a bound.
+
+"Turn!" he cried. "Turn, or I'll put my sword through your back. The
+door shall serve you presently, but it is odds that it will need a
+couple of men to bear you through it. Look to your dirty skin!"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+
+A couple of hours after the engagement in the Marquis de Condillac's
+apartments at the Sanglier Noir at La Rochette, Monsieur de Garnache,
+attended only by Rabecque, rode briskly into France once more and made
+for the little town of Cheylas, which is on the road that leads down to
+the valley of the Isere and to Condillac. But not as far as the township
+did he journey. On a hill, the slopes all cultivated into an opulent
+vineyard, some two miles east of Cheylas, stood the low, square grey
+building of the Convent of Saint Francis. Thither did Monsieur de
+Garnache bend his horse's steps. Up the long white road that crept
+zigzag through the Franciscans' vineyards rode the Parisian and his
+servant under the welcome sunshine of that November afternoon.
+
+Garnache's face was gloomy and his eyes sad, for his thoughts were all
+of Valerie, and he was prey to a hundred anxieties regarding her.
+
+They gained the heights at last, and Rabecque got down to beat with his
+whip upon the convent gates.
+
+A lay-brother came to open, and in reply to Garnache's request that he
+might have a word with the Father Abbot, invited him to enter.
+
+Through the cloisters about the great quadrangle, where a couple of
+monks, their habits girt high as their knees, were busy at gardeners'
+work, Garnache followed his conductor, and up the steps to the Abbot's
+chamber.
+
+The master of the Convent of Saint Francis of Cheylas a tall, lean
+man with an ascetic face, prominent cheekbones, and a nose not unlike
+Garnache's own--the nose of a man of action rather than of prayer--bowed
+gravely to this stalwart stranger, and in courteous accents begged to be
+informed in what he might serve him.
+
+Hat in hand, Garnache took a step forward in that bare, scantily
+furnished little room, permeated by the faint, waxlike odour that is
+peculiar to the abode of conventuals. Without hesitation he stated the
+reason of his visit.
+
+"Father," said he, "a son of the house of Condillac met his end this
+morning at La Rochette."
+
+The monk's eyes seemed to quicken, as though his interest in the outer
+world had suddenly revived.
+
+"It is the Hand of God," he cried. "Their evil ways have provoked at
+last the anger of Heaven. How did this unfortunate meet his death?"
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"De mortuis nil nisi bonum," said he. His air was grave, his blue eyes
+solemn, and the Abbot had little cause to suspect the closeness with
+which that pair of eyes was watching him. He coloured faintly at
+the implied rebuke, but he inclined his head as if submissive to the
+correction, and waited for the other to proceed.
+
+"There is the need, Father, to give his body burial," said Garnache
+gently.
+
+But at that the monk raised his head, and a deeper flush the flush of
+anger--spread now upon his sallow cheeks. Garnache observed it, and was
+glad.
+
+"Why do you come to me?" he asked.
+
+"Why?" echoed Garnache, and there was hesitancy now in his voice. "Is
+not the burial of the dead enjoined by Mother Church? Is it not a part
+of your sacred office?"
+
+"You ask me this as you would challenge my reply," said the monk,
+shaking his head. "It is as you say, but it is not within our office to
+bury the impious dead, nor those who in life were excommunicate and died
+without repentance."
+
+"How can you assume he died without repentance?"
+
+"I do not; but I assume he died without absolution, for there is no
+priest who, knowing his name, would dare to shrive him, and if one
+should do it in ignorance of his name and excommunication, why then it
+is not done at all. Bid others bury this son of the house of Condillac;
+it matters no more by what hands or in what ground he be buried than if
+he were the horse he rode or the hound that followed him."
+
+"The Church is very harsh, Father," said Garnache sternly.
+
+"The Church is very just," the priest answered him, more sternly still,
+a holy wrath kindling his sombre eyes.
+
+"He was in life a powerful noble," said Garnache thoughtfully. "It is
+but fitting that, being dead, honour and reverence should be shown his
+body."
+
+"Then let those who have themselves been honoured by the Condillacs
+honour this dead Condillac now. The Church is not of that number,
+monsieur. Since the late Marquis's death the house of Condillac has been
+in rebellion against us; our priests have been maltreated, our authority
+flouted; they paid no tithes, approached no sacraments. Weary of their
+ungodliness the Church placed its ban upon them; under this ban it seems
+they die. My heart grieves for them; but--"
+
+He spread his hands, long and almost transparent in their leanness, and
+on his face a cloud of sorrow rested.
+
+"Nevertheless, Father," said Garnache, "twenty brothers of Saint Francis
+shall bear the body home to Condillac, and you yourself shall head this
+grim procession."
+
+"I?" The monk shrank back before him, and his figure seemed to grow
+taller. "Who are you, sir, that say to me what I shall do, the Church's
+law despite?"
+
+Garnache took the Abbot by the sleeve of his rough habit and drew him
+gently towards the window. There was a persuasive smile on his lips and
+in his keen eyes which the monk, almost unconsciously, obeyed.
+
+"I will tell you," said Garnache, "and at the same time I shall seek to
+turn you from your harsh purpose."
+
+At the hour at which Monsieur de Garnache was seeking to persuade the
+Abbot of Saint Francis of Cheylas to adopt a point of view more kindly
+towards a dead man, Madame de Condillac was at dinner, and with her
+was Valerie de La Vauvraye. Neither woman ate appreciably. The one was
+oppressed by sorrow, the other by anxiety, and the circumstance that
+they were both afflicted served perhaps to render the Dowager gentler in
+her manner towards the girl.
+
+She watched the pale face and troubled eyes of Valerie; she observed the
+almost lifeless manner in which she came and went as she was bidden, as
+though a part of her had ceased to exist, and that part the part that
+matters most. It did cross her mind that in this condition mademoiselle
+might the more readily be bent to their will, but she dwelt not overlong
+upon that reflection. Rather was her mood charitable, no doubt because
+she felt herself the need of charity, the want of sympathy.
+
+She was tormented by fears altogether disproportionate to their cause.
+A hundred times she told herself that no ill could befall Marius.
+Florimond was a sick man, and were he otherwise, there was still
+Fortunio to stand by and see to it that the right sword pierced the
+right heart, else would his pistoles be lost to him.
+
+Nevertheless she was fretted by anxiety, and she waited impatiently for
+news, fuming at the delay, yet knowing full well that news could not yet
+reach her.
+
+Once she reproved Valerie for her lack of appetite, and there was in
+her voice a kindness Valerie had not heard for months--not since the old
+Marquis died, nor did she hear it now, or, hearing it, she did not heed
+it.
+
+"You are not eating, child," the Dowager said, and her eyes were gentle.
+
+Valerie looked up like one suddenly awakened; and in that moment her
+eyes filled with tears. It was as if the Dowager's voice had opened the
+floodgates of her sorrow and let out the tears that hitherto had been
+repressed. The Marquise rose and waved the page and an attendant lackey
+from the room. She crossed to Valerie's side and put her arm about the
+girl's shoulder.
+
+"What ails you, child?" she asked. For a moment the girl suffered the
+caress; almost she seemed to nestle closer to the Dowager's shoulder.
+Then, as if understanding had come to her suddenly, she drew back and
+quietly disengaged herself from the other's arms. Her tears ceased; the
+quiver passed from her lip.
+
+"You are very good, madame," she said, with a coldness that rendered the
+courteous words almost insulting, "but nothing ails me save a wish to be
+alone."
+
+"You have been alone too much of late," the Dowager answered, persisting
+in her wish to show kindness to Valerie; for all that, had she looked
+into her own heart, she might have been puzzled to find a reason for her
+mood--unless the reason lay in her own affliction of anxiety for Marius.
+
+"Perhaps I have," said the girl, in the same cold, almost strained
+voice. "It was not by my own contriving."
+
+"Ah, but it was, child; indeed it was. Had you been reasonable you had
+found us kinder. We had never treated you as we have done, never made a
+prisoner of you."
+
+Valerie looked up into the beautiful ivory-white face, with its black
+eyes and singularly scarlet lips, and a wan smile raised the corners of
+her gentle mouth.
+
+"You had no right--none ever gave it you--to set constraint and
+restraint upon me."
+
+"I had--indeed, indeed I had," the Marquise answered her, in a tone of
+sad protest. "Your father gave me such a right when he gave me charge of
+you."
+
+"Was it a part of your charge to seek to turn me from my loyalty to
+Florimond, and endeavour to compel me by means gentle or ungentle into
+marriage with Marius?"
+
+"We thought Florimond dead; or, if not dead, then certainly unworthy of
+you to leave you without news of him for years together. And if he was
+not dead then, it is odds he will be dead by now." The words slipped
+out almost unconsciously, and the Marquise bit her lip and straightened
+herself, fearing an explosion. But none came. The girl looked across
+the table at the fire that smouldered on the hearth in need of being
+replenished.
+
+"What do you mean, madame?" she asked; but her tone was listless,
+apathetic, as of one who though uttering a question is incurious as to
+what the answer may be.
+
+"We had news some days ago that he was journeying homewards, but that he
+was detained by fever at La Rochette. We have since heard that his fever
+has grown so serious that there is little hope of his recovery."
+
+"And it was to solace his last moments that Monsieur Marius left
+Condillac this morning?"
+
+The Dowager looked sharply at the girl; but Valerie's face continued
+averted, her gaze resting on the fire. Her tone suggested nothing beyond
+a natural curiosity.
+
+"Yes," said the Dowager.
+
+"And lest his own efforts to help his brother out of this world should
+prove insufficient he took Captain Fortunio with him?" said Valerie, in
+the same indifferent voice.
+
+"What do you mean?" the Marquise almost hissed into the girl's ear.
+
+Valerie turned to her, a faint colour stirring in her white face.
+
+"Just what I have said, madame. Would you know what I have prayed?
+All night was I upon my knees from the moment that I recovered
+consciousness, and my prayers were that Heaven might see fit to let
+Florimond destroy your son. Not that I desire Florimond's return, for
+I care not if I never set eyes on him again. There is a curse upon this
+house, madame," the girl continued, rising from her chair and speaking
+now with a greater animation, whilst the Marquise recoiled a step, her
+face strangely altered and suddenly gone grey, "and I have prayed
+that that curse might be worked out upon that assassin, Marius. A fine
+husband, madame, you would thrust upon the daughter of Gaston de La
+Vauvraye."
+
+And turning, without waiting for an answer, she moved slowly down
+the room, and took her way to her own desolate apartments, so full of
+memories of him she mourned--of him, it seemed to her, she must always
+mourn; of him who lay dead in the black waters of the moat beneath her
+window.
+
+Stricken with a sudden, inexplicable terror, the Dowager, who for
+all her spirit was not without a certain superstition, felt her knees
+loosen, and she sank limply into a chair. She was amazed at the extent
+of Valerie's knowledge, and puzzled by it; she was amazed, too, at the
+seeming apathy of Valerie for the danger in which Florimond stood, and
+at her avowal that she did not care if she never again beheld him. But
+such amazement as came to her was whelmed fathoms-deep in her sudden
+fears for Marius. If he should die! She grew cold at the thought, and
+she sat there, her hands folded in her lap, her face grey. That mention
+of the curse the Church had put upon them had frozen her quick blood and
+turned her stout spirit to mere water.
+
+At last she rose and went out into the open to inquire if no messenger
+had yet arrived, for all that she knew there was not yet time for any
+messenger to have reached the chateau. She mounted the winding staircase
+of stone that led to the ramparts, and there alone, in the November
+sunshine, she paced to and fro for hours, waiting for news, straining
+her eyes to gaze up the valley of the Isere, watching for the horseman
+that must come that way. Then, as time sped on and the sun approached
+its setting and still no one came, she bethought her that if harm had
+befallen Marius, none would ride that night to Condillac. This very
+delay seemed pregnant with news of disaster. And then she shook off her
+fears and tried to comfort herself. There was not yet time. Besides,
+what had she to fear for Marius? He was strong and quick, and Fortunio
+was by his side. A man was surely dead by now at La Rochette; but that
+man could not be Marius.
+
+At last, in the distance, she espied a moving object, and down on the
+silent air of eventide came the far-off rattle of a horse's hoofs. Some
+one was riding, galloping that way. He was returned at last. She leaned
+on the battlements, her breath coming in quick, short gasps, and watched
+the horseman growing larger with every stride of his horse.
+
+A mist was rising from the river, and it dimmed the figure; and she
+cursed the mist for heightening her anxiety, for straining further
+her impatience. Then a new fear was begotten in her mind. Why came one
+horseman only where two should have ridden? Who was it that returned,
+and what had befallen his companion? God send, at least, it might be
+Marius who rode thus, at such a breakneck pace.
+
+At last she could make him out. He was close to the chateau now, and she
+noticed that his right arm was bandaged and hanging in a sling. And then
+a scream broke from her, and she bit her lip hard to keep another in
+check, for she had seen the horseman's face, and it was Fortunio's.
+Fortunio--and wounded! Then, assuredly, Marius was dead!
+
+She swayed where she stood. She set her hand on her bosom, above her
+heart, as if she would have repressed the beating of the one, the
+heaving of the other; her soul sickened, and her mind seemed to turn
+numb, as she waited there for the news that should confirm her fears.
+
+The hoofs of his horse thundered over the planks of the drawbridge,
+and came clatteringly to halt as he harshly drew rein in the courtyard
+below. There was a sound of running feet and men sprang to his
+assistance. Madame would have gone below to meet him; but her limbs
+seemed to refuse their office. She leaned against one of the merlons of
+the embattled parapet, her eyes on the spot where he should emerge from
+the stairs, and thus she waited, her eyes haggard, her face drawn.
+
+He came at last, lurching in his walk, being overstiff from his long
+ride. She took a step forward to meet him. Her lips parted.
+
+"Well?" she asked him, and her voice sounded harsh and strained. "How
+has the venture sped?"
+
+"The only way it could," he answered. "As you would wish it."
+
+At that she thought that she must faint. Her lungs seemed to writhe for
+air, and she opened her lips and took long draughts of the rising mist,
+never speaking for a moment or two until she had sufficiently recovered
+from this tremendous revulsion from her fears.
+
+"Then, where is Marius?" she asked at last.
+
+"He has remained behind to accompany the body home. They are bringing it
+here."
+
+"They?" she echoed. "Who are they?"
+
+"The monks of Saint Francis of Cheylas," he answered.
+
+A something in his tone, a something in his shifty eyes, a cloud upon
+his fair and usually so ingenuous looking countenance aroused her
+suspicions and gave her resurrected courage pause.
+
+She caught him viciously by the arms, and forced his glance to meet her
+own in the fading daylight.
+
+"It is the truth you are telling me, Fortunio?" she snapped, and her
+voice was half-angry, half-fearful.
+
+He faced her now, his eyes bold. He raised a hand to lend emphasis to
+his words.
+
+"I swear, madame, by my salvation, that Monsieur Marius is sound and
+well."
+
+She was satisfied. She released his arm.
+
+"Does he come to-night?" she asked.
+
+"They will be here to-morrow, madame. I rode on to tell you so."
+
+"An odd fancy, this of his. But"--and a sudden smile overspread her
+face--"we may find a more useful purpose for one of these monks."
+
+An hour ago she would willingly have set mademoiselle at liberty in
+exchange for the assurance that Marius had been successful in the
+business that had taken him over the border into Savoy. She would have
+done it gladly, content that Marius should be heir to Condillac. But
+now that Condillac was assured her son, she must have more for him; her
+insatiable greed for his advancement and prosperity was again upon
+her. Now, more than ever--now that Florimond was dead--must she have La
+Vauvraye for Marius, and she thought that mademoiselle would no longer
+be difficult to bend. The child had fallen in love with that mad
+Garnache, and when a woman is crossed in love, while her grief lasts
+it matters little to her where she weds. Did she not know it out of the
+fund of her own bitter experience? Was it not that--the compulsion her
+own father had employed to make her find a mate in a man so much older
+than herself as Condillac--that had warped her own nature, and done much
+to make her what she was?
+
+A lover she had had, and whilst he lived she had resisted them, and
+stood out against this odious marriage that for convenience' sake they
+forced upon her. He was killed in Paris in a duel, and when the news of
+it came to her, she had folded her hands and let them wed her to whom
+they listed.
+
+Of just such a dejection of spirit had she observed the signs in
+Valerie; let them profit by it while it lasted. They had been long
+enough without Church ceremonies at Condillac. There should be two
+to-morrow to make up for the empty time--a wedding and a burial.
+
+She was going down the stairs, Fortunio a step behind her, when her mind
+reverted to the happening at La Rochette.
+
+"Was it well done?" she asked.
+
+"It made some stir," said he. "The Marquis had men with him, and had the
+affair taken place in France ill might have come of it."
+
+"You shall give me a full account of it," said she, rightly thinking
+that there was still something to be explained. Then she laughed
+softly. "Yes, it was a lucky chance for us, his staying at La Rochette.
+Florimond was born under an unlucky star, I think, and you under a lucky
+one, Fortunio."
+
+"I think so, too, as regards myself," he answered grimly, and he thought
+of the sword that had ploughed his cheek last night and pierced his
+sword-arm that morning, and he thanked such gods as in his godlessness
+he owned for the luck that had kept that sword from finding out his
+heart.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+
+On the morrow, which was a Friday and the tenth of November--a date to
+be hereafter graven on the memory of all concerned in the affairs of
+Condillac--the Dowager rose betimes, and, for decency's sake, having in
+mind the business of the day, she gowned herself in black.
+
+Betimes, too, the Lord Seneschal rode out of Grenoble, attended by
+a couple of grooms, and headed for Condillac, in doing which--little
+though he suspected it--he was serving nobody's interests more
+thoroughly than Monsieur de Garnache's.
+
+Madame received him courteously. She was in a blithe and happy mood that
+morning--the reaction from her yesterday's distress of mind. The world
+was full of promise, and all things had prospered with her and Marius.
+Her boy was lord of Condillac; Florimond, whom she had hated and who had
+stood in the way of her boy's advancement, was dead and on his way to
+burial; Garnache, the man from Paris who might have made trouble for
+them had he ridden home again with the tale of their resistance, was
+silenced for all time, and the carp in the moat would be feasting by
+now upon what was left of him; Valerie de La Vauvraye was in a dejected
+frame of mind that augured well for the success of the Dowager's
+plans concerning her, and by noon at latest there would be priests at
+Condillac, and, if Marius still wished to marry the obstinate baggage,
+there would be no difficulty as to that.
+
+It was a glorious morning, mild and sunny as an April day, as though
+Nature took a hand in the Dowager's triumph and wished to make the best
+of its wintry garb in honour of it.
+
+The presence of this gross suitor of hers afforded her another source
+of satisfaction. There would no longer be the necessity she once had
+dreaded of listening to his suit for longer than it should be her
+pleasure to be amused by him. But when Tressan spoke, he struck the
+first note of discord in the perfect harmony which the Dowager imagined
+existed.
+
+"Madame," said he, "I am desolated that I am not a bearer of better
+tidings. But for all that we have made the most diligent search, the
+man Rabecque has not yet been apprehended. Still, we have not abandoned
+hope," he added, by way of showing that there was a silver lining to his
+cloud of danger.
+
+For just a moment madame's brows were knitted. She had forgotten
+Rabecque until now; but an instant's reflection assured her that in
+forgetting him she had done him no more than such honour as he deserved.
+She laughed, as she led the way down the garden steps--the mildness of
+the day and the brightness of her mood had moved her there to receive
+the Seneschal.
+
+"From the sombreness of your tone one might fear your news to be of the
+nature of some catastrophe. What shall it signify that Rabecque eludes
+your men? He is but a lackey after all."
+
+"True," said the Seneschal, very soberly; "but do not forget, I beg,
+that he is the bearer of letters from one who is not a lackey."
+
+The laughter went out of her face at that. Here was something that had
+been lost sight of in the all-absorbing joy of other things. In calling
+the forgotten Rabecque to mind she had but imagined that it was no more
+than a matter of the tale he might tell--a tale not difficult to refute,
+she thought. Her word should always weigh against a lackey's. But that
+letter was a vastly different matter.
+
+"He must be found, Tressan," she said sharply.
+
+Tressan smiled uneasily, and chewed at his beard.
+
+"No effort shall be spared," he promised her. "Of that you may be very
+sure. The affairs of the province are at a standstill," he added, that
+vanity of his for appearing a man of infinite business rising even in
+an hour of such anxiety, for to himself, no less than to her, was
+there danger should Rabecque ever reach his destination with the papers
+Garnache had said he carried.
+
+"The affairs of the province are at a standstill," he repeated, "while
+all my energies are bent upon this quest. Should we fail to have news of
+his capture in Dauphiny, we need not, nevertheless, despond. I have
+sent men after him along the three roads that lead to Paris. They are to
+spare neither money nor horses in picking up his trail and effecting his
+capture. After all, I think we shall have him."
+
+"He is our only danger now," the Marquise answered, "for Florimond is
+dead--of the fever," she added, with a sneering smile which gave Tressan
+sensations as of cold water on his spine. "It were an irony of fate if
+that miserable lackey were to reach Paris now and spoil the triumph for
+which we have worked so hard."
+
+"It were, indeed," Tressan agreed with her, "and we must see that he
+does not."
+
+"But if he does," she returned, "then we must stand together." And with
+that she set her mind at ease once more, her mood that morning being
+very optimistic.
+
+"Always, I hope, Clotilde," he answered, and his little eyes leered up
+out of the dimples of fat in which they were embedded. "I have stood by
+you like a true friend in this affair; is it not so?"
+
+"Indeed; do I deny it?" she answered half scornfully.
+
+"As I shall stand by you always when the need arises. You are a little
+in my debt concerning Monsieur de Garnache."
+
+"I--I realize it," said she, and she felt again as if the sunshine were
+gone from the day, the blitheness from her heart. She was moved to
+bid him cease leering at her and to take himself and his wooing to the
+devil. But she bethought her that the need for him might not yet
+utterly be passed. Not only in the affair of Garnache--in which he stood
+implicated as deeply as herself--might she require his loyalty, but also
+in the matter of what had befallen yesterday at La Rochette; for despite
+Fortunio's assurances that things had gone smoothly, his tale hung none
+too convincingly together; and whilst she did not entertain any serious
+fear of subsequent trouble, yet it might be well not utterly to banish
+the consideration of such a possibility, and to keep the Seneschal her
+ally against it. So she told him now, with as much graciousness as she
+could command, that she fully realized her debt, and when, encouraged,
+he spoke of his reward, she smiled upon him as might a girl smile upon
+too impetuous a wooer whose impetuosity she deprecates yet cannot wholly
+withstand.
+
+"I am a widow of six months," she reminded him, as she had reminded him
+once before. Her widowhood was proving a most convenient refuge. "It is
+not for me to listen to a suitor, however my foolish heart may incline.
+Come to me in another six months' time."
+
+"And you will wed me then?" he bleated.
+
+By an effort her eyes smiled down upon him, although her face was a
+trifle drawn.
+
+"Have I not said that I will listen to no suitor? and what is that but a
+suitor's question?"
+
+He caught her hand; he would have fallen on his knees there and then, at
+her feet, on the grass still wet with the night's mist, but that he in
+time bethought him of how sadly his fine apparel would be the sufferer.
+
+"Yet I shall not sleep, I shall know no rest, no peace until you have
+given me an answer. Just an answer is all I ask. I will set a curb upon
+my impatience afterwards, and go through my period of ah--probation
+without murmuring. Say that you, will marry me in six months' time--at
+Easter, say."
+
+She saw that an answer she must give, and so she gave him the answer
+that he craved. And he--poor fool!--never caught the ring of her voice,
+as false as the ring of a base coin; never guessed that in promising she
+told herself it would be safe to break that promise six months hence,
+when the need of him and his loyalty would be passed.
+
+A man approached them briskly from the chateau. He brought news that a
+numerous company of monks was descending the valley of the Isere towards
+Condillac. A faint excitement stirred her, and accompanied by Tressan
+she retraced her steps and made for the battlements, whence she might
+overlook their arrival.
+
+As they went Tressan asked for an explanation of this cortege, and she
+answered him with Fortunio's story of how things had sped yesterday at
+La Rochette.
+
+Up the steps leading to the battlements she went ahead of him, with
+a youthful, eager haste that took no thought for the corpulence and
+short-windedness of the following Seneschal. From the heights she looked
+eastwards, shading her eyes from the light of the morning sun, and
+surveyed the procession which with slow dignity paced down the valley
+towards Condillac.
+
+At its head walked the tall, lean figure of the Abbot of Saint Francis
+of Cheylas, bearing on high a silvered crucifix that flashed and
+scintillated in the sunlight. His cowl was thrown back, revealing his
+pale, ascetic countenance and shaven head. Behind him came a coffin
+covered by a black pall, and borne on the shoulders of six black-robed,
+black cowled monks, and behind these again walked, two by two, some
+fourteen cowled brothers of the order of Saint Francis, their heads
+bowed, their arms folded, and their hands tucked away in their capacious
+sleeves.
+
+It was a numerous cortege, and as she watched its approach the Marquise
+was moved to wonder by what arguments had the proud Abbot been induced
+to do so much honour to a dead Condillac and bear his body home to this
+excommunicated roof.
+
+Behind the monks a closed carriage lumbered down the uneven mountain
+way, and behind this rode four mounted grooms in the livery of
+Condillac. Of Marius she saw nowhere any sign, and she inferred him to
+be travelling in that vehicle, the attendant servants being those of the
+dead Marquis.
+
+In silence, with the Seneschal at her elbow, she watched the procession
+advance until it was at the foot of the drawbridge. Then, while the
+solemn rhythm of their feet sounded across the planks that spanned the
+moat, she turned, and, signing to the Seneschal to follow her, she went
+below to meet them. But when she reached the courtyard she was surprised
+to find they had not paused, as surely would have been seemly. Unbidden,
+the Abbot had gone forward through the great doorway and down the
+gallery that led to the hall of Condillac. Already, when she arrived
+below, the coffin and its bearers had disappeared, and the last of the
+monks was passing from sight in its wake. Leaning against the doorway
+through which they were vanishing stood Fortunio, idly watching that
+procession and thoughtfully stroking his mustachios. About the yard
+lounged a dozen or so men-at-arms, practically all the garrison that was
+left them since the fight with Garnache two nights ago.
+
+After the last monk had disappeared, she still remained there,
+expectantly; and when she saw that neither the carriage nor the grooms
+made their appearance, she stepped up to Fortunio to inquire into the
+reason of it.
+
+"Surely Monsieur de Condillac rides in that coach," said she.
+
+"Surely," Fortunio answered, himself looking puzzled. "I will go seek
+the reason, madame. Meanwhile will you receive the Abbot? The monks will
+have deposited their burden."
+
+She composed her features into a fitting solemnity, and passed briskly
+through to the hall, Tressan ever at her heels. Here she found
+the coffin deposited on the table, its great black pall of velvet,
+silver-edged, sweeping down to the floor. No fire had been lighted that
+morning nor had the sun yet reached the windows, so that the place wore
+a chill and gloomy air that was perhaps well attuned to the purpose that
+it was being made to serve.
+
+With a rare dignity, her head held high, she swept down the length of
+that noble chamber towards the Abbot, who stood erect as a pikestaff: at
+the tablehead, awaiting her. And well was it for him that he was a man
+of austere habit of mind, else might her majestic, incomparable beauty
+have softened his heart and melted the harshness of his purpose.
+
+He raised his hand when she was within a sword's length of him, and
+with startling words, delivered in ringing tones, he broke the ponderous
+silence.
+
+"Wretched woman," he denounced her, "your sins have found you out.
+Justice is to be done, and your neck shall be bent despite your stubborn
+pride. Derider of priests, despoiler of purity, mocker of Holy Church,
+your impious reign is at an end."
+
+Tressan fell back aghast, his face blenching to the lips; for if justice
+was at hand for her, as the Abbot said, then was justice at hand for
+him as well. Where had their plans miscarried? What flaw was there that
+hitherto she had not perceived? Thus he questioned himself in his sudden
+panic.
+
+But the Marquise was no sharer in his tremors. Her eyes opened a trifle
+wider; a faint colour crept into her cheeks; but her only emotions were
+of amazement and indignation. Was he mad, this shaveling monk? That was
+the question that leapt into her mind, the very question with which she
+coldly answered his outburst.
+
+"For madness only," she thought fit to add, "could excuse such rash
+temerity as yours."
+
+"Not madness, madame," he answered, with chill haughtiness--"not
+madness, but righteous indignation. You have defied the power of Holy
+Church as you have defied the power of our sovereign lady, and justice
+is upon you. We are here to present the reckoning, and see its payment
+made in full."
+
+She fancied he alluded to the body in the coffin--the body of her
+stepson--and she could have laughed at his foolish conclusions that
+she must account Florimond's death an act of justice upon her for her
+impiety. But her rising anger left her no room for laughter.
+
+"I thought, sir priest, you were come to bury the dead. But it rather
+seems you are come to talk."
+
+He looked at her long and sternly. Then he shook his head, and the
+faintest shadow of a smile haunted his ascetic face.
+
+"Not to talk, madame; oh, not to talk," he answered slowly. "But to act,
+I have come, madame, to liberate from this shambles the gentle lamb you
+hold here prisoned."
+
+At that some of the colour left her cheeks; her eyes grew startled: at
+last she began to realize that all was not as she had thought--as she
+had been given to understand.--Still, she sought to hector it, from very
+instinct.
+
+"_Vertudieu_!" she thundered at him. "What mean you?"
+
+Behind her Tressan's great plump knees were knocking one against the
+other. Fool that he had been to come to Condillac that day, and to be
+trapped thus in her company, a partner in her guilt. This proud Abbot
+who stood there uttering denunciations had some power behind him,
+else had he never dared to raise his voice in Condillac within call of
+desperate men who would give little thought to the sacredness, of his
+office.
+
+"What mean you?" she repeated--adding with a sinister smile, "in your
+zeal, Sir Abbot, you are forgetting that my men are within call."
+
+"So, madame, are mine," was his astounding answer, and he waved a hand
+towards the array of monks, all standing with bowed heads and folded
+arms.
+
+At that her laughter rang shrill through the chamber. "These poor
+shavelings?" she questioned.
+
+"Just these poor shavelings, madame," he answered, and he raised his
+hand again and made a sign. And then an odd thing happened, and it
+struck a real terror into the heart of the Marquise and heightened that
+which was already afflicting her fat lover, Tressan.
+
+The monks drew themselves erect. It was as if a sudden gust of wind had
+swept through their ranks and set them all in motion. Cowls fell back
+and habits were swept aside, and where twenty monks had stood, there
+were standing now a score of nimble, stalwart men in the livery of
+Condillac, all fully armed, all grinning in enjoyment of her and
+Tressan's dismay.
+
+One of them turned aside and locked the door of the chamber. But his
+movement went unheeded by the Dowager, whose beautiful eyes, starting
+with horror, were now back upon the grim figure of the Abbot, marvelling
+almost to see no transformation wrought in him.
+
+"Treachery!" she breathed, in an awful voice, that was no louder than
+a whisper, and again her eyes travelled round the company, and suddenly
+they fastened upon Fortunio, standing six paces from her to the right,
+pulling thoughtfully at his mustachios, and manifesting no surprise at
+what had taken place.
+
+In a sudden, blind choler, she swept round, plucked the dagger from
+Tressan's belt and flung herself upon the treacherous captain. He had
+betrayed her in some way; he had delivered up Condillac--into whose
+power she had yet had no time to think. She caught him by the throat
+with a hand of such nervous strength as one would little have suspected
+from its white and delicate contour. Her dagger was poised in the air,
+and the captain, taken thus suddenly, was palsied with amazement and
+could raise no hand to defend himself from the blow impending.
+
+But the Abbot stepped suddenly to her side and caught her wrist in his
+thin, transparent hand.
+
+"Forbear," he bade her. "The man is but a tool."
+
+She fell back--dragged back almost by the Abbot--panting with rage and
+grief; and then she noticed that during the moment that her back had
+been turned the pall had been swept from the coffin. The sight of the
+bare deal box arrested her attention, and for the moment turned aside
+her anger. What fresh surprise did they prepare her?
+
+No sooner had she asked herself the question than herself she answered
+it, and an icy hand seemed to close about her heart. It was Marius who
+was dead. They had lied to her. Marius's was the body they had borne to
+Condillac--those men in the livery of her stepson.
+
+With a sudden sob in her throat she took a step towards the coffin. She
+must see for herself. One way or the other she must at once dispel this
+torturing doubt. But ere she had taken three paces, she stood arrested
+again, her hands jerked suddenly to the height of her breast, her lips
+parting to let out a scream of terror. For the coffin-lid had slowly
+raised and clattered over. And as if to pile terror for her, a figure
+rose from the box, and, sitting up, looked round with a grim smile; and
+the figure was the figure of a man whom she knew to be dead, a man
+who had died by her contriving--it was the figure of Garnache. It
+was Garnache as he had been on the occasion of his first coming to
+Condillac, as he had been on the day they had sought his life in this
+very room. How well she knew that great hooked nose and the bright,
+steely blue eyes, the dark brown hair, ash-coloured at the temples where
+age had paled it, and the fierce, reddish mustachios, bristling above
+the firm mouth and long, square chin.
+
+She stared and stared, her beautiful face livid and distorted, till
+there was no beauty to be seen in it, what time the Abbot regarded her
+coldly and Tressan, behind her, turned almost sick with terror. But not
+the terror of ghosts was it afflicted him. He saw in Garnache a man who
+was still of the quick--a man who by some miracle had escaped the fate
+to which they supposed him to have succumbed; and his terror was the
+terror of the reckoning which that man would ask.
+
+After a moment's pause, as if relishing the sensation he had created,
+Garnache rose to his feet and leapt briskly to the ground. There was
+nothing ghostly about the thud with which he alighted on his feet before
+her. A part of her terror left her; yet not quite all. She saw that she
+had but a man to deal with, yet she began to realize that this man was
+very terrible.
+
+"Garnache again!" she gasped.
+
+He bowed serenely, his lips smiling.
+
+"Aye, madame," he told her pleasantly, "always Garnache. Tenacious as
+a leech, madame; and like a leech come hither to do a little work of
+purification."
+
+Her eyes, now kindling again as she recovered from her recent fears,
+sought Fortunio's shifty glance. Garnache followed it and read what was
+in her mind.
+
+"What Fortunio has done," said he, "he has done by your son's authority
+and sanction."
+
+"Marius?" she inquired, and she was almost fearful lest she should hear
+that by her son he meant her stepson, and that Marius was dead.
+
+"Yes, Marius," he answered her. "I bent him to my will. I threatened him
+that he and this fellow of his, this comrade in arms so worthy of his
+master, should be broken on the wheel together unless I were implicitly
+obeyed. If they would save their lives, this was their chance. They were
+wise, and they took it, and thus afforded me the means of penetrating
+into Condillac and rescuing Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye."
+
+"Then Marius--?" She left her question unfinished, her hand clutching
+nervously at the bosom of her gown.
+
+"Is sound and well, as Fortunio truthfully will have told you. But he is
+not yet out of my grasp, nor will be until the affairs of Condillac are
+settled. For if I meet with further opposition here, broken on the wheel
+he shall be yet, I promise you."
+
+Still she made a last attempt at hectoring it. The long habit of
+mastership dies hard. She threw back her head; her courage revived now
+that she knew Marius to be alive and sound.
+
+"Fine words," she sneered. "But who are you that you can threaten so and
+promise so?"
+
+"I am the Queen-Regent's humble mouthpiece, madame. What I threaten, I
+threaten in her name. Ruffle it no longer, I beseech you. It will prove
+little worth your while. You are deposed, madame, and you had best take
+your deposition with dignity and calm--in all friendliness do I advise
+it."
+
+"I am not yet come so low that I need your advice," she answered sourly.
+
+"You may before the sun sets," he answered, with his quiet smile. "The
+Marquis de Condillac and his wife are still at La Rochette, waiting
+until my business here is done that they may come home."
+
+"His wife?" she cried.
+
+"His wife, madame. He has brought home a wife from Italy."
+
+"Then--then--Marius?" She said no more than that. Maybe she had no
+intention of muttering even so much of her thoughts aloud. But Garnache
+caught the trend of her mind, and he marvelled to see how strong a habit
+of thought can be. At once upon hearing of the Marquis's marriage her
+mind had flown back to its wonted pondering of the possibilities of
+Marius's wedding Valerie.
+
+But Garnache dispelled such speculations.
+
+"No, madame," said he. "Marius looks elsewhere for a wife--unless
+mademoiselle of her own free will should elect to wed him--a thing
+unlikely." Then, with a sudden change to sternness--"Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye is well, madame?" he asked.
+
+She nodded her head, but made no answer in words. He turned to Fortunio.
+
+"Go fetch her," he bade the captain, and one of the men unlocked the
+door to let Fortunio out upon that errand.
+
+The Parisian took a turn in the apartment, and came close to Tressan.
+He nodded to the Seneschal with a friendliness that turned him sick with
+fright.
+
+"Well met, my dear Lord Seneschal. I am rejoiced to find you here. Had
+it been otherwise I must have sent for you. There is a little matter
+to be settled between us. You may depend upon me to settle it to your
+present satisfaction, if to your future grief." And, with a smile, he
+passed on, leaving the Seneschal too palsied to answer him, too stricken
+to disclaim his share in what had taken place at Condillac.
+
+"You have terms to make with me?" the Marquise questioned proudly.
+
+"Certainly," he answered, with his grim courtesy. "Upon your acceptance
+of those terms shall depend Marius's life and your own future liberty."
+
+"What are they?"
+
+"That within the hour all your people--to the last scullion--shall have
+laid down their arms and vacated Condillac."
+
+It was beyond her power to refuse.
+
+"The Marquis will not drive me forth?" she half affirmed, half asked.
+
+"The Marquis, madame, has no power in this matter. It is for the Queen
+to deal with your insubordination--for me as the Queen's emissary."
+
+"If I consent, monsieur, what then?"
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and smiled quietly.
+
+"There is no 'if,' madame. Consent you must, willingly or unwillingly.
+To make sure of that have I come back thus and with force. But should
+you deliver battle, you will be worsted--and it will be very ill for
+you. Bid your men depart, as I have told you, and you also shall have
+liberty to go hence."
+
+"Aye, but whither?" she cried, in a sudden frenzy of anger.
+
+"I realize, madame, from what I know of your circumstances that you will
+be well-nigh homeless. You should have thought of how one day you might
+come to be dependent upon the Marquis de Condillac's generosity before
+you set yourself to conspire against him, before you sought to encompass
+his death. You can hardly look for generosity at his hands now, and so
+you will be all but homeless, unless--" He paused, and his eyes strayed
+to Tressan and were laden with a sardonic look.
+
+"You take a very daring tone with me," she told him. "You speak to me as
+no man has ever dared to speak."
+
+"When the power was yours, madame, you dealt with me as none has ever
+dared to deal. The advantage now is mine. Behold how I use it in your
+own interests; observe how generously I shall deal with you who deal in
+murder. Monsieur de Tressan," he called briskly. The Seneschal started
+forward as if some one had prodded him suddenly.
+
+"Mu--monsieur?" said he.
+
+"With you, too, will I return good for evil. Come hither."
+
+The Seneschal approached, wondering what was about to take place. The
+Marquise watched his coming, a cold glitter in her eye, for--keener of
+mental vision than Tressan--she already knew the hideous purpose that
+was in Garnache's mind.
+
+The soldiers grinned; the Abbot looked on with an impassive face.
+
+"The Marquise de Condillac is likely to be homeless henceforth," said
+the Parisian, addressing the Seneschal. "Will you not be gallant enough
+to offer her a home, Monsieur de Tressan?"
+
+"Will I?" gasped Tressan, scarce daring to believe his own ears, his
+eyes staring with a look that was almost one of vacancy. "Madame well
+knows how readily."
+
+"Oho?" crowed Garnache, who had been observing madame's face. "She
+knows? Then do so, monsieur; and on that condition I will forget your
+indiscretions here. I pledge you my word that you shall not be called to
+further account for the lives that have been lost through your treachery
+and want of loyalty, provided that of your own free will you lay down
+your Seneschalship of Dauphiny--an office which I cannot consent to see
+you filling hereafter."
+
+Tressan stared from the Dowager to Garnache and back to the Dowager. She
+stood there as if Garnache's words had turned her into marble, bereft of
+speech through very rage. And then the door opened, and Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye entered, followed closely by Fortunio.
+
+At sight of Garnache she stood still, set her hand on her heart, and
+uttered a low cry. Was it indeed Garnache she saw--Garnache, her brave
+knight-errant? He looked no longer as he had looked during those days
+when he had been her gaoler; but he looked as she liked to think of him
+since she had accounted him dead. He advanced to meet her, a smile in
+his eyes that had something wistful in it. He held out both hands to
+her, and she took them, and there, under the eyes of all, before he
+could snatch them away, she had stooped and kissed them, whilst a murmur
+of "Thank God! Thank God!" escaped from her lips to heaven.
+
+"Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!" he remonstrated, when it was too late to
+stay her. "You must not; it is not seemly in me to allow it."
+
+He saw in the act no more than an expression of the gratitude for what
+he had done to serve her, and for the risk in which his life had been
+so willingly placed in that service. Under the suasion of his words she
+grew calm again; then, suddenly, a fear stirred her once more in that
+place where she had known naught but fears.
+
+"Why are you here, monsieur? You have come into danger again?"
+
+"No, no," he laughed. "These are my own men, at least for the time
+being. I am come in power this time, to administer justice. What shall
+be done with this lady, mademoiselle?" he asked; and knowing well the
+merciful sweetness of the girl's soul, he added, "Speak, now. Her fate
+shall rest in your hands."
+
+Valerie looked at her enemy, and then her eyes strayed round the room
+and took stock of the men standing there in silence, of the Abbot who
+still remained at the table-head, a pale, scarce-interested spectator of
+this odd scene.
+
+The change had come so abruptly. A few minutes ago she had been still a
+prisoner, suffering tortures at having heard that Marius was to return
+that day, and that, willy-nilly, she must wed him now. And now she was
+free it seemed: her champion was returned in power, and he stood bidding
+her decide the fate of her late oppressors.
+
+Madame's face was ashen. She judged the girl by her own self; she had no
+knowledge of any such infinite sweetness as that of this child's nature,
+a sweetness that could do no hurt to any. Death was what the Marquise
+expected, since she knew that death would she herself have pronounced
+had the positions been reversed. But--
+
+"Let her go in peace, monsieur," she heard mademoiselle say, and she
+could not believe but that she was being mocked. And as if mockery were
+at issue, Garnache laughed.
+
+"We will let her go, mademoiselle--yet not quite her own way. You must
+not longer remain unrestrained, madame," he told the Marquise. "Natures
+such as yours need a man's guidance. I think you will be sufficiently
+punished if you wed this rash Monsieur de Tressan, just as he will be
+sufficiently punished later when disillusionment follows his present
+youthful ardour. Make each other happy, then," and he waved his arms
+from one to the other. "Our good Father, here, will tie the knot at
+once, and then, my Lord Seneschal, you may bear home your bride. Her son
+shall follow you."
+
+But the Marquise blazed out now. She stamped her foot, and her eyes
+seemed to have taken fire.
+
+"Never, sir! Never in life!" she cried. "I will not be so constrained. I
+am the Marquise de Condillac, monsieur. Do not forget it!"
+
+"I am hardly in danger of doing that. It is because I remember it that
+I urge you to change your estate with all dispatch; and cease to be the
+Marquise de Condillac. That same Marquise has a heavy score against
+her. Let her evade payment by this metamorphosis. I have opened for you,
+madame, a door through which you may escape."
+
+"You are insolent," she told him. "By God, sir! I am no baggage to be
+disposed of by the will of any man."
+
+At that Garnache himself took fire. Her anger proved as the steel
+smiting the flint of his own nature, and one of his fierce bursts of
+blazing passion whirled about her head.
+
+"And what of this child, here?" he thundered. "What of her, madame? Was
+she a baggage to be disposed of by the will of any man or woman? Yet you
+sought to dispose of her against her heart, against her nature, against
+her plighted word. Enough said!" he barked, and so terrific was his mien
+and voice that the stout-spirited Dowager was cowed, and recoiled as he
+advanced a step in her direction. "Get you married. Take you this man
+to husband, you who with such calmness sought to drive others into
+unwilling wedlock. Do it, madame, and do it now, or by the Heaven above
+us, you shall come to Paris with me, and you'll not find them nice
+there. It will avail you little to storm and shout at them that you are
+Marquise de Condillac. As a murderess and a rebel shall you be tried,
+and as both or either it is odds you will be broken on the wheel--and
+your son with you. So make your choice, madame."
+
+He ceased. Valerie had caught him by the arm. At once his fury fell from
+him. He turned to her.
+
+"What is it, child?"
+
+"Do not compel her, if she will not wed him," said she. "I
+know--and--she did not--how terrible a thing it is."
+
+"Nay, patience, child," he soothed her, smiling now, his smile as the
+sunshine that succeeds a thunderstorm.
+
+"It is none so bad with her. She is but coy. They had plighted their
+troth already, so it seems. Besides, I do not compel her. She shall
+marry him of her own free will--or else go to Paris and stand her trial
+and the consequences."
+
+"They had plighted their troth, do you say?"
+
+"Well--had you not, Monsieur le Seneschal?"
+
+"We had, monsieur," said Tressan, with conscious pride; "and for myself
+I am ready for these immediate nuptials."
+
+"Then, in God's name, let Madame give us her answer now. We have not the
+day to waste."
+
+She stood looking at him, her toe tapping the ground, her eyes sullenly
+angry. And in the end, half-fainting in her great disdain, she consented
+to do his will. Paris and the wheel formed too horrible an alternative;
+besides, even if that were spared her, there was but a hovel in Touraine
+for her, and Tressan, for all his fat ugliness, was wealthy.
+
+So the Abbot, who had lent himself to the mummery of coming there to
+read a burial service, made ready now, by order of the Queen's emissary,
+to solemnize a wedding.
+
+It was soon done. Fortunio stood sponsor for Tressan, and Garnache
+himself insisted upon handing the Lord Seneschal his bride, a stroke
+of irony which hurt the proud lady of Condillac more than all her
+sufferings of the past half-hour.
+
+When it was over and the Dowager Marquise de Condillac had been
+converted into the Comtesse de Tressan, Garnache bade them depart in
+peace and at once.
+
+"As I have promised, you shall be spared all prosecution, Monsieur de
+Tressan," he assured the Seneschal at parting. "But you must resign at
+once the King's Seneschalship of Dauphiny, else will you put me to the
+necessity of having you deprived of your office--and that might entail
+unpleasant consequences."
+
+They went, madame with bowed head, her stubborn pride broken at last as
+the Abbot of Saint Francis had so confidently promised her. After them
+went the Abbot and the lackeys of Florimond, and Fortunio went with
+these to carry out Garnache's orders that the men of the Dowager's
+garrison be sent packing at once, leaving with the Parisian, in the
+great hall, just Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. SAINT MARTIN'S EVE
+
+Uneasy in his mind, seeking some way to tell the thing and acquit
+himself of the painful task before him, Garnache took a turn in the
+apartment.
+
+Mademoiselle leaned against the table, which was still burdened by the
+empty coffin, and observed him. His ponderings were vain; he could find
+no way to tell, his story. She had said that she did not exactly love
+this Florimond, that her loyalty to him was no more than her loyalty to
+her father's wishes. Nevertheless, he thought, what manner of hurt must
+not her pride receive when she learned that Florimond had brought him
+home a wife? Garnache was full of pity for her and for the loneliness
+that must be hers hereafter, mistress of a vast estate in Dauphiny,
+alone and friendless. And he was a little sorry for himself and the
+loneliness which, he felt, would be his hereafter; but that was by the
+way.
+
+At last it was she herself who broke the silence.
+
+"Monsieur," she asked him, and her voice was strained and husky, "were
+you in time to save Florimond?"
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle," he answered readily, glad that by that question she
+should have introduced the subject. "I was in time."
+
+"And Marius?" she inquired. "From what I heard you say, I take it that
+he has suffered no harm."
+
+"He has suffered none. I have spared him that he might participate in
+the joy of his mother at her union with Monsieur de Tressan."
+
+"I am glad it was so, monsieur. Tell me of it." Her voice sounded formal
+and constrained.
+
+But either he did not hear or did not heed the question.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he said slowly. "Florimond is coming--"
+
+"Florimond?" she broke in, and her voice went shrill, as if with a
+sudden fear, her cheeks turned white as chalk. The thing that for months
+she had hoped and prayed for was come at last, and it struck her almost
+dead with terror.
+
+He remarked the change, and set it down to a natural excitement. He
+paused a moment. Then:
+
+"He is still at La Rochette. But he does no more than wait until he
+shall have learned that his stepmother has departed from Condillac."
+
+"But--why--why--? Was he then in no haste to come to me?" she inquired,
+her voice faltering.
+
+"He is--" He stopped and tugged at his mustachios, his eyes regarding
+her sombrely. He was close beside her now, where he had halted, and he
+set his hand gently upon her shoulder, looked down into that winsome
+little oval face she raised to his.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he inquired, "would it afflict you very sorely if you
+were not destined, after all, to wed the Lord of Condillac?"
+
+"Afflict me?" she echoed. The very question set her gasping with hope.
+"No--no, monsieur; it would not afflict me."
+
+"That is true? That is really, really true?" he cried, and his tone
+seemed less despondent.
+
+"Don't you know how true it is?" she said, in such accents and with such
+a shy upward look that something seemed suddenly to take Garnache by the
+throat. The blood flew to his cheeks. He fancied an odd meaning in those
+words of hers--a meaning that set his pulses throbbing faster than joy
+or peril had ever set them yet. Then he checked himself, and deep down
+in his soul he seemed to hear a peal of mocking laughter--just such a
+burst of sardonic mirth as had broken from his lips two nights ago when
+on his way to Voiron. Then he went back to the business he had in hand.
+
+"I am glad it is so with you," he said quietly. "Because Florimond has
+brought him home a wife."
+
+The words were out, and he stood back as stands a man who, having cast
+an insult, prepares to ward the blow he expects in answer. He had looked
+for a storm, a wild, frantic outburst; the lightning of flashing, angry
+eyes; the thunder of outraged pride. Instead, here was a gentle calm, a
+wan smile overspreading her sweet, pale face, and then she hid that
+face in her hands, buried face and hands upon his shoulder and fell to
+weeping very quietly.
+
+This, he thought, was almost worse than the tempest he had looked for.
+How was he to know that these tears were the overflow of a heart that
+was on the point of bursting from sheer joy? He patted her shoulder; he
+soothed her.
+
+"Little child," he whispered in her ear. "What does it matter? You did
+not really love him. He was all unworthy of you. Do not grieve, child.
+So, so, that is better."
+
+She was looking up at him, smiling through the tears that suffused er
+eyes.
+
+"I am weeping for joy, monsieur," said she.
+
+"For joy?" quoth he. "_Vertudieu_! There is no end to the things a woman
+weeps for!"
+
+Unconsciously, instinctively almost, she nestled closer to him, and
+again his pulses throbbed, again that flush came to overspread his lean
+countenance. Very softly he whispered in her ear:
+
+"Will you go to Paris with me, mademoiselle?"
+
+He meant by that question no more than to ask whether, now that here in
+Dauphiny she would be friendless and alone, it were not better for her
+to place herself under the care of the Queen-Regent. But what blame to
+her if she misunderstood the question, if she read in it the very words
+her heart was longing to hear from him? The very gentleness of his tone
+implied his meaning to be the one she desired. She raised her hazel eyes
+again to his, she nestled closer to him, and then, with a shy fluttering
+of her lids, a delicious red suffusing her virgin cheek, she answered
+very softly:
+
+"I will go anywhere with you, monsieur--anywhere."
+
+With a cry he broke from her. There was no fancying now; no possibility
+of misunderstanding. He saw how she had misread his question, how she
+had delivered herself up to him in answer. His almost roughness startled
+her, and she stared at him as he stamped down the apartment and back
+to where she stood, seeking in vain to master the turbulence of his
+feelings. He stood still again. He took her by the shoulders and held
+her at arms' length, before him, thus surveying her, and there was
+trouble in his keen eyes.
+
+"Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!" he cried. "Valerie, my child, what are you
+saying to me?"
+
+"What would you have me say?" she asked, her eyes upon the floor. "Was I
+too forward? It seemed to me there could not be question of such a thing
+between us now. I belong to you. What man has ever served a woman as
+you have served me? What better friend, what nobler lover did ever woman
+have? Why then need I take shame at confessing my devotion?"
+
+He swallowed hard, and there was a mist before his eyes--eyes that had
+looked unmoved on many a scene of carnage.
+
+"You know not what you do," he cried out, and his voice was as the voice
+of one in pain. "I am old."
+
+"Old?" she echoed in deep surprise, and she looked up at him, as if she
+sought evidence of what he stated.
+
+"Aye, old," he assured her bitterly. "Look at the grey in my hair, the
+wrinkles in my face. I am no likely lover for you, child. You'll need a
+lusty, comely young gallant."
+
+She looked at him, and a faint smile flickered at the corners of her
+lips. She observed his straight, handsome figure; his fine air of
+dignity and of strength. Every inch a man was he; never lived there one
+who was more a man; and what more than such a man could any maid desire?
+
+"You are all that I would have you," she answered him, and in his mind
+he almost cursed her stubbornness, her want of reason.
+
+"I am peevish and cross-grained," he informed her, "and I have grown old
+in ignorance of woman's ways. Love has never come to me until now. What
+manner of lover, think you, can I make?"
+
+Her eyes were on the windows at his back. The sunshine striking through
+them seemed to give her the reply she sought.
+
+"To-morrow will be Saint Martin's Day," she told him; "yet see with a
+warmth the sun is shining."
+
+"A poor, make-believe Saint Martin's Summer," said he. "I am fitly
+answered by your allegory."
+
+"Oh, not make-believe, not make-believe," she exclaimed. "There is no
+make-believe in the sun's brightness and its warmth. We see it and we
+feel it, and we are none the less glad of it because the time of year
+should be November; rather do we take the greater joy in it. And it is
+not yet November in your life, not yet by many months."
+
+"What you say is apt, perhaps," said he, "and may seem more apt than
+it is since my name is Martin, though I am no saint." Then he shook off
+this mood that he accounted selfish; this mood that would take her--as
+the wolf takes the lamb--with no thought but for his own hunger.
+
+"No, no!" he cried out. "It were unworthy in me!"
+
+"When I love you, Martin?" she asked him gently.
+
+A moment he stared at her, as if through those clear eyes he would
+penetrate to the very depths of her maiden soul. Then he sank on to his
+knees before her as any stripling lover might have done, and kissed her
+hands in token of the fact that he was conquered.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael
+Sabatini
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. MARTIN'S SUMMER ***
+
+***** This file should be named 2640-h.htm or 2640-h.zip ***** This
+and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+http://www.gutenberg.org/2/6/4/2640/
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Project Gutenberg Volunteer, and David Widger
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be
+renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one
+owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and
+you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission
+and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in
+the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and
+distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the
+PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a
+registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks,
+unless you receive specific permission. If you do not charge anything
+for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You
+may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative
+works, reports, performances and research. They may be modified and
+printed and given away--you may do practically ANYTHING with public
+domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license,
+especially commercial redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU
+DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
+Project Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree
+to and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all the
+terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy all
+copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be used
+on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who agree
+to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few things that
+you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works even without
+complying with the full terms of this agreement. See paragraph 1.C
+below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement and help
+preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works.
+See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in
+the collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you
+are located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent
+you from copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating
+derivative works based on the work as long as all references to Project
+Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the
+Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic
+works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with
+the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name
+associated with the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this
+agreement by keeping this work in the same format with its attached
+full Project Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with
+others.
+
+1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing
+or creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost
+no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use
+it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
+eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work with
+the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work,
+you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through
+1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute
+this electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other
+than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official
+version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site
+(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
+to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
+of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain
+Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the full
+Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing access
+to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method you
+already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed to the
+owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has agreed to donate
+royalties under this paragraph to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid within 60 days following each
+date on which you prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your
+periodic tax returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such
+and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to the
+Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies you
+in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he does not
+agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm License. You
+must require such a user to return or destroy all copies of the works
+possessed in a physical medium and discontinue all use of and all access
+to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
+any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
+receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth
+in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from both the
+Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael Hart, the
+owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the Foundation as
+set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm collection.
+Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, and the
+medium on which they may be stored, may contain "Defects," such as, but
+not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription
+errors, a copyright or other intellectual property infringement, a
+defective or damaged disk or other medium, a computer virus, or computer
+codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
+
+1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal fees.
+YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY,
+BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE PROVIDED IN
+PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE TRADEMARK OWNER, AND
+ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR
+ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES
+EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a defect
+in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can receive
+a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a written
+explanation to the person you received the work from. If you received
+the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with your
+written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with the
+defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation,
+the trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will remain
+freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure and
+permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. To
+learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and
+how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 and the
+Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the state
+of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal Revenue
+Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification number
+is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887,
+email business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official page
+at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information: Dr. Gregory B. Newby Chief Executive
+and Director gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide spread
+public support and donations to carry out its mission of increasing
+the number of public domain and licensed works that can be freely
+distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest array
+of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations ($1 to
+$5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt status with
+the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
+DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
+visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make any
+statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from outside
+the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other ways
+including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To donate,
+please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. unless
+a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily keep eBooks
+in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, including
+how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to subscribe to
+our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+
+
diff --git a/2640.zip b/2640.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0d0d962
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2640.zip
diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6312041
--- /dev/null
+++ b/LICENSE.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
+Procedures for determining public domain status are described in
+the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org.
+
+No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in
+jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize
+this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright
+status under the laws that apply to them.
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..60531b8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #2640 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2640)
diff --git a/old/stmsm10.txt b/old/stmsm10.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8eb4cb4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/stmsm10.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,10919 @@
+Project Gutenberg Etext St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+#6 in our series by Rafael Sabatini
+
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check
+the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!!
+
+Please take a look at the important information in this header.
+We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an
+electronic path open for the next readers.  Do not remove this.
+
+*It must legally be the first thing seen when opening the book.*
+In fact, our legal advisors said we can't even change margins.
+
+**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
+
+**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
+
+*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations*
+
+Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and
+further information is included below.  We need your donations.
+
+
+Title:  St. Martin's Summer
+
+Author:  Rafael Sabatini
+
+May, 2001  [Etext #2640]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+
+Project Gutenberg Etext St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+*****This file should be named stmsm10.txt or stmsm10.zip******
+
+Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, stmsm11.txt
+VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, stmsm10a.txt
+
+
+This Etext prepared by an anonymous Project Gutenberg volunteer.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg Etexts are usually created from multiple editions,
+all of which are in the Public Domain in the United States, unless a
+copyright notice is included.  Therefore, we usually do NOT keep any
+of these books in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance
+of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing.
+
+Please note:  neither this list nor its contents are final till
+midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement.
+The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at
+Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month.  A
+preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment
+and editing by those who wish to do so.  To be sure you have an
+up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes
+in the first week of the next month.  Since our ftp program has
+a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a
+look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a
+new copy has at least one byte more or less.
+
+
+Information about Project Gutenberg (one page)
+
+We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work.  The
+time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours
+to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright
+searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc.  This
+projected audience is one hundred million readers.  If our value
+per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2
+million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-six text
+files per month, or 432 more Etexts in 1999 for a total of 2000+
+If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the
+total should reach over 200 billion Etexts given away this year.
+
+The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext
+Files by December 31, 2001.  [10,000 x 100,000,000 = 1 Trillion]
+This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers,
+which is only ~5% of the present number of computer users.
+
+At our revised rates of production, we will reach only one-third
+of that goal by the end of 2001, or about 3,333 Etexts unless we
+manage to get some real funding; currently our funding is mostly
+from Michael Hart's salary at Carnegie-Mellon University, and an
+assortment of sporadic gifts; this salary is only good for a few
+more years, so we are looking for something to replace it, as we
+don't want Project Gutenberg to be so dependent on one person.
+
+We need your donations more than ever!
+
+
+All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg/CMU": and are
+tax deductible to the extent allowable by law.  (CMU = Carnegie-
+Mellon University).
+
+For these and other matters, please mail to:
+
+Project Gutenberg
+P. O. Box  2782
+Champaign, IL 61825
+
+When all other email fails. . .try our Executive Director:
+Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com>
+hart@pobox.com forwards to hart@prairienet.org and archive.org
+if your mail bounces from archive.org, I will still see it, if
+it bounces from prairienet.org, better resend later on. . . .
+
+We would prefer to send you this information by email.
+
+******
+
+To access Project Gutenberg etexts, use any Web browser
+to view http://promo.net/pg.  This site lists Etexts by
+author and by title, and includes information about how
+to get involved with Project Gutenberg.  You could also
+download our past Newsletters, or subscribe here.  This
+is one of our major sites, please email hart@pobox.com,
+for a more complete list of our various sites.
+
+To go directly to the etext collections, use FTP or any
+Web browser to visit a Project Gutenberg mirror (mirror
+sites are available on 7 continents; mirrors are listed
+at http://promo.net/pg).
+
+Mac users, do NOT point and click, typing works better.
+
+Example FTP session:
+
+ftp metalab.unc.edu
+login: anonymous
+password: your@login
+cd pub/docs/books/gutenberg
+cd etext90 through etext99 or etext00 through etext01, etc.
+dir [to see files]
+get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files]
+GET GUTINDEX.??  [to get a year's listing of books, e.g., GUTINDEX.99]
+GET GUTINDEX.ALL [to get a listing of ALL books]
+
+***
+
+**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor**
+
+(Three Pages)
+
+
+***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START***
+Why is this "Small Print!" statement here?  You know: lawyers.
+They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with
+your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from
+someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our
+fault.  So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement
+disclaims most of our liability to you.  It also tells you how
+you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to.
+
+*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT
+By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
+etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept
+this "Small Print!" statement.  If you do not, you can receive
+a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by
+sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person
+you got it from.  If you received this etext on a physical
+medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request.
+
+ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS
+This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-
+tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor
+Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg Association at
+Carnegie-Mellon University (the "Project").  Among other
+things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright
+on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and
+distribute it in the United States without permission and
+without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules, set forth
+below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext
+under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark.
+
+To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable
+efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain
+works.  Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any
+medium they may be on may contain "Defects".  Among other
+things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
+intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged
+disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer
+codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
+
+LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES
+But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below,
+[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this
+etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including
+legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR
+UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT,
+INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE
+OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE
+POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
+
+If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of
+receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any)
+you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that
+time to the person you received it from.  If you received it
+on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and
+such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement
+copy.  If you received it electronically, such person may
+choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to
+receive it electronically.
+
+THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS".  NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS
+TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT
+LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A
+PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+
+Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or
+the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the
+above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you
+may have other legal rights.
+
+INDEMNITY
+You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors,
+officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost
+and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or
+indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause:
+[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification,
+or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect.
+
+DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm"
+You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by
+disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this
+"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg,
+or:
+
+[1]  Only give exact copies of it.  Among other things, this
+     requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the
+     etext or this "small print!" statement.  You may however,
+     if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable
+     binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form,
+     including any form resulting from conversion by word pro-
+     cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as
+     *EITHER*:
+
+     [*]  The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and
+          does *not* contain characters other than those
+          intended by the author of the work, although tilde
+          (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may
+          be used to convey punctuation intended by the
+          author, and additional characters may be used to
+          indicate hypertext links; OR
+
+     [*]  The etext may be readily converted by the reader at
+          no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent
+          form by the program that displays the etext (as is
+          the case, for instance, with most word processors);
+          OR
+
+     [*]  You provide, or agree to also provide on request at
+          no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the
+          etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC
+          or other equivalent proprietary form).
+
+[2]  Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this
+     "Small Print!" statement.
+
+[3]  Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the
+     net profits you derive calculated using the method you
+     already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  If you
+     don't derive profits, no royalty is due.  Royalties are
+     payable to "Project Gutenberg Association/Carnegie-Mellon
+     University" within the 60 days following each
+     date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare)
+     your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return.
+
+WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO?
+The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time,
+scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty
+free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution
+you can think of.  Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg
+Association / Carnegie-Mellon University".
+
+We are planning on making some changes in our donation structure
+in 2000, so you might want to email me, hart@pobox.com beforehand.
+
+
+
+
+*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*
+
+
+
+
+
+This Etext prepared by an anonymous Project Gutenberg volunteer.
+
+
+
+
+
+St. Martin's Summer
+
+by Rafael Sabatini
+
+Originally published in 1921
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+I.     THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+II.    MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+III.   THE DOWAGER'S COMPLIANCE
+IV.    THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+V.     MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+VI.    MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+VII.   THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+VIII.  THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+IX.    THE SENESCHAL'S ADVICE
+X.     THE RECRUIT
+XI.    VALERIE'S GAOLER
+XII.   A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+XIII.  THE COURIER
+XIV.   FLORIMOND'S LETTER
+XV.    THE CONFERENCE
+XVI.   THE UNEXPECTED
+XVII.  HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+XVIII. IN THE MOAT
+XIX.   THROUGH THE NIGHT
+XX.    FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+XXI.   THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+XXII.  THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+XXIII. THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+XXIV.  SAINT MARTINS EVE
+
+
+
+
+SAINT MARTIN'S SUMMER
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY
+
+
+My Lord of Tressan, His Majesty's Seneschal of Dauphiny, sat at his
+ease, his purple doublet all undone, to yield greater freedom to
+his vast bulk, a yellow silken undergarment visible through the gap,
+as is visible the flesh of some fruit that, swollen with
+over-ripeness, has burst its skin.
+
+His wig - imposed upon him by necessity, not fashion lay on the
+table amid a confusion of dusty papers, and on his little fat nose,
+round and red as a cherry at its end, rested the bridge of his
+horn-rimmed spectacles.  His bald head - so bald and shining that
+it conveyed an unpleasant sense of nakedness, suggesting that its
+uncovering had been an act of indelicacy on the owner's part -
+rested on the back of his great chair, and hid from sight the gaudy
+escutcheon wrought upon the crimson leather.  His eyes were closed,
+his mouth open, and whether from that mouth or from his nose - or,
+perhaps, conflicting for issue between both - there came a snorting,
+rumbling sound to proclaim that my Lord the Seneschal was hard at
+work upon the King's business.
+
+Yonder, at a meaner table, in an angle between two windows, a
+pale-faced thread-bare secretary was performing for a yearly pittance
+the duties for which my Lord the Seneschal was rewarded by emoluments
+disproportionately large.
+
+The air of that vast apartment was disturbed by the sounds of
+Monsieur de Tressan's slumbers, the scratch and splutter of the
+secretary's pen, and the occasional hiss and crackle of the logs
+that burned in the great, cavern-like fireplace.  Suddenly to these
+another sound was added.  With a rasp and rattle the heavy curtains
+of blue velvet flecked with silver fleurs-de-lys were swept from
+the doorway, and the master of Monsieur de Tressan's household, in
+a well filled suit of black relieved by his heavy chain of office,
+stepped pompously forward.
+
+The secretary dropped his pen, and shot a frightened glance at his
+slumbering master; then raised his hands above his head, and shook
+them wildly at the head lackey.
+
+"Sh!" he whispered tragically.  "Doucement, Monsieur Anselme."
+
+Anselme paused.  He appreciated the gravity of the situation.  His
+bearing lost some of its dignity; his face underwent a change.  Then
+with a recovery of some part of his erstwhile resolution:
+
+"Nevertheless, he must be awakened," he announced, but in an
+undertone, as if afraid to do the thing he said must needs be done.
+
+The horror in the secretary's eyes increased, but Anselme's reflected
+none of it.  It was a grave thing, he knew by former experience, to
+arouse His Majesty's Seneschal of Dauphiny from his after-dinner
+nap; but it was an almost graver thing to fail in obedience to that
+black-eyed woman below who was demanding an audience.
+
+Anselme realized that he was between the sword and the wall.  He
+was, however, a man of a deliberate habit that was begotten of
+inherent indolence and nurtured among the good things that fell to
+his share as master of the Tressan household.  Thoughtfully he
+caressed his tuft of red beard, puffed out his cheeks, and raised
+his eyes to the ceiling in appeal or denunciation to the heaven
+which he believed was somewhere beyond it.
+
+"Nevertheless, he must be awakened," he repeated.
+
+And then Fate came to his assistance.  Somewhere in the house a door
+banged like a cannon-shot.  Perspiration broke upon the secretary's
+brow.  He sank limply back in his chair, giving himself up for lost.
+Anselme started and bit the knuckle of his forefinger in a manner
+suggesting an inarticulate imprecation.
+
+My Lord the Seneschal moved.  The noise of his slumbers culminated
+in a sudden, choking grunt, and abruptly ceased.  His eyelids rolled
+slowly back, like an owl's, revealing pale blue eyes, which fixed
+themselves first upon the ceiling, then upon Anselme.  Instantly he
+sat up, puffing and scowling, his hands shuffling his papers.
+
+"A thousand devils!  Anselme, why am I interrupted?" he grumbled
+querulously, still half-asleep.  "What the plague do you want?  Have
+you no thought for the King's affairs?  Babylas" - this to his
+secretary - "did I not tell you that I had much to do; that I must
+not be disturbed?"
+
+It was the great vanity of the life of this man, who did nothing,
+to appear the busiest fellow in all France, and no audience - not
+even that of his own lackeys - was too mean for him to take the
+stage to in that predilect role.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte," said Anselme, in tones of abject self-effacement,
+"I had never dared intrude had the matter been of less urgency.  But
+Madame the Dowager of Condillac is below.  She begs to see Your
+Excellency instantly."
+
+At once there was a change.  Tressan became wide-awake upon the
+instant.  His first act was to pass one hand over the wax-like
+surface of his bald head, whilst his other snatched at his wig.
+Then he heaved himself ponderously out of his great chair.  He
+donned his wig, awry in his haste, and lurched forward towards
+Anselme, his fat fingers straining at his open doublet and drawing
+it together.
+
+"Madame la Douairiere here?" he cried.  "Make fast these buttons,
+rascal!  Quick!  Am I to receive a lady thus?  Am I - ?  Babylas,"
+he snapped, interrupting himself and turning aside even as Anselme
+put forth hands to do his bidding.  "A mirror, from my closet!
+Dispatch!"
+
+The secretary was gone in a flash, and in a flash returned, even
+as Anselme completed his master's toilet.  But clearly Monsieur de
+Tressan had awakened in a peevish humour, for no sooner were the
+buttons of his doublet secured than with his own fingers he tore
+them loose again, cursing his majordomo the while with vigour.
+
+"You dog, Anselme, have you no sense of fitness, no discrimination?
+ Am I to appear in this garment of the mode of a half-century ago
+before Madame la Marquise?  Take it off; take it off, man!  Get me
+the coat that came last month from Paris - the yellow one with the
+hanging sleeves and the gold buttons, and a sash - the crimson sash
+I had from Taillemant.  Can you move no quicker, animal?  Are you
+still here?"
+
+Anselme, thus enjoined, lent an unwonted alacrity to his movements,
+waddling grotesquely like a hastening waterfowl.  Between him and
+the secretary they dressed my Lord the Seneschal, and decked him
+out till he was fit to compare with a bird of paradise for
+gorgeousness of colouring if not for harmony of hues and elegance
+of outline.
+
+Babylas held the mirror, and Anselme adjusted the Seneschal's wig,
+whilst Tressan himself twisted his black mustachios - how they kept
+their colour was a mystery to his acquaintance - and combed the
+tuft of beard that sprouted from one of his several chins.
+
+He took a last look at his reflection, rehearsed a smile, and bade
+Anselme introduce his visitor.  He desired his secretary to go to
+the devil, but, thinking better of it, he recalled him as he reached
+the door.  His cherished vanity craved expression.
+
+"Wait!" said he.  "There is a letter must be written.  The King's
+business may not suffer postponement - not for all the dowagers in
+France.  Sit down."
+
+Babylas obeyed him.  Tressan stood with his back to the open door.
+His ears, strained to listen, had caught the swish of a woman's
+gown.  He cleared his throat, and began to dictate:
+
+"To Her Majesty the Queen-Regent - "  He paused, and stood with
+knitted brows, deep in thought.  Then he ponderously repeated -
+"To Her Majesty the Queen Regent - Have you got that?"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Comte.  'To Her Majesty the Queen Regent.'"
+
+There was a step, and a throat-clearing cough behind him.
+
+"Monsieur de Tressan," said a woman's voice, a rich, melodious
+voice, if haughty and arrogant of intonation.
+
+On the instant he turned, advanced a step, and bowed.
+
+"Your humblest servant, madame," said he, his hand upon his heart.
+"This is an honour which  - "
+
+"Which necessity thrusts upon you," she broke in imperiously.
+"Dismiss that fellow."
+
+The secretary, pale and shy, had risen.  His eyes dilated at the
+woman's speech.  He looked for a catastrophe as the natural result
+of her taking such a tone with this man who was the terror of his
+household and of all Grenoble.  Instead, the Lord Seneschal's
+meekness left him breathless with surprise.
+
+"He is my secretary, madame.  We were at work as you came.  I was
+on the point of inditing a letter to Her Majesty.  The office of
+Seneschal in a province such as Dauphiny is helas!  - no sinecure."
+He sighed like one whose brain is weary.  "It leaves a man little
+time even to eat or sleep."
+
+"You will be needing a holiday, then," said she, with cool
+insolence.  "Take one for once, and let the King's business give
+place for half an hour to mine."
+
+The secretary's horror grew by leaps and bounds.
+
+Surely the storm would burst at last about this audacious woman's
+head.  But the Lord Seneschal - usually so fiery and tempestuous -
+did no more than make her another of his absurd bows.
+
+"You anticipate, madame, the very words I was about to utter.
+Babylas, vanish!"  And he waved the scribbler doorwards with a
+contemptuous hand.  "Take your papers with you - into my closet
+there.  We will resume that letter to Her Majesty when madame shall
+have left me."
+
+The secretary gathered up his papers, his quills, and his inkhorn,
+and went his way, accounting the end of the world at hand.
+
+When the door had closed upon him, the Seneschal, with another bow
+and a simper, placed a chair at his visitor's disposal.  She looked
+at the chair, then looked at the man much as she had looked at the
+chair, and turning her back contemptuously on both, she sauntered
+towards the fireplace.  She stood before the blaze, with her whip
+tucked under her arm, drawing off her stout riding-gloves.  She was
+a tall, splendidly proportioned woman, of a superb beauty of
+countenance, for all that she was well past the spring of life.
+
+In the waning light of that October afternoon none would have
+guessed her age to be so much as thirty, though in the sunlight
+you might have set it at a little more.  But in no light at all
+would you have guessed the truth, that her next would be her
+forty-second birthday.  Her face was pale, of an ivory pallor that
+gleamed in sharp contrast with the ebony of her lustrous hair.
+Under the long lashes of low lids a pair of eyes black and insolent
+set off the haughty lines of her scarlet lips.  Her nose was thin
+and straight, her neck an ivory pillar splendidly upright upon her
+handsome shoulders.
+
+She was dressed for riding, in a gown of sapphire velvet, handsomely
+laced in gold across the stomacher, and surmounted at the neck,
+where it was cut low and square, by the starched band of fine linen
+which in France was already replacing the more elaborate ruff.  On
+her head, over a linen coif, she wore a tall-crowned grey beaver,
+swathed with a scarf of blue and gold.
+
+Standing by the hearth, one foot on the stone kerb, one elbow leaning
+lightly on the overmantel, she proceeded leisurely to remove her
+gloves.
+
+The Seneschal observed her with eyes that held an odd mixture of
+furtiveness and admiration, his fingers - plump, indolent-looking
+stumps - plucking at his beard.
+
+"Did you but know, Marquise, with what joy, with what a - "
+
+"I will imagine it, whatever it may be," she broke in, with that
+brusque arrogance that marked her bearing.  "The time for flowers
+of rhetoric is not now.  There is trouble coming, man; trouble,
+dire trouble."
+
+Up went the Seneschal's brows; his eyes grew wider.
+
+"Trouble?" quoth he.  And, having opened his mouth to give exit to
+that single word, open he left it.
+
+She laughed lazily, her lip curling, her face twisting oddly, and
+mechanically she began to draw on again the glove she had drawn off.
+
+"By your face I see how well you understand me," she sneered.  "The
+trouble concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye."
+
+"From Paris - does it come from Court?"  His voice was sunk.
+
+She nodded.  "You are a miracle of intuition today, Tressan."
+
+He thrust his tiny tuft of beard between his teeth - a trick he had
+when perplexed or thoughtful.  "Ah!" he exclaimed at last, and it
+sounded like an indrawn breath of apprehension.  "Tell me more."
+
+"What more is there to tell?  You have the epitome of the story."
+
+"But what is the nature of the trouble?  What form does it take,
+and by whom are you advised of it?"
+
+"A friend in Paris sent me word, and his messenger did his work
+well, else had Monsieur de Garnache been here before him, and I
+had not so much as had the mercy of this forewarning."
+
+"Garnache?" quoth the Count.  "Who is Garnache?"
+
+"The emissary of the Queen-Regent.  He has been dispatched hither
+by her to see that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye has justice and
+enlargement."
+
+Tressan fell suddenly to groaning and wringing his hands a pathetic
+figure had it been less absurd.
+
+"I warned you, madame!  I warned you how it would end," he cried.
+"I told you - "
+
+"Oh, I remember the things you told me," she cut in, scorn in her
+voice.  "You may spare yourself their repetition.  What is done is
+done, and I'll not - I would not - have it undone.  Queen-Regent
+or no Queen-Regent, I am mistress at Condillac; my word is the only
+law we know, and I intend that so it shall continue."
+
+Tressan looked at her in surprise.  This unreasoning, feminine
+obstinacy so wrought upon him that he permitted himself a smile and
+a lapse into irony and banter.
+
+"Parfaitement," said he, spreading his hands, and bowing.  "Why
+speak of trouble, then?"
+
+She beat her whip impatiently against her gown, her eyes staring
+into the fire.  "Because, my attitude being such as it is, trouble
+will there be."
+
+The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and moved a step towards her.
+He was cast down to think that he might have spared himself the
+trouble of donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris.  She
+had eyes for no finery that afternoon.  He was cast down, too, to
+think how things might go with him when this trouble came.  It
+entered his thoughts that he had lain long on a bed of roses in
+this pleasant corner of Dauphiny, and he was smitten now with fear
+lest of the roses he should find nothing remaining but the thorns.
+
+"How came the Queen-Regent to hear of - of mademoiselle's - ah -
+situation?" he inquired.
+
+The Marquise swung round upon him in a passion.
+
+"The girl found a dog of a traitor to bear a letter for her.  That
+is enough.  If ever chance or fate should bring him my way, by God!
+he shall hang without shrift."
+
+Then she put her anger from her; put from her, too, the insolence
+and scorn with which so lavishly she had addressed him hitherto.
+Instead she assumed a suppliant air, her beautiful eyes meltingly
+set upon his face.
+
+"Tressan," said she in her altered voice, "I am beset by enemies.
+But you will not forsake me?  You will stand by me to the end - will
+you not, my friend?  I can count upon you, at least?"
+
+"In all things, madame," he answered, under the spell of her gaze.
+"What force does this man Garnache bring with him?  Have you
+ascertained?"
+
+"He brings none," she answered, triumph in her glance.
+
+"None?" he echoed, horror in his.  "None?  Then - then - "
+
+He tossed his arms to heaven, and stood a limp and shaken thing.
+She leaned forward, and regarded him stricken in surprise.
+
+"Diable!  What ails you?" she snapped.  "Could I have given you
+better news?"
+
+"If you could have given me worse, I cannot think what it might have
+been," he groaned.  Then, as if smitten by a sudden notion that
+flashed a gleam of hope into this terrifying darkness that was
+settling down upon him, he suddenly looked up.  "You mean to resist
+him?" he inquired.
+
+She stared at him a second, then laughed, a thought unpleasantly.
+
+"Pish!  But you are mad," she scorned him.  "Do you need ask if I
+intend to resist - I, with the strongest castle in Dauphiny?  By
+God!  sir, if you need to hear me say it, hear me then say that I
+shall resist him and as many as the Queen may send after him, for
+as long as one stone of Condillac shall stand upon another."
+
+The Seneschal blew out his lips, and fell once more to the chewing
+of his beard.
+
+"What did you mean when you said I could have given you no worse
+news than that of his coming alone?" she questioned suddenly.
+
+"Madame," said he, "if this man comes without force, and you resist
+the orders of which he is the bearer, what think you will betide?"
+
+"He will appeal to you for the men he needs that he may batter down
+my walls," she answered calmly.
+
+He looked at her incredulously.  "You realize it?" he ejaculated.
+"You realize it?"
+
+"What is there in it that should puzzle a babe?"
+
+Her callousness was like a gust of wind upon the living embers of
+his fears.  It blew them into a blaze of wrath, sudden and terrific
+as that of such a man at bay could be.  He advanced upon her with
+the rolling gait of the obese, his cheeks purple, his arms waving
+wildly, his dyed mustachios bristling.
+
+"And what of me, madame?" he spluttered.  "What of me?  Am I to be
+ruined, gaoled, and hanged, maybe, for refusing him men? - for that
+is what is in your mind.  Am I to make myself an outlaw?  Am I, who
+have been Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny these fifteen years, to end
+my days in degradation in the cause of a woman's matrimonial
+projects for a simpering school-girl?  Seigneur du Ciel!" he roared,
+"I think you are gone mad - mad, mad! over this affair.  You would
+not think it too much to set the whole province in flames so that
+you could have your way with this wretched child.  But, Ventregris!
+to ruin me - to - to - "
+
+He fell silent for very want of words; just gaped and gasped, and
+then, with hands folded upon his paunch, he set himself to pace the
+chamber.
+
+Madame de Condillac stood watching him, her face composed, her
+glance cold.  She was like some stalwart oak, weathering with
+unshaken front a hurricane.  When he had done, she moved away from
+the fireplace, and, beating her side gently with her whip, she
+stepped to the door.
+
+"Au revoir, Monsieur de Tressan," said she, mighty cool, her back
+towards him.
+
+At that he halted in his feverish stride, stood still and threw up
+his head.  His anger went out, as a candle is extinguished by a
+puff of wind.  And in its place a new fear crept into his heart.
+
+"Madame, madame!" he cried.  "Wait!  Hear me."
+
+She paused, half-turned, and looked at him over her shoulder, scorn
+in her glance, a sneer on her scarlet mouth, insolence in every
+line of her.
+
+"I think, monsieur, that I have heard a little more than enough,"
+said she.  "I am assured, at least, that in you I have but a
+fair-weather friend, a poor lipserver."
+
+"Ah, not that, madame," he cried, and his voice was stricken.  "Say
+not that.  I would serve you as would none other in all this world
+ - you know it, Marquise; you know it."
+
+She faced about, and confronted him, her smile a trifle broader, as
+if amusement were now blending with her scorn.
+
+"It is easy to protest.  Easy to say, 'I will die for you,' so long
+as the need for such a sacrifice be remote.  But let me do no more
+than ask a favour, and it is, 'What of my good name, madame?  What
+of my seneschalship?  Am I to be gaoled or hanged to pleasure you?'
+Faugh!" she ended, with a toss of her splendid head.  "The world is
+peopled with your kind, and I - alas!  for a woman's intuitions -
+had held you different from the rest."
+
+Her words were to his soul as a sword of fire might have been to
+his flesh.  They scorched and shrivelled it.  He saw himself as she
+would have him see himself - a mean, contemptible craven; a coward
+who made big talk in times of peace, but faced about and vanished
+into hiding at the first sign of danger.  He felt himself the
+meanest, vilest thing a-crawl upon this sinful earth, and she - dear
+God! - had thought him different from the ruck.  She had held him in
+high esteem, and behold, how short had he not fallen of all her
+expectations!  Shame and vanity combined to work a sudden, sharp
+revulsion in his feelings.
+
+"Marquise," he cried, "you say no more than what is just.  But
+punish me no further.  I meant not what I said.  I was beside
+myself.  Let me atone - let my future actions make amends for that
+odious departure from my true self."
+
+There was no scorn now in her smile; only an ineffable tenderness,
+beholding which he felt it in his heart to hang if need be that
+he might continue high in her regard.  He sprang forward, and took
+the hand she extended to him.
+
+"I knew, Tressan," said she, "that you were not yourself, and that
+when you bethought you of what you had said, my valiant, faithful
+friend would not desert me."
+
+He stooped over her hand, and slobbered kisses upon her
+unresponsive glove.
+
+"Madame," said he, "you may count upon me.  This fellow out of
+Paris shall have no men from me, depend upon it."
+
+She caught him by the shoulders, and held him so, before her.  Her
+face was radiant, alluring; and her eyes dwelt on his with a kindness
+he had never seen there save in some wild daydream of his.
+
+"I will not refuse a service you offer me so gallantly," said she.
+"It were an ill thing to wound you by so refusing it."
+
+"Marquise," he cried, "it is as nothing to what I would do did the
+occasion serve.  But when this thing 'tis done; when you have had
+your way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and the nuptials shall
+have been celebrated, then - dare I hope - ?"
+
+He said no more in words, but his little blue eyes had an eloquence
+that left nothing to mere speech.
+
+Their glances met, she holding him always at arm's length by that
+grip upon his shoulders, a grip that was firm and nervous.
+
+In the Seneschal of Dauphiny, as she now gazed upon him, she beheld
+a very toad of a man, and the soul of her shuddered at the sight of
+him combining with the thing that he suggested.  But her glance was
+steady and her lips maintained their smile, just as if that ugliness
+of his had been invested with some abstract beauty existing only to
+her gaze; a little colour crept into her cheeks, and red being the
+colour of love's livery, Tressan misread its meaning.
+
+She nodded to him across the little distance of her outstretched
+arms, then smothered a laugh that drove him crazed with hope, and
+breaking from him she sped swiftly, shyly it almost seemed to him,
+to the door.
+
+There she paused a moment looking back at him with a coyness that
+might have become a girl of half her years, yet which her splendid
+beauty saved from being unbecoming even in her.
+
+One adorable smile she gave him, and before he could advance to
+hold the door for her, she had opened it and passed out.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE
+
+
+To promise rashly, particularly where a woman is the suppliant,
+and afterwards, if not positively to repent the promise, at least
+to regret that one did not hedge it with a few conditions, is a
+proceeding not uncommon to youth.  In a man of advanced age, such
+as Monsieur de Tressan, it never should have place; and, indeed,
+it seldom has, unless that man has come again under the sway of the
+influences by which youth, for good or ill, is governed.
+
+Whilst the flush of his adoration was upon him, hot from the contact
+of her presence, he knew no repentance, found room in his mind for
+no regrets.  He crossed to the window, and pressed his huge round
+face to the pane, in a futile effort to watch her mount and ride
+out of the courtyard with her little troop of attendants.  Finding
+that he might not - the window being placed too high - gratify his
+wishes in that connection, he dropped into his chair, and sat in
+the fast-deepening gloom, reviewing, fondly here, hurriedly there,
+the interview that had but ended.
+
+Thus night fell, and darkness settled down about him, relieved only
+by the red glow of the logs smouldering on the hearth.  In the gloom
+inspiration visited him.  He called for lights and Babylas.  Both
+came, and he dispatched the lackey that lighted the tapers to summon
+Monsieur d'Aubran, the commander of the garrison of Grenoble.
+
+In the interval before the soldier's coming he conferred with Babylas
+concerning what he had in mind, but he found his secretary
+singularly dull and unimaginative.  So that, perforce, he must fall
+back upon himself.  He sat glum and thoughtful, his mind in
+unproductive travail, until the captain was announced.
+
+Still without any definite plan, he blundered headlong, nevertheless,
+into the necessary first step towards the fulfilment of his purpose.
+
+"Captain," said he, looking mighty grave, "I have cause to believe
+that all is not as it should be in the hills in the district of
+Montelimar."
+
+"Is there trouble, monsieur?" inquired the captain, startled.
+
+"Maybe there is, maybe there is not," returned the Seneschal
+mysteriously.  "You shall have your full orders in the morning.
+Meanwhile, make ready to repair to the neighbourhood of Montelimar
+to-morrow with a couple of hundred men."
+
+"A couple of hundred, monsieur!" exclaimed d'Aubran.  "But that
+will be to empty Grenoble of soldiers."
+
+"What of it?  We are not likely to require them here.  Let your
+orders for preparation go round tonight, so that your knaves may be
+ready to set out betimes to-morrow.  If you will be so good as to
+wait upon me early you shall have your instructions."
+
+Mystified, Monsieur d'Aubran departed on his errand, and my Lord
+Seneschal went down to supper well pleased with the cunning device
+by which he was to leave Grenoble without a garrison.  It was an
+astute way of escape from the awkward situation into which his
+attachment to the interests of the dowager of Condillac was likely
+to place him.
+
+But when the morning came he was less pleased with the idea, chiefly
+because he had been unable to invent any details that should lend
+it the necessary colour, and d'Aubran - worse luck - was an
+intelligent officer who might evince a pardonable but embarrassing
+curiosity.  A leader of soldiers has a right to know something at
+least of the enterprise upon which he leads them.  By morning, too,
+Tressan found that the intervening space of the night, since he had
+seen Madame de Condillac, had cooled his ardour very considerably.
+
+He had reached the incipient stages of regret of his rash promise.
+
+When Captain d'Aubran was announced to him, he bade them ask him to
+come again in an hour's time.  From mere regrets he was passing now,
+through dismay, into utter repentance of his promise.  He sat in his
+study, at his littered writing-table, his head in his hands, a
+confusion of thoughts, a wild, frenzied striving after invention in
+his brain.
+
+Thus Anselme found him when he thrust aside the portiere to announce
+that a Monsieur de Garnache, from Paris, was below, demanding to see
+the Lord Seneschal at once upon an affair of State.
+
+Tressan's flesh trembled and his heart fainted.  Then, suddenly,
+desperately, he took his courage in both hands.  He remembered who
+he was and what he was the King's Lord Seneschal of the Province of
+Dauphiny.  Throughout that province, from the Rhone to the Alps,
+his word was law, his name a terror to evildoers - and to some
+others besides.  Was he to blench and tremble at the mention of the
+name of a Court lackey out of Paris, who brought him a message from
+the Queen-Regent?  Body of God! not he.
+
+He heaved himself to his feet, warmed and heartened by the thought;
+his eye sparkled, and there was a deeper flush than usual upon his
+cheek.
+
+"Admit this Monsieur de Garnache," said he with a fine loftiness,
+and in his heart he pondered what he would say and how he should
+say it; how he should stand, how move, and how look.  His roving
+eye caught sight of his secretary.  He remembered something - the
+cherished pose of being a man plunged fathoms-deep in business.
+Sharply he uttered his secretary's name.
+
+Babylas raised his pale face; he knew what was coming; it had come
+so many times before.  But there was no vestige of a smile on his
+drooping lips, no gleam of amusement in his patient eye.  He thrust
+aside the papers on which he was at work, and drew towards him a
+fresh sheet on which to pen the letter which, he knew by experience,
+Tressan was about to indite to the Queen-mother.  For these purposes
+Her Majesty was Tressan's only correspondent.
+
+Then the door opened, the portiere was swept aside, and Anselme
+announced "Monsieur de Garnache."
+
+Tressan turned as the newcomer stepped briskly into the room, and
+bowed, hat in hand, its long crimson feather sweeping the ground,
+then straightened himself and permitted the Seneschal to take his
+measure.
+
+Tressan beheld a man of a good height, broad to the waist and spare
+thence to the ground, who at first glance appeared to be mainly clad
+in leather.  A buff jerkin fitted his body; below it there was a
+glimpse of wine-coloured trunks, and hose of a slightly deeper hue,
+which vanished immediately into a pair of huge thighboots of untanned
+leather.  A leather swordbelt, gold-embroidered at the edges, carried
+a long steel-halted rapier in a leather scabbard chaped with steel.
+The sleeves of his doublet which protruded from his leather casing
+were of the same colour and material as his trunks.  In one hand he
+carried his broad black hat with its crimson feather, in the other a
+little roll of parchment; and when he moved the creak of leather and
+jingle of his spurs made pleasant music for a martial spirit.
+
+Above all, this man's head, well set upon his shoulders, claimed some
+attention.  His nose was hooked and rather large, his eyes were blue,
+bright as steel, and set a trifle wide.  Above a thin-lapped,
+delicate mouth his reddish mustachios, slightly streaked with grey,
+stood out, bristling like a cat's.  His hair was darker - almost
+brown save at the temples, where age had faded it to an ashen colour.
+In general his aspect was one of rugged strength.
+
+The Seneschal, measuring him with an adversary's eye, misliked his
+looks.  But he bowed urbanely, washing his hands in the air, and
+murmuring:
+
+"Your servant, Monsieur de - ?"
+
+"Garnache," came the other's crisp, metallic voice, and the name
+had a sound as of an oath on his lips.  "Martin Marie Rigobert de
+Garnache.  I come to you on an errand of Her Majesty's, as this my
+warrant will apprise you."  And he proffered the paper he held,
+which Tressan accepted from his hand.
+
+A change was visible in the wily Seneschal's fat countenance.  Its
+round expanse had expressed interrogation until now; but at the
+Parisian's announcement that he was an emissary of the Queen's,
+Tressan insinuated into it just that look of surprise and of
+increased deference which would have been natural had he not already
+been forewarned of Monsieur de Garnache's mission and identity.
+
+He placed a chair at his visitor's disposal, himself resuming his
+seat at his writing-table, and unfolding the paper Garnache had given
+him.  The newcomer seated himself, hitched his sword-belt round so
+that he could lean both hands upon the hilt, and sat, stiff and
+immovable, awaiting the Lord Seneschal's pleasure.  From his desk
+across the room the secretary, idly chewing the feathered end of
+his goose-quill, took silent stock of the man from Paris, and
+wondered.
+
+Tressan folded the paper carefully, and returned it to its owner.
+It was no more than a formal credential, setting forth that Garnache
+was travelling into Dauphiny on a State affair, and commanding
+Monsieur de Tressan to give him every assistance he might require
+in the performance of his errand.
+
+"Parfaitement," purred the Lord Seneschal.  "And now, monsieur, if
+you will communicate to me the nature of your affair, you shall find
+me entirely at your service."
+
+"It goes without saying that you are acquainted with the Chateau de
+Condillac?" began Garnache, plunging straight into business.
+
+"Perfectly."  The Seneschal leaned back, and was concerned to feel
+his pulses throbbing a shade too quickly.  But he controlled his
+features, and maintained a placid, bland expression.
+
+"You are perhaps acquainted with its inhabitants?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Intimate with them?"
+
+The Seneschal pursed his lips, arched his brows, and slowly waved
+his podgy hands, a combination of grimace and gesture that said
+much or nothing.  But reflecting that Monsieur de Tressan had a
+tongue, Garnache apparently did not opine it worth his while to
+set a strain upon his own imagination, for -
+
+"Intimate with them?" he repeated, and this time there was a sharper
+note in his voice.
+
+Tressan leaned forward and brought his finger-tips together.  His
+voice was as urbane as it lay within its power to be.
+
+"I understood that monsieur was proposing to state his business,
+not to question mine."
+
+Garnache sat back in his chair, and his eyes narrowed.  He scented
+opposition, and the greatest stumbling-block in Garnache's career
+had been that he could never learn to brook opposition from any man.
+That characteristic, evinced early in life, had all but been the
+ruin of him.  He was a man of high intellectual gifts, of military
+skill and great resource; out of consideration for which had he
+been chosen by Marie de Medicis to come upon this errand.  But he
+marred it all by a temper so ungovernable that in Paris there was
+current a byword, "Explosive as Garnache."
+
+Little did Tressan dream to what a cask of gunpowder he was applying
+the match of his smug pertness.  Nor did Garnache let him dream it
+just yet.  He controlled himself betimes, bethinking him that, after
+all, there might be some reason in what this fat fellow said.
+
+
+"You misapprehend my purpose, sir," said he, his lean brown hand
+stroking his long chin.  "I but sought to learn how far already you
+may be informed of what is taking place up there, to the end that
+I may spare myself the pains of citing facts with which already you
+are acquainted.  Still, monsieur, I am willing to proceed upon the
+lines which would appear to be more agreeable to yourself.
+
+"This, then, is the sum of the affair that brings me: The late
+Marquis de Condillac left two sons.  The elder, Florimond - who is
+the present marquis, and who has been and still continues absent,
+warring in Italy, since before his father's death - is the stepson
+of the present Dowager, she being the mother of the younger son,
+Marius de Condillac.
+
+"Should you observe me to be anywhere at error, I beg, monsieur,
+that you will have the complaisance to correct me."
+
+The Seneschal bowed gravely, and Monsieur de Garnache continued:
+
+"Now this younger son - I believe that he is in his twenty-first year
+at present - has been something of a scapegrace."
+
+"A scapegrace?  Bon Dieu, no.  That is a harsh name to give him.
+A little indiscreet at times, a little rash, as is the way of youth."
+
+He would have said more, but the man from Paris was of no mind to
+waste time on quibbles.
+
+"Very well," he snapped, cutting in.  "We will say, a little
+indiscreet.  My errand is not concerned with Monsieur Marius's
+morals or with his lack of them.  These indiscretions which you
+belittle appear to have been enough to have estranged him from his
+father, a circumstance which but served the more to endear him to
+his mother.  I am told that she is a very handsome woman, and that
+the boy favours her surprisingly."
+
+"Ah!" sighed the Seneschal in a rapture.  "A beautiful woman - a
+noble, splendid woman.'
+
+"Hum!"  Garnache observed the ecstatic simper with a grim eye.  Then
+he proceeded with his story.
+
+"The late marquis possessed in his neighbour, the also deceased
+Monsieur de La Vauvraye, a very dear and valued friend.  Monsieur
+de La Vauvraye had an only child, a daughter, to inherit his very
+considerable estates probably the wealthiest in all Dauphiny, so I
+am informed.  It was the dearest wish of his heart to transform what
+had been a lifelong friendship in his own generation into a closer
+relationship in the next - a wish that found a very ready echo in
+the heart of Monsieur de Condillac.  Florimond de Condillac was
+sixteen years of age at the time, and Valerie de La Vauvraye
+fourteen.  For all their tender years, they were betrothed, and they
+grew up to love each other and to look forward to the consummation
+of the plans their fathers had laid for them."
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," the Seneschal protested, "how can you possibly
+infer so much?  How can you say that they loved each other?  What
+authority can you have for pretending to know what was in their
+inmost hearts?"
+
+"The authority of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye," was the unanswerable
+rejoinder.  "I am telling you, more or less, what she herself wrote
+to the Queen."
+
+"Ah!  Well, well - proceed, monsieur."
+
+"This marriage should render Florimond de Condillac the wealthiest
+and most powerful gentleman in Dauphiny - one of the wealthiest in
+France; and the idea of it pleased the old marquis, inasmuch as the
+disparity there would be between the worldly possessions of his two
+sons would serve to mark his disapproval of the younger.  But before
+settling down, Florimond signified a desire to see the world, as was
+fit and proper and becoming in a young man who was later to assume
+such wide responsibilities.  His father, realizing the wisdom of
+such a step, made but slight objection, and at the age of twenty
+Florimond set out for the Italian wars.  Two years afterwards, a
+little over six months ago, his father died, and was followed to the
+grave some weeks later by Monsieur de La Vauvraye.  The latter, with
+a want of foresight which has given rise to the present trouble,
+misjudging the character of the Dowager of Condillac, entrusted to
+her care his daughter Valerie pending Florimond's return, when the
+nuptials would naturally be immediately celebrated.  I am probably
+telling you no more than you already know.  But you owe the
+infliction to your own unwillingness to answer my questions."
+
+"No, no, monsieur; I assure you that in what you say there is much
+that is entirely new to me."
+
+"I rejoice to hear it, Monsieur de Tressan," said Garnache very
+seriously, "for had you been in possession of all these facts, Her
+Majesty might have a right to learn how it chanced that you had
+nowise interfered in what is toward at Condillac.
+
+"But to proceed: Madame de Condillac and her precious Benjamin -
+this Marius - finding themselves, in Florimond's absence, masters
+of the situation, have set about turning it to their own best
+advantage.  Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, whilst being nominally
+under their guardianship, finds herself practically gaoled by them,
+and odious plans are set before her to marry Marius.  Could the
+Dowager but accomplish this, it would seem that she would not only
+be assuring a future of ease and dignity for her son, but also be
+giving vent to all her pent-up hatred of her stepson.
+
+"Mademoiselle, however, withstands them, and in this she is aided
+by a fortuitous circumstance which has arisen out of the overbearing
+arrogance that appears to be madame's chief characteristic.
+Condillac after the marquis's death had refused to pay tithes to
+Mother Church and has flouted and insulted the Bishop.  This prelate,
+after finding remonstrance vain, has retorted by placing Condillac
+under an Interdict, depriving all within it of the benefit of clergy.
+Thus, they have been unable to find a priest to venture thither, so
+that even had they willed to marry mademoiselle by force to Marius,
+they lacked the actual means of doing so.
+
+"Florimond continues absent.  We have every reason to believe that
+he has been left in ignorance of his father's death.  Letters coming
+from him from time to time prove that he was alive and well at least
+until three months ago.  A messenger has been dispatched to find him
+and urge him to return home at once.  But pending his arrival the
+Queen has determined to take the necessary steps to ensure that
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye shall be released from her captivity,
+that she shall suffer no further molestation at the hands of Madame
+de Condillac and her son - enfin, that she shall run no further risks.
+
+"My errand, monsieur, is to acquaint you with these facts, and to
+request you to proceed to Condillac and deliver thence Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye, whom I am subsequently to escort to Paris and place
+under Her Majesty's protection until such time as the new marquis
+shall return to claim her."
+
+Having concluded, Monsieur de Garnache sat back in his chair, and
+threw one leg over the other, fixing his eyes upon the Seneschal's
+face and awaiting his reply.
+
+On that gross countenance before him he saw fall the shadow of
+perplexity.  Tressan was monstrous ill-at-ease, and his face lost
+a good deal of its habitual plethora of colour.  He sought to
+temporize.
+
+"Does it not occur to you, monsieur, that perhaps too much
+importance may have been attached to the word of this child - this
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye?"
+
+"Does it occur to you that such has been the case, that she has
+overstated it?" counter-questioned Monsieur de Garnache.
+
+"No, no.  I do not say that.  But - but - would it not be better -
+more - ah - satisfactory to all concerned, if you yourself were to
+go to Condillac, and deliver your message in person, demanding
+mademoiselle?"
+
+The man from Paris looked at him a moment, then stood up suddenly,
+and shifted the carriages of his sword back to their normal
+position.  His brows came together in a frown, from which the
+Seneschal argued that his suggestion was not well received.
+
+"Monsieur," said the Parisian very coldly, like a man who contains
+a rising anger, "let me tell you that this is the first time in my
+life that I have been concerned in anything that had to do with
+women and I am close upon forty years of age.  The task, I can
+assure you, was little to my taste.  I embarked upon it because,
+being a soldier and having received my orders, I was in the
+unfortunate position of being unable to help myself.  But I intend,
+monsieur, to adhere rigidly to the letter of these commands.  Already
+I have endured more than enough in the interests of this damsel.  I
+have ridden from Paris, and that means close upon a week in the
+saddle - no little thing to a man who has acquired certain habits of
+life and developed a taste for certain minor comforts which he is
+very reluctant to forgo.  I have fed and slept at inns, living on
+the worst of fares and sleeping on the hardest, and hardly the
+cleanest, of beds.  Ventregris!  Figure to yourself that last night
+we lay at Luzan, in the only inn the place contained - a hovel,
+Monsieur le Seneschal, a hovel in which I would not kennel a dog
+I loved."
+
+His face flushed, and his voice rose as he dwelt upon the things
+he had undergone.
+
+"My servant and I slept in a dormitory'- a thousand devils! monsieur,
+in a dormitory!  Do you realize it?  We had for company a drunken
+vintner, a pedlar, a pilgrim on his way to Rome, and two peasant
+women; and they sent us to bed without candles, for modesty's sake.
+I ask you to conceive my feelings in such a case as that.  I could
+tell you more; but that as a sample of what I have undergone could
+scarcely be surpassed."
+
+"Truly-truly outrageous," sympathized the Seneschal; yet he grinned.
+
+"I ask you -have I not suffered inconvenience enough already in the
+service of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye that you can blame me if I
+refuse to go a single step further than my orders bid me?"
+
+The Seneschal stared at him now in increasing dismay.  Had his own
+interests been less at issue he could have indulged his mirth at
+the other's fiery indignation at the inconveniences he recited.  As
+it was, he had nothing to say; no thought or feeling other than what
+concerned finding a way of escape from the net that seemed to be
+closing in about him - how to seem to serve the Queen without turning
+against the Dowager of Condillac; how to seem to serve the Dowager
+without opposing the wishes of the Queen.
+
+"A plague on the girl!" he growled, unconsciously uttering his
+thoughts aloud.  "The devil take her!"
+
+Garnache smiled grimly.  "That is a bond of sympathy between us,"
+said he.  "I have said those very words a hundred times - a thousand
+times, indeed - between Paris and Grenoble.  Yet I scarcely see that
+you can damn her with as much justice as can I.
+
+"But there, monsieur; all this is unprofitable.  You have my message.
+I shall spend the day at Grenoble, and take a well-earned rest.  By
+this time to-morrow I shall be ready to start upon my return journey.
+I shall have then the honour to wait upon you again, to the end that
+I may receive from you the charge of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.  I
+shall count upon your having her here, in readiness to set out with
+me, by noon to-morrow."
+
+He bowed, with a flourish of his plumed hat, and would with that have
+taken his departure but that the Seneschal stayed him.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," he cried, in piteous affright, "you do not know
+the Dowager of Condillac."
+
+"Why, no.  What of it?"
+
+"What of it?  Did you know her, you would understand that she is not
+the woman to be driven.  I may order her in the Queen's name to
+deliver up Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.  But she will withstand me."
+
+"Withstand you?" echoed Garnache, frowning into the face of this
+fat man, who had risen also, brought to his feet by excitement.
+"Withstand you - you, the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny?  You are
+amusing yourself at my expense."
+
+"But I tell you that she will," the other insisted in a passion.
+"You may look for the girl in vain tomorrow unless you go to
+Condillac yourself and take her."
+
+Garnache drew himself up and delivered his answer in a tone that
+was final.
+
+"You are the governor of the province, monsieur, and in this matter
+you have in addition the Queen's particular authority - nay, her
+commands are imposed upon you.  Those commands, as interpreted by
+me, you will execute in the manner I have indicated."
+
+The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and chewed a second at his
+beard.
+
+"It is an easy thing for you to tell me what to do.  Tell me, rather,
+how to do it, how to overcome her opposition."
+
+"You are very sure of opposition - strangely sure, monsieur," said
+Garnache, looking him between the eyes.  "In any case, you have
+soldiers."
+
+"And so has she, and the strongest castle in southern France - to
+say nothing of the most cursed obstinacy in the world.  What she
+says, she does."
+
+"And what the Queen says her loyal servants do," was Garnache's
+rejoinder, in a withering tone.  "I think there is nothing more to
+be said, monsieur," he added.  "By this time to-morrow I shall
+expect to receive from you, here, the charge of Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye.  A demain, donc, Monsieur le Seneschal."
+
+And with another bow the man from Paris drew himself erect, turned
+on his heel, and went jingling and creaking from the room.
+
+The Lord Seneschal sank back in his chair, and wondered to himself
+whether to die might not prove an easy way out of the horrid
+situation into which chance and his ill-starred tenderness for the
+Dowager of Condillac had thrust him.
+
+At his desk sat his secretary, who had been a witness of the
+interview, lost in wonder almost as great as the Seneschal's own.
+
+For an hour Tressan remained where he was, deep in thought and
+gnawing at his beard.  Then with a sudden burst of passion,
+expressed in a round oath or two, he rose, and called for his horse
+that he might ride to Condillac.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE DOWAGER'S COMPLIANCE
+
+
+Promptly at noon on the morrow Monsieur de Garnache presented
+himself once more at the Seneschal's palace, and with him went
+Rabecque, his body-servant, a lean, swarthy, sharp-faced man, a
+trifle younger than his master.
+
+Anselme, the obese master of the household, received them with
+profound respect, and at once conducted Garnache to Monsieur de
+Tressan's presence.
+
+On the stairs they met Captain d'Aubran, who was descending.  The
+captain was not in the best of humours.  For four-and-twenty hours
+he had kept two hundred of his men under arms, ready to march as
+soon as he should receive his orders from the Lord Seneschal, yet
+those instructions were not forthcoming.  He had been to seek them
+again that morning, only to be again put off.
+
+Monsieur de Garnache had considerable doubt, born of his yesterday's
+interview with the Seneschal, that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye would
+be delivered into his charge as he had stipulated.  His relief was,
+therefore, considerable, upon being ushered into Tressan's presence,
+to find a lady in cloak and hat, dressed as for a journey, seated in
+a chair by the great fireplace.
+
+Tressan advanced to meet him, a smile of cordial welcome on his lips,
+and they bowed to each other in formal greeting.
+
+"You see, monsieur," said the Seneschal, waving a plump hand in the
+direction of the lady, "that you have been obeyed.  Here is your
+charge."
+
+Then to the lady: "This is Monsieur de Garnache," he announced, "of
+whom I have already told you, who is to conduct you to Paris by order
+of Her Majesty.
+
+"And now, my good friends, however great the pleasure I derive from
+your company, I care not how soon you set out, for I have some
+prodigious arrears of work upon my hands."
+
+Garnache bowed to the lady, who returned his greeting by an
+inclination of the head, and his keen eyes played briskly over her.
+She was a plump-faced, insipid child, with fair hair and pale blue
+eyes, stolid and bovine in their expressionlessness.
+
+"I am quite ready, monsieur," said she, rising as she spoke, and
+gathering her cloak about her; and Garnache remarked that her voice
+had the southern drawl, her words the faintest suggestion of a
+patois.  It was amazing how a lady born and bred could degenerate
+in the rusticity of Dauphiny.  Pigs and cows, he made no doubt, had
+been her chief objectives.  Yet, even so, he thought he might have
+expected that she would have had more to say to him than just those
+five words expressing her readiness to depart.  He had looked for
+some acknowledgment of satisfaction at his presence, some utterances
+of gratitude either to himself or to the Queen-Regent for the
+promptness with which she had been succoured.  He was disappointed,
+but he showed nothing of it, as with a simple inclination of the
+head -
+
+"Good!" said he.  "Since you are ready and Monsieur le Seneschal is
+anxious to be rid of us, let us by all means be moving.  You have a
+long and tedious journey before you, mademoiselle."
+
+"I - I am prepared for that," she faltered.
+
+He stood aside, and bending from the waist he made a sweeping
+gesture towards the door with the hand that held his hat.  To the
+invitation to precede him she readily responded, and, with a bow
+to the Seneschal, she began to walk across the apartment.
+
+Garnache's eyes, narrowing slightly, followed her, like points of
+steel.  Suddenly he shot a disturbing glance at Tressan's face, and
+the corner of his wild-cat mustachios twitched.  He stood erect, and
+called her very sharply.
+
+"Mademoiselle!"
+
+She stopped, and turned to face him, an incredible shyness seeming
+to cause her to avoid his gaze.
+
+"You have, no doubt, Monsieur le Seneschal's word for my identity.
+But I think it is as well that you should satisfy yourself.  Before
+placing yourself entirely in my care, as you are about to do, you
+would be well advised to assure yourself, that I am indeed Her
+Majesty's emissary.  Will you be good enough to glance at this?"
+
+He drew forth as he spoke the letter in the queen's own hand, turned
+it upside down, and so presented it to her.  The Seneschal looked
+on stolidly, a few paces distant.
+
+"But certainly, mademoiselle, assure yourself that this gentleman
+is no other than I have told you."
+
+Thus enjoined, she took the letter; for a second her eyes met
+Garnache's glittering gaze, and she shivered.  Then she bent her
+glance to the writing, and studied it a moment, what time the man
+from Paris watched her closely.
+
+Presently she handed it back to him.
+
+"Thank you, monsieur," was all she said.
+
+"You are satisfied that it is in order, mademoiselle?" he inquired,
+and a note of mockery too subtle for her or the Seneschal ran
+through his question.
+
+"I am quite satisfied."
+
+Garnache turned to Tressan.  His eyes were smiling, but unpleasantly,
+and in his voice when he spoke there was something akin to the
+distant rumble that heralds an approaching storm.
+
+"Mademoiselle," said he, "has received an eccentric education."
+
+"Eh?" quoth Tressan, perplexed.
+
+"I have heard tell, monsieur, of a people somewhere in the East who
+read and write from right to left; but never yet have I heard tell
+of any - particularly in France - so oddly schooled as to do their
+reading upside down."
+
+Tressan caught the drift of the other's meaning.  He paled a little,
+and sucked his lip, his eyes wandering to the girl, who stood in
+stolid inapprehension of what was being said.
+
+"Did she do that?" said he, and he scarcely knew what he was saying;
+all that he realized was that it urged him to explain this thing.
+"Mademoiselle's education has been neglected - a by no means uncommon
+happening in these parts.  She is sensitive of it; she seeks to hide
+the fact."
+
+Then the storm broke about their heads.  And it crashed and thundered
+awfully in the next few minutes.
+
+"O liar! O damned, audacious liar," roared Garnache uncompromisingly,
+advancing a step upon the Seneschal, and shaking the parchment
+threateningly in his very face, as though it were become a weapon of
+offence.  "Was it to hide the fact that she had not been taught to
+write that she sent the Queen a letter pages-long?  Who is this
+woman?"  And the finger he pointed at the girl quivered with the
+rage that filled him at this trick they had thought to put upon him.
+
+Tressan sought refuge in offended dignity.  He drew himself up,
+threw back his head, and looked the Parisian fiercely in the eye.
+
+"Since you take this tone with me, monsieur -"
+
+"I take with you - as with any man - the tone that to me seems best.
+You miserable fool!  As sure as you're a rogue this affair shall
+cost you your position.  You have waxed fat and sleek in your
+seneschalship; this easy life in Dauphiny appears to have been well
+suited to your health.  But as your paunch has grown, so, of a
+truth, have your brains dwindled, else had you never thought to
+cheat me quite so easily.
+
+"Am I some lout who has spent his days herding swine, think you,
+that you could trick me into believing this creature to be
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye - this creature with the mien of a
+peasant, with a breath reeking of garlic like a third-rate
+eating-house, and the walk of a woman who has never known footgear
+until this moment?  Tell me, sir, for what manner of fool did you
+take me?"
+
+The Seneschal stood with blanched face and gaping mouth, his fire
+all turned to ashes before the passion of this gaunt man.
+
+Garnache paid no heed to him.  He stepped to the girl, and roughly
+raised her chin with his hand so that she was forced to look him in
+the face.
+
+"What is your name, wench?" he asked her.
+
+"Margot," she blubbered, bursting into tears.
+
+He dropped her chin, and turned away with a gesture of disgust.
+
+"Get you gone," he bade her harshly.  "Get you back to the kitchen
+or the onion-field from which they took you."
+
+And the girl, scarce believing her good fortune, departed with a
+speed that bordered on the ludicrous.  Tressan had naught to say,
+no word to stay her with; pretence, he realized, was vain.
+
+"Now, my Lord Seneschal," quoth Garnache, arms akimbo, feet planted
+wide, and eyes upon the wretched man's countenance, "what may you
+have to say to me?"
+
+Tressan shifted his position; he avoided the other's glance; he was
+visibly trembling, and when presently he spoke it was in faltering
+accents.
+
+"It - it - seems, monsieur, that - ah - that I have been the victim
+of some imposture."
+
+"It had rather seemed to me that the victim chosen was myself."
+
+"Clearly we were both victims," the Seneschal rejoined.  Then he
+proceeded to explain.  "I went to Condillac yesterday as you desired
+me, and after a stormy interview with the Marquise I obtained from
+her - as I believed - the person of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+You see I was not myself acquainted with the lady."
+
+Garnache looked at him.  He did not believe him.  He regretted
+almost that he had not further questioned the girl.  But, after all,
+perhaps it might be easier and more expedient if he were to appear
+to accept the Seneschal's statement.  But he must provide against
+further fraud.
+
+"Monsieur le Seneschal," said he in calmer tones, putting his anger
+from him, "at the best you are a blunderer and an ass, at the worst
+a traitor.  I will inquire no further at present; I'll not seek to
+discriminate too finely."
+
+"Monsieur, these insults - " began the Seneschal, summoning dignity
+to his aid.  But Garnache broke in:
+
+"La, la!  I speak in the Queen's name.  If you have thought to aid
+the Dowager of Condillac in this resistance of Her Majesty's mandate,
+let me enjoin you, as you value your seneschalship - as you value
+your very neck - to harbour that thought no longer.
+
+"It seems that, after all, I must deal myself with the situation.
+I must go myself to Condillac.  If they should resist me, I shall
+look to you for the necessary means to overcome that resistance.
+
+"And bear you this in mind: I have chosen to leave it an open
+question whether you were a party to the trick it has been sought
+to put upon the Queen, through me, her representative.  But it is
+a question that I have it in my power to resolve at any moment - to
+resolve as I choose.  Unless, monsieur, I find you hereafter - as
+I trust - actuated by the most unswerving loyalty, I shall resolve
+that question by proclaiming you a traitor; and as a traitor I shall
+arrest you and carry you to Paris.  Monsieur le Seneschal, I have
+the honour to give you good-day!"
+
+When he was gone, Monsieur de Tressan flung off his wig, and mopped
+the perspiration from his brow.  He went white as snow and red as
+fire by turns, as he paced the apartment in a frenzy.  Never in the
+fifteen years that were sped since he had been raised to the
+governorship of the province had any man taken such a tone with him
+and harangued him in such terms.
+
+A liar and a traitor had he been called that morning, a knave and
+a fool; he had been browbeaten and threatened; and he had swallowed
+it all, and almost turned to lick the hand that administered the
+dose.  Dame!  What manner of cur was he become?  And the man who
+had done all this - a vulgar upstart out of Paris, reeking of
+leather and the barrack-room still lived!
+
+Bloodshed was in his mind; murder beckoned him alluringly to take
+her as his ally.  But he put the thought from him, frenzied though
+he might be.  He must fight this knave with other weapons; frustrate
+his mission, and send him back to Paris and the Queen's scorn,
+beaten and empty-handed.
+
+"Babylas's!" he shouted.
+
+Immediately the secretary appeared.
+
+"Have you given thought to the matter of Captain d'Aubran?" he
+asked, his voice an impatient snarl.
+
+"Yes, monsieur, I have pondered it all morning."
+
+"Well?  And what have you concluded?"
+
+"Helas! monsieur, nothing."
+
+Tressan smote the table before him a blow that shook some of the
+dust out of the papers that cumbered it.  "Ventregris!  How am I
+served?  For what do I pay you, and feed you, and house you,
+good-for-naught, if you are to fail me whenever I need the things
+you call your brains?  Have you no intelligence, no thought, no
+imagination?  Can you invent no plausible business, no likely
+rising, no possible disturbances that shall justify my sending
+Aubran and his men to Montelimar - to the very devil, if need be."
+
+The secretary trembled in his every limb; his eyes shunned his
+master's as his master's had shunned Garnache's awhile ago.  The
+Seneschal was enjoying himself.  If he had been bullied and
+browbeaten, here, at least, was one upon whom he, in his turn,
+might taste the joys of bullying and browbeating.
+
+"You lazy, miserable calf," he stormed, "I might be better served
+by a wooden image.  Go!  It seems I must rely upon myself.  It is
+always so.  Wait!" he thundered; for the secretary, only too glad
+to obey his last order, had already reached the door.  "Tell
+Anselme to bid the Captain attend me here at once."
+
+Babylas's bowed and went his errand.
+
+A certain amount of his ill-humour vented, Tressan made an effort
+to regain his self-control.  He passed his handkerchief for the
+last time over face and head, and resumed his wig.
+
+When d'Aubran entered, the Seneschal was composed and in his wonted
+habit of ponderous dignity.  "Ah, d'Aubran," said he, "your men
+are ready?"
+
+"They have been ready these four-and-twenty hours, monsieur."
+
+"Good.  You are a brisk soldier, d'Aubran.  You are a man to be
+relied upon."
+
+D'Aubran bowed.  He was a tall, active young fellow with a pleasant
+face and a pair of fine black eyes.
+
+"Monsieur le Seneschal is very good."
+
+With a wave of the hand the Seneschal belittled his own goodness.
+
+"You will march out of Grenoble within the hour, Captain, and you
+will lead your men to Montelimar.  There you will quarter them, and
+await my further orders.  Babylas will give you a letter to the
+authorities, charging them to find you suitable quarters.  While
+there, d'Aubran, and until my further orders reach you, you will
+employ your time in probing the feeling in the hill district.  You
+understand?"
+
+"Imperfectly," d'Aubran confessed.
+
+"You will understand better when you have been in Montelimar a week
+or so.  It may, of course, be a false alarm.  Still, we must
+safeguard the King's interests and be prepared.  Perhaps we may
+afterwards be charged with starting at shadows; but it is better to
+be on the alert from the moment the shadow is perceived than to
+wait until the substance itself has overwhelmed us."
+
+It sounded so very much as if the Seneschal's words really had some
+hidden meaning, that d'Aubran, if not content with going upon an
+errand of which he knew so little, was, at least, reconciled to
+obey the orders he received.  He uttered words that conveyed some
+such idea to Tressan's mind, and within a half-hour he was marching
+out of Grenoble with beating drums, on his two days' journey to
+Montelimar.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE CHATEAU DE CONDILLAC
+
+
+As Captain d'Aubran and his troop were speeding westwards from
+Grenoble, Monsieur de Garnache, ever attended by his man, rode
+briskly in the opposite direction, towards the grey towers of
+Condillac, that reared themselves towards the greyer sky above the
+valley of the Isere.  It was a chill, dull, autumnal day, with a
+raw wind blowing from the Alps; its breath was damp, and foretold
+of the rain that was likely to come anon, the rain with which the
+clouds hanging low about the distant hills were pregnant.
+
+But Monsieur de Garnache was totally insensible to his surroundings;
+his mind was very busy with the interview from which he had come,
+and the interview to which he was speeding.  Once he permitted
+himself a digression, that he might point a moral for the benefit
+of his servant.
+
+"You see, Rebecque, what a plague it is to have to do with women.
+Are you sufficiently grateful to me for having quelled your
+matrimonial ardour of two months ago?  No, you are not.  Grateful
+you may be; sufficiently grateful, never; it would be impossible.
+No gratitude could be commensurate with the benefit I conferred
+upon you.  Yet if you had married, and discovered for yourself
+the troubles that come from too close an association with that sex
+which some wag of old ironically called the weaker, and of which
+contemporary fools with no sense of irony continue so to speak in
+good faith, you could have blamed only yourself.  You would have
+shrugged your shoulders and made the best of it, realizing that no
+other man had put this wrong upon you.  But with me - thousand
+devils! - it is very different.  I am a man who, in one particular
+at least, has chosen his way of life with care; I have seen to it
+that I should walk a road unencumbered by any petticoat.  What
+happens?  What comes of all my careful plans?
+
+"Fate sends an infernal cut-throat to murder our good king - whose
+soul God rest eternally!  And since his son is of an age too
+tender to wield the sceptre, the boy's mother does it in his name.
+Thus, I, a soldier, being subject to the head of the State, find
+myself, by no devising of my own, subject to a woman.
+
+"In itself that is bad enough.  Too bad, indeed - Ventregris! - too
+bad.  Yet Fate is not content.  It must occur to this woman to
+select me - me of all men - to journey into Dauphiny, and release
+another woman from the clutches of yet a third.  And to what shifts
+are we not put, to what discomforts not subjected?  You know them,
+Rabecque, for you have shared them with me.  But it begins to break
+upon my mind that what we have endured may be as nothing to what
+may lie before us.  It is an ill thing to have to do with women.
+Yet you, Rabecque, would have deserted me for one of them!"
+
+Rabecque was silent.  Maybe he was ashamed of himself; or maybe
+that, not agreeing with his master, he had yet sufficient
+appreciation of his position to be discreetly silent where his
+opinions might be at variance.  Thus Garnache was encouraged to
+continue.
+
+"And what is all this trouble about, which they have sent me to
+set right?  About a marriage.  There is a girl wants to marry one
+man, and a woman who wants to marry her to another.  Ponder the
+possibilities of tragedy in such a situation.  Half this world's
+upheavals have had their source in less.  Yet you, Rabecque,
+would have married!"
+
+Necessity at last turned his discourse to other matters.
+
+"Tell me, now," said he abruptly, in a different tone, "is there
+hereabouts a ford?"
+
+"There is a bridge up yonder, monsieur," returned the servant,
+thankful to have the conversation changed.
+
+They rode towards it in silence, Garnache's eyes set now upon the
+grey pile that crowned the hillock, a half-mile away, on the
+opposite bank of the stream.  They crossed the bridge and rode up
+the gently rising, bare, and rugged ground towards Condillac.  The
+place wore an entirely peaceful air, strong and massive though it
+appeared.  It was encircled by a ditch, but the drawbridge was
+down, and the rust on its chains argued that long had it been so.
+
+None coming to challenge them, the pair rode across the planks,
+and the dull thud of their hooves started into activity some one
+in the gatehouse.
+
+A fellow rudely clad - a hybrid between man-at-arms and lackey -
+lounged on a musket to confront them in the gateway. Monsieur de
+Garnache announced his name, adding that he came to crave an
+audience of Madame la Marquise, and the man stood aside to admit
+him. Thus he and Rabecque rode forward into the roughly paved
+courtyard.
+
+From several doorways other men emerged, some of martial bearing,
+showing that the place was garrisoned to some extent.  Garnache
+took little heed of them.  He flung his reins to the man whom he
+had first addressed - the fellow had kept pace beside him - and
+leapt nimbly to the ground, bidding Rabecque await him there.
+
+The soldier lackey resigned the reins to Rabecque, and requested
+Monsieur de Garnache to follow him.  He led the way through a door
+on the left, down a passage and across an anteroom, and ushered the
+visitor finally into a spacious, gloomy hall, panelled in black oak
+and lighted as much by the piled-up fire that flared on the noble
+hearth as by the grey daylight that filtered through the tall
+mullioned windows.
+
+As they entered, a liver-coloured hound that lay stretched before
+the fire growled lazily, and showed the whites of his eyes.  Paying
+little attention to the dog, Garnache looked about him.  The
+apartment was handsome beyond praise, in a sombre, noble fashion.
+It was hung with pictures of departed Condillacs - some of them
+rudely wrought enough - with trophies of ancient armour, and with
+implements of the chase.  In the centre stood an oblong table of
+black oak, very richly carved about its massive legs, and in a
+china bowl, on this, an armful of late roses filled the room with
+their sweet fragrance.
+
+Then Garnache espied a page on the window-seat, industriously
+burnishing a cuirass.  He pursued his task, indifferent to the
+newcomer's advent, until the knave who had conducted thither the
+Parisian called the boy and bade him go tell the Marquise that a
+Monsieur de Garnache, with a message from the Queen-Regent, begged
+an audience.
+
+The boy rose, and simultaneously, out of a great chair by the
+hearth, whose tall back had hitherto concealed him, there rose
+another figure.  This was a stripling of some twenty summers -
+twenty-one, in fact - of a pale, beautifully featured face, black
+hair and fine black eyes, and very sumptuously clad in a suit of
+shimmering silk whose colour shifted from green to purple as he
+moved.
+
+Monsieur de Garnache assumed that he was in the presence of Marius
+de Condillac.  He bowed a trifle stiffly, and was surprised to have
+his bow returned with a graciousness that amounted almost to
+cordiality.
+
+"You are from Paris, monsieur?" said the young man, in a gentle,
+pleasant voice.  "I fear you have had indifferent weather for your
+journey."
+
+Garnache thought of other things besides the weather that he had
+found indifferent, and he felt warmed almost to the point of anger
+at the very recollection.  But he bowed again, and answered amiably
+enough.
+
+The young man offered him a seat, assuring him that his mother would
+not keep him waiting long.  The page had already gone upon his errand.
+
+Garnache took the proffered chair, and sank down with creak and
+jingle to warm himself at the fire.
+
+"From what you have said, I gather that you are Monsieur Marius de
+Condillac," said he.  "I, as you may have heard me announced by your
+servant, am Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache - at your service."
+
+"We have heard of you, Monsieur de Garnache," said the youth as he
+crossed his shapely legs of silken violet, and fingered the great
+pearl that depended from his ear.  "But we had thought that by now
+you would be on your way to Paris."
+
+"No doubt - with Margot," was the grim rejoinder.
+
+But Marius either gathered no suggestion from its grimness, or did
+not know the name Garnache uttered, for he continued:
+
+"We understood that you were to escort Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye
+to Paris, to place her under the tutelage of the Queen-Regent.  I
+will not conceal from you that we were chagrined at the reflection
+cast upon Condillac; nevertheless, Her Majesty's word is law in
+Dauphiny as much as it is in Paris."
+
+"Quite as much, and I am relieved to hear you confess it," said
+Garnache drily, and he scanned more closely the face of this young
+man.  He found cause to modify the excellent impression he had
+received at first.  Marius's eyebrows were finely pencilled, but
+they arched a shade too much, and his eyes were set a trifle too
+closely; the mouth, which had seemed beautiful at first, looked,
+in addition, on this closer inspection, weak, sensual, and cruel.
+
+There fell upon the momentary silence the sound of an opening door,
+and both men rose simultaneously to their feet.
+
+In the splendid woman that entered, Monsieur de Garnache saw a
+wonderful likeness to the boy who stood beside him.  She received
+the emissary very graciously.  Marius set a chair for her between
+the two they had been occupying, and thus interchanging phrases of
+agreeable greeting the three sat down about the hearth with every
+show of the greatest amity.
+
+A younger man might have been put out of countenance; the woman's
+surpassing beauty, her charm of manner, her melodious voice, falling
+on the ear soft and gentle as a caress, might have turned a man of
+less firmness a little from his purpose, a little perhaps from his
+loyalty and the duty that had brought him all the way from Paris.
+But Monsieur de Garnache was to her thousand graces as insensible
+as a man of stone.  And he came to business briskly.  He had no mind
+to spend the day at her fireside in pleasant, meaningless talk.
+
+"Madame," said he, "monsieur your son informs me that you have heard
+of me and of the business that brings me into Dauphiny.  I had not
+looked for the honour of journeying quite so far as Condillac; but
+since Monsieur de Tressan, whom I made my ambassador, appears to
+have failed so signally, I am constrained to inflict my presence
+upon you."
+
+"Inflict?" quoth she, with a pretty look of make-believe dismay.
+"How harsh a word, monsieur!"
+
+The smoothness of the implied compliment annoyed him.
+
+"I will use any word you think more adequate, madame, if you will
+suggest it," he answered tartly.
+
+"There are a dozen I might suggest that would better fit the case
+ - and with more justice to yourself," she answered, with a smile
+that revealed a gleam of white teeth behind her scarlet lips.
+"Marcus, bid Benoit bring wine.  Monsieur de Garnache will no doubt
+be thirsting after his ride."
+
+Garnache said nothing.  Acknowledge the courtesy he would not;
+refuse it he could not.  So he sat, and waited for her to speak,
+his eyes upon the fire.
+
+Madame had already set herself a course.  Keener witted than her
+son, she had readily understood, upon Garnache's being announced to
+her, that his visit meant the failure of the imposture by which she
+had sought to be rid of him.
+
+"I think, monsieur," she said presently, watching him from under
+her lids, "that we have, all of us who are concerned in Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye's affairs, been at cross-purposes.  She is an
+impetuous, impulsive child, and it happened that some little time
+ago we had words - such things will happen in the most united
+families.  Whilst the heat of her foolish anger was upon her, she
+wrote a letter to the Queen, in which she desired to be removed
+from my tutelage.  Since then, monsieur, she has come to repent her
+of it.  You, who no doubt understand a woman's mind - "
+
+"Set out upon no such presumption, madame," he interrupted.  "I
+know as little of a woman's mind as any man who thinks he knows a
+deal - and that is nothing."
+
+She laughed as at an excellent jest, and Marius, overhearing
+Garnache's retort as he was returning to resume his seat, joined
+in her laugh.
+
+"Paris is a fine whetstone for a man's wits," said he.
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I take it, madame, that you wish me to understand that Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye, repenting of her letter, desires no longer to repair
+to Paris; desires, in fact, to remain here at Condillac in your
+excellent care."
+
+"You apprehend the position exactly, monsieur."
+
+"To my mind," said he, "it presents few features difficult of
+apprehension."
+
+Marius's eyes flashed his mother a look of relief; but the Marquise,
+who had an ear more finely trained, caught the vibration of a second
+meaning in the emissary's words.
+
+"All being as you say, madame," he continued, "will you tell me why,
+instead of some message to this purport, you sent Monsieur de
+Tressan back to me with a girl taken from some kitchen or barnyard,
+whom it was sought to pass off upon me as Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye?"
+
+The Marquise laughed, and her son, who had shown signs of
+perturbation, taking his cue from her, laughed too.
+
+"It was a jest, monsieur" - she told him, miserably conscious that
+the explanation could sound no lamer.
+
+"My compliments, madame, upon the humour that prevails in Dauphiny.
+But your jest failed of its purpose.  It did not amuse me, nor, so
+far as I could discern, was Monsieur de Tressan greatly taken with
+it.  But all this is of little moment, madame," he continued.
+"Since you tell me that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye is content to
+remain here, I am satisfied that it is so."
+
+They were the very words that she desired to hear from him; yet his
+manner of uttering them gave her little reassurance.  The smile on
+her lips was forced; her watchful eyes smiled not at all.
+
+"Still," he continued, "you will be so good as to remember that I
+am not my own master in this affair.  Were that so, I should not
+fail to relieve you at once of my unbidden presence."
+
+"Oh, monsieur - "
+
+"But, being the Queen's emissary, I have her orders to obey, and
+those orders are to convey Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to Paris.
+They make no allowance for any change that may have occurred in
+mademoiselle's inclinations.  If the journey is now distasteful to
+her, she has but her own rashness to blame in having sought it
+herself.  What imports is that she is bidden by the Queen to repair
+to Paris; as a loyal subject she must obey the Queen's commands;
+you, as a loyal subject, must see to it that she obeys them.  So,
+madame, I count upon your influence with mademoiselle to see that
+she is ready to set out by noon to-morrow.  One day already has
+been wasted me by your - ah - jest, madame.  The Queen likes her
+ambassadors to be brisk."
+
+The Dowager reclined in her chair, and bit her lip.  This man was
+too keen for her.  She had no illusions.  He had seen through her
+as if she had been made of glass; he had penetrated her artifices
+and detected her falsehoods.  Yet feigning to believe her and them,
+he had first neutralized her only weapons - other than offensive -
+then used them for her own defeat.  Marius it was who took up the
+conversation.
+
+"Monsieur," he cried - and there was a frown drawing together his
+fine brows - "what you suggest amounts to a tyranny on the Queen's
+part."
+
+Garnache was on his feet, his chair grating the polished floor.
+
+"Monsieur says?" quoth he, his glittering eye challenging the rash
+boy to repeat his words.
+
+But the Dowager intervened with a little trill of laughter.
+
+"Bon Dieu!  Marius, what are you saying?  Foolish boy!  And you,
+Monsieur de Garnache, do not heed him, I beg you.  We are so far
+from Court in this little corner of Dauphiny, and my son has been
+reared in so free an atmosphere that he is sometimes betrayed into
+expressions whose impropriety he does not realize."
+
+Garnache bowed in token of his perfect satisfaction, and at that
+moment two servants entered bearing flagons and beakers, fruits and
+sweetmeats, which they placed upon the table.  The Dowager rose,
+and went to do the honours of the board.  The servants withdrew.
+
+"You will taste our wine of Condillac, monsieur?"
+
+He acquiesced, expressing thanks, and watched her fill a beaker for
+him, one for herself, and another for her son.  She brought him the
+cup in her hands.  He took it with a grave inclination of the head.
+Then she proffered him the sweetmeats.  To take one, he set down the
+cup on the table, by which he had also come to stand.  His left hand
+was gloved and held his beaver and whip.
+
+She nibbled, herself, at one of the comfits, and he followed her
+example.  The boy, a trifle sullen since the last words, stood on
+the hearth with his back to the fire, his hands clasped behind him.
+
+"Monsieur," she said, "do you think it would enable you to comply
+with what I have signified to be not only our own wishes, but those
+of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye herself, if she were to state them
+to you?"
+
+He looked up sharply, his lips parting in a smile that revealed his
+strong white teeth.
+
+"Are you proposing another of your jests, madame?"
+
+She laughed outright.  A wonderful assurance was hers, thought
+Monsieur de Garnache.  "Mon Dieu! no, monsieur," she cried.  "If
+you will, you may see the lady herself."
+
+He took a turn in the apartment, idly, as does a man in thought.
+
+"Very well," said he, at last.  "I do not say that it will alter my
+determination.  But perhaps - yes, I should be glad of an opportunity
+of the honour of making Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye's acquaintance.
+But no impersonations, I beg, madame!"  He said it half-laughingly,
+taking his cue from her.
+
+"You need have no fear of any."
+
+She walked to the door, opened it, and called "Gaston!"  In answer
+came the page whom Garnache had found in the room when he was
+admitted.
+
+"Desire Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to come to us here at once,"
+she bade the boy, and closed the door.
+
+Garnache had been all eyes for some furtive sign, some whispered
+word; but he had surprised neither.
+
+His pacing had brought him to the opposite end of the board, where
+stood the cup of wine madame had poured for Marius.  His own,
+Garnache, had left untouched.  As if abstractedly, he now took up
+the beaker, pledged madame with his glance, and drank.  She watched
+him, and suddenly a suspicion darted through her mind - a suspicion
+that he suspected them.
+
+Dieu!  What a man was this!  He took no chances.  Madame reflected
+that this augured ill for the success of the last resource upon
+which, should all else fail, she was counting to keep mademoiselle
+at Condillac.  It seemed incredible that one so wary and watchful
+should have committed the rashness of venturing alone into Condillac
+without taking his precautions to ensure his ability to retreat.
+
+In her heart she felt daunted by him.  But in the matter of that
+wine - the faintest of smiles hovered on her lips, her eyebrows
+went up a shade.  Then she took up the cup that had been poured for
+the Parisian, and bore it to her son.
+
+"Marius, you are not drinking," said she.  And seeing a command in
+her eyes; he took the beaker from her hand and bore it to his lips,
+emptying the half of it, whilst with the faintest smile of scorn the
+Dowager swept Garnache a glance of protest, as of one repudiating
+an unworthy challenge.
+
+Then the door opened, and the eyes of all three were centred upon
+the girl that entered.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LOSES HIS TEMPER
+
+
+"You sent for me, madame," said the girl, seeming to hesitate upon
+the threshold of the room, and her voice - a pleasant, boyish
+contralto - was very cold and conveyed a suggestion of disdain.
+
+The Marquise detected that inauspicious note, and was moved by it
+to regret her already of having embarked upon so bold a game as to
+confront Monsieur de Garnache with Valerie.  It was a step she had
+decided upon as a last means of convincing the Parisian of the truth
+of her statement touching the change that had taken place in
+mademoiselle's inclinations.  And she had provided for it as soon
+as she heard of Garnache's arrival by informing mademoiselle that
+should she be sent for, she must tell the gentleman from Paris that
+it was her wish to remain at Condillac.  Mademoiselle had
+incontinently refused, and madame, to win her compliance, had
+resorted to threats.
+
+"You will do as you consider best, of course," she had said, in a
+voice that was ominously sweet.  "But I promise you that if you do
+otherwise than as I tell you, you shall be married before sunset to
+Marius, whether you be willing or not.  Monsieur de Garnache comes
+alone, and if I so will it alone he shall depart or not at all.  I
+have men enough at Condillac to see my orders carried out, no matter
+what they be.
+
+"You may tell yourself that this fellow will return to help you.
+Perhaps he will; but when he does, it will be too late so far as you
+shall be concerned."
+
+Terrified by that threat, Valerie had blenched, and had felt her
+spirit deserting her.
+
+"And if I comply, madame?" she had asked.  "If I do as you wish, if
+I tell this gentleman that I no longer desire to go to Paris - what
+then?"
+
+The Dowager's manner had become more affectionate.  She had patted
+the shrinking girl upon the shoulder.  "In that case, Valerie, you
+shall suffer no constraint; you shall continue here as you have done."
+
+"And has there been no constraint hitherto?" had been the girl's
+indignant rejoinder.
+
+"Hardly, child," the Dowager had returned.  "We have sought to
+guide you to a wise choice - no more than that.  Nor shall we do
+more hereafter if you do my pleasure now and give this Monsieur de
+Garnache the answer that I bid you.  But if you fail me, remember
+ - you marry Marius before nightfall."
+
+She had not waited for the girl to promise her compliance.  She was
+too clever a woman to show anxiety on that score.  She left her with
+that threat vibrating in her mind, confident that she would scare
+the girl into obedience by the very assurance she exhibited that
+Valerie would not dare to disobey.
+
+But now, at the sound of that chill voice, at the sight of that calm,
+resolved countenance, madame was regretting that she had not stayed
+to receive the girl's promise before she made so very sure of her
+pliability.
+
+She glanced anxiously at Garnache.  His eyes were upon the girl.  He
+was remarking the slender, supple figure, moderately tall and looking
+taller in its black gown of mourning; the oval face, a trifle pale
+now from the agitation that stirred her, with its fine level brows,
+its clear, hazel eyes, and its crown of lustrous brown hair rolled
+back under the daintiest of white coifs.  His glance dwelt
+appreciatively on the slender nose, with its delicate nostrils, the
+charming line of mouth and chin, the dazzling whiteness of her skin,
+conspicuous not only in neck and face but in the long, slender hands
+that were clasped before her.
+
+These signs of breeding, everywhere proclaimed, left him content
+that here was no imposture; the girl before him was, indeed, Valerie
+de La Vauvraye.
+
+At madame's invitation she came forward.  Marius hastened to close
+the door and to set a chair for her, his manner an admirable
+suggestion of ardour restrained by deference.
+
+She sat down with an outward calm under which none would have
+suspected the full extent of her agitation, and she bent her eyes
+upon the man whom the Queen had sent for her deliverance.
+
+After all, Garnache's appearance was hardly suggestive of the role
+of Perseus which had been thrust upon him.  She saw a tall, spare
+man, with prominent cheek-bones, a gaunt, high-bridged nose, very
+fierce mustachios, and a pair of eyes that were as keen as
+sword-blades and felt to her glance as penetrating.  There was
+little about him like to take a woman's fancy or claim more than a
+moderate share of her attention, even when circumstances rendered
+her as interested in him as was now Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+
+There fell a silence, broken at last by Marius, who leaned, a
+supple, graceful figure, his elbow resting upon the summit of
+Valerie's chair.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache does us the injustice to find a difficulty
+in believing that you no longer wish to leave us."
+
+That was by no means what Garnache had implied; still, since it
+really expressed his mind, he did not trouble to correct Marius.
+
+Valerie said nothing, but her eyes travelled to madame's countenance,
+where she found a frown.  Garnache observed the silence, and drew
+his own conclusions.
+
+"So we have sent for you, Valerie," said the Dowager, taking up her
+son's sentence, "that you may yourself assure Monsieur de Garnache
+that it is so."
+
+Her voice was stern; it bore to the girl's ears a subtle, unworded
+repetition of the threat the Marquise had already voiced.
+Mademoiselle caught it, and Garnache caught it too, although he
+failed to interpret it as precisely as he would have liked.
+
+The girl seemed to experience a difficulty in answering.  Her eyes
+roved to Garnache's, and fell away in affright before their glitter.
+That man's glance seemed to read her very mind, she thought; and
+suddenly the reflection that had terrified her became her hope.  If
+it were as she deemed it, what matter what she said?  He would know
+the truth, in spite of all.
+
+"Yes, madame," she said at last, and her voice was wholly void of
+expression.  "Yes, monsieur, it is as madame says.  It is my wish
+to remain at Condillac."
+
+From the Dowager, standing a pace or two away from Garnache, came
+the sound of a half-sigh.  Garnache missed nothing.  He caught the
+sound, and accepted it as an expression of relief.  The Marquise
+stepped back a pace; idly, one might have thought; not so thought
+Garnache.  It had this advantage: that it enabled her to stand where
+he might not watch her face without turning his head.  He was content
+that such was her motive.  To defeat her object, to show her that he
+had guessed it, he stepped back, too, also with that same idleness
+of air, so that he was once more in line with her.  And then he
+spoke, addressing Valerie.
+
+"Mademoiselle, that you should have written to the Queen in haste
+is deplorable now that your views have undergone this change.  I am
+a stupid man, mademoiselle, just a blunt soldier with orders to
+obey and no authority to think.  My orders are to conduct you to
+Paris.  Your will was not taken into consideration.  I know not how
+the Queen would have me act, seeing your reluctance; it may be that
+she would elect to leave you here, as you desire.  But it is not
+for me to arrogate to determine the Queen's mind.  I can but be
+guided by her orders, and those orders leave me no course but one
+ - to ask you, mademoiselle, to make ready immediately to go with
+me."
+
+The look of relief that swept into Valerie's face, the little flush
+of colour that warmed her cheeks, hitherto so pale, were all the
+confirmation that he needed of what he suspected.
+
+"But, monsieur," said Marius, "it must be plain to you that since
+the Queen's orders are but a compliance with mademoiselle's wishes,
+now that mademoiselle's wishes have altered, so too would Her
+Majesty's commands alter to comply with them once more."
+
+"That may be plain to you, monsieur; for me, unfortunately, there
+are my orders for only guide," Garnache persisted.  "Does not
+mademoiselle herself agree with me?"
+
+She was about to speak; her glance had looked eager, her lips had
+parted.  Then, of a sudden, the little colour faded from her cheeks
+again, and she seemed stricken with a silence.  Garnache's eyes,
+directed in a sidelong glance to the Marquise's face, surprised
+there a frown that had prompted that sudden change.
+
+He half-turned, his manner changing suddenly to a freezing civility.
+
+"Madame la Marquise," said he, "I beg with all deference to suggest
+that I am not allowed the interview you promised me with Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye."
+
+The ominous coldness with which he had begun to speak had had a
+disturbing effect upon the Dowager; the words he uttered, when she
+had weighed them, brought an immense relief.  It seemed, then, that
+he but needed convincing that this was Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+This argued that for the rest he was satisfied.
+
+"There, monsieur, you are at fault," she cried, and she was smiling
+into his grave eyes.  "Because once I put that jest upon you, you
+imagine - "
+
+"No, no," he broke in.  "You misapprehend me.  I do not say that
+this is not Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye; I do not say that - "
+
+He paused; he was at the end of his resources.  He did not know how
+to put the thing without giving offence, and it had been his resolve
+ - realizing the necessity for it - to conduct this matter with a
+grave courtesy.
+
+To feel that after having carried the affair so far with a for him
+ - commendable lightness of touch, he should be at a loss for a
+delicate word to convey a harsh accusation began to anger him.  And
+once Garnache began to be angered, the rest followed quickly.  It
+was just that flaw in his character that had been the ruin of him,
+that had blighted what otherwise might have been a brilliant career.
+Astute and wily as a fox, brave as a lion, and active as a panther,
+gifted with intelligence, insight and resource, he had carried a
+dozen enterprises up to the very threshold of success, there to have
+ruined them all by giving way to some sudden access of choler.
+
+So was it now.  His pause was but momentary.  Yet in that moment,
+from calm and freezing that he had been, he became ruffled and hot.
+The change was visible in his heightened colour, in his flashing
+eyes, and in his twitching mustachios.  For just a second he sought
+to smother his wrath; he had a glimmer of remembrance of the need
+for caution and diplomacy in the darkness of anger that was
+descending over him.  Then, without further warning, he exploded.
+
+His nervous, sinewy hand clenched itself and fell with a crash upon
+the table, overturning a flagon and sending a lake of wine across
+the board, to trickle over at a dozen points and form in puddles at
+the feet of Valerie.  Startled, they all watched him, mademoiselle
+the most startled of the three.
+
+"Madame," he thundered, "I have been receiving dancing-lessons at
+your hands for long enough.  It is time, I think, we did a little
+ordinary walking, else shall we get no farther along the road I mean
+to go and that is the road to Paris with mademoiselle for company."
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur!" cried the startled Marquise, placing herself
+intrepidly before him; and Marius trembled for her, for so wild did
+the man seem that he almost feared he might strike her.
+
+"I have heard enough," he blazed.  "Not another word from any here
+in Condillac!  I'll take this lady with me now, at once; and if any
+here raises a finger to resist me, as Heaven is my witness, it will
+be the last resistance he will ever offer any man.  Let a hand be
+laid upon me, or a sword bared before my eyes, and I swear, madame,
+that I'll come back and burn this dunghill of rebellion to the
+ground."
+
+In the blindness of his passion all his fine keenness was cast to
+the wind, his all-observing watchfulness was smothered in the cloud
+of anger that oppressed his brain.  He never saw the sign that
+madame made to her son, never so much as noticed Marius's stealthy
+progress towards the door.
+
+"Oh," he continued, a satirical note running now through his
+tempestuous voice, "it is a fine thing to cozen each other with
+honeyed words, with smirks and with grimaces.  But we have done
+with that, madame."  He towered grimly above her, shaking a
+threatening finger in her very face.  "We have done with that.  We
+shall resort to deeds, instead."
+
+"Aye, monsieur," she answered very coldly, sneering upon his
+red-hot fury, "there shall be deeds enough to satisfy even your
+outrageous thirst for them."
+
+That cold, sneering voice, with its note of threat, was like a hand
+of ice upon his overheated brain.  It cooled him on the instant.
+He stiffened, and looked about him.  He saw that Marius had
+disappeared, and that mademoiselle had risen and was regarding him
+with singularly imploring eyes.
+
+He bit his lip in mortified chagrin.  He cursed himself inwardly
+for a fool and a dolt - the more pitiable because he accounted
+himself cunning above others.  Had he but kept his temper, had he
+done no more than maintain the happy pretence that he was a slave
+to the orders he had received - a mere machine - he might have
+gained his ends by sheer audacity.  At least, his way of retreat
+would have remained open, and he might have gone, to return another
+day with force at his heels.
+
+As it was, that pretty whelp, her son, had been sent, no doubt, for
+men.  He stepped up to Valerie.
+
+"Are you ready, mademoiselle?" said he; for little hope though he
+might still have of winning through, yet he must do the best to
+repair the damage that was of his making.
+
+She saw that the storm of passion had passed, and she was infected
+by the sudden, desperate daring that prompted that question of his.
+
+"I am ready, monsieur," said she, and her boyish voice had an
+intrepid ring.  "I will come with you as I am."
+
+"Then, in God's name, let us be going."
+
+They moved together towards the door, with never another glance for
+the Dowager where she stood, patting the head of the hound that had
+risen and come to stand beside her.  In silence she watched them,
+a sinister smile upon her beautiful, ivory face.
+
+Then came a sound of feet and voices in the anteroom.  The door was
+flung violently open, and a half-dozen men with naked swords came
+blundering into the room, Marius bringing up the rear.
+
+With a cry of fear Valerie shrank back against the panelled wall,
+her little hands to her cheeks, her eyes dilating with alarm.
+
+Garnache's sword rasped out, an oath rattled from his clenched teeth,
+and he fell on guard.  The men paused, and took his measure.  Marius
+urged them on, as if they had been a pack of dogs.
+
+"At him!" he snapped, his finger pointing, his handsome eyes flashing
+angrily.  "Cut him down!"
+
+They moved; but mademoiselle moved at the same moment.  She sprang
+before them, between their swords and their prey.
+
+"You shall not do it; you shall not do it!" she cried, and her face
+looked drawn, her eyes distraught.  "It is murder - murder, you
+curs!"  And the memory of how that dainty little lady stood undaunted
+before so much bared steel, to shield him from those assassins, was
+one that abode ever after with Garnache.
+
+"Mademoiselle," said he, in a quiet voice, "if you will but stand
+aside there will be some murder done among them first."
+
+But she did not move.  Marius clenched his hands, fretted by the
+delay.  The Dowager looked on and smiled and patted her dog's head.
+To her mademoiselle now turned in appeal.
+
+"Madame," she exclaimed, "you'll not allow it.  You'll not let them
+do this thing.  Bid them put up their swords, madame.  Bethink you
+that Monsieur de Garnache is here in the Queen's name."
+
+Too well did madame bethink her of it.  Garnache need not plague
+himself with vexation that his rash temper alone had wrought his
+ruin now.  It had but accelerated it.  It was just possible, perhaps,
+that suavity might have offered him opportunities; but, for the rest,
+from the moment that he showed himself firm in his resolve to carry
+mademoiselle to Paris, his doom was sealed.  Madame would never
+willingly have allowed him to leave Condillac alive, for she realized
+that did she do so he would stir up trouble enough to have them
+outlawed.  He must perish here, and be forgotten.  If questions came
+to be asked later, Condillac would know nothing of him.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache promised us some fine deeds on his own account,"
+she mocked him.  "We but afford him the opportunity to perform them.
+If these be not enough for his exceeding valour, there are more men
+without whom we can summon."
+
+A feeling of pity for mademoiselle - perhaps of no more than
+decency - now overcame Marius.  He stepped forward.
+
+"Valerie," he said, "it is not fitting you should remain."
+
+"Aye, take her hence," the Dowager bade him, with a smile.  "Her
+presence is unmanning our fine Parisian."
+
+Eager to do so, over-eager, Marius came forward, past his men-at-arms,
+until he was but some three paces from the girl and just out of reach
+of a sudden dart of Garnache's sword.
+
+Softly, very warily, Garnache slipped his right foot a little farther
+to the right.  Suddenly he threw his weight upon it, so that he was
+clear of the girl.  Before they understood what he was about, the
+thing had taken place.  He had leaped forward, caught the young man
+by the breast of his shimmering doublet, leaped back to shelter
+beyond mademoiselle, hurled Marius to the ground, and planted his
+foot, shod as it was in his thickly mudded riding-boot, full upon
+the boy's long, shapely neck.
+
+"Move so much as a finger, my pretty fellow," he snapped at him,
+"and I'll crush the life from you as from a toad."
+
+There was a sudden forward movement on the part of the men; but if
+Garnache was vicious, he was calm.  Were he again to lose his temper
+now, there would indeed be a speedy end to him.  That much he knew,
+and kept repeating to himself, lest he should be tempted to forget
+it.
+
+"Back!" he bade them in a voice so imperative that they stopped,
+and looked on with gaping mouths.  "Back, or he perishes!"  And
+dropping the point of his sword, he lightly rested it upon the
+young man's breast.
+
+In dismay they looked to the Dowager for instruction.  She craned
+forward, the smile gone from her lips, a horror in her eyes, her
+bosom heaving.  A moment ago she had smiled upon mademoiselle's
+outward signs of fear; had mademoiselle been so minded, she might
+in her turn have smiled now at the terror written large upon the
+Dowager's own face.  But her attention was all absorbed by the
+swiftly executed act by which Garnache had gained at least a
+temporary advantage.
+
+She had turned and looked at the strange spectacle of that dauntless
+man, erect, his foot upon Marius's neck, like some fantastic figure
+of a contemporary Saint George and a contemporary dragon.  She
+pressed her hands tighter upon her bosom; her eyes sparkled with an
+odd approval of that brisk deed.
+
+But Garnache's watchful eyes were upon the Dowager.  He read the
+anxious fear that marred the beauty of her face, and he took heart
+at the sight, for he was dependent upon the extent to which he might
+work upon her feelings.
+
+"You smiled just now, madame, when it was intended to butcher a man
+before your eyes.  You smile no longer, I observe, at this the first
+of the fine deeds I promised you."
+
+"Let him go," she said, and her voice was scarce louder than a
+whisper, horror-laden.  "Let him go, monsieur, if you would save
+your own neck."
+
+"At that price, yes - though, believe me, you are paying too much
+for so poor a life as this.  Still, you value the thing, and I hold
+it; and so you'll forgive me if I am extortionate."
+
+"Release him, and, in God's name, go your ways.  None shall stay
+you," she promised him.
+
+He smiled.  "I'll need some security for that.  I do not choose to
+take your word for it, Madame de Condillac."
+
+"What security can I give you?" she cried, wringing her hands, her
+eyes on the boy's ashen face ashen from mingling fear and rage -
+where it showed beyond Garnache's heavy boot.
+
+"Bid one of your knaves summon my servant.  I left him awaiting me
+in the courtyard."
+
+The order was given, and one of the cut-throats departed.
+
+In a tense and anxious silence they awaited his return, though he
+kept them but an instant.
+
+Rabecque's eyes took on a startled look when he had viewed the
+situation.  Garnache called to him to deprive those present of their
+weapons.
+
+"And let none refuse, or offer him violence," he added, "or your
+master's life shall pay the price of it."
+
+The Dowager with a ready anxiety repeated to them his commands.
+Rabecque, understanding nothing, went from man to man, and received
+from each his weapons.  He placed the armful on the windowseat, at
+the far end of the apartment, as Garnache bade him.  At the other
+end of the long room, Garnache ordered the disarmed men to range
+themselves.  When that was done, the Parisian removed his foot from
+his victim's neck.
+
+"Stand up," he commanded, and Marius very readily obeyed him.
+
+Garnache placed himself immediately behind the boy.  "Madame," said
+he, "no harm shall come to your son if he is but wise.  Let him
+disobey me, or let any man in Condillac lift a hand against us, and
+that shall be the signal for Monsieur de Condillac's death.
+Mademoiselle, it is your wish to accompany me to Paris?"
+
+"Yes, monsieur," she answered fearlessly, her eyes sparkling now.
+
+"We will be going then.  Place yourself alongside of Monsieur de
+Condillac.  Rabecque, follow me.  Forward, Monsieur de Condillac.
+You will be so good as to conduct us to our horses in the courtyard."
+
+They made an odd procession as they marched out of the hall, under
+the sullen eyes of the baulked cut-throats and their mistress.  On
+the threshold Garnache paused, and looked over his shoulder.
+
+"Are you content, madame?  Have you seen fine deeds enough for one
+day?" he asked her, laughing.  But, white to the lips with chagrin,
+she returned no answer.
+
+Garnache and his party crossed the anteroom, after having taken the
+precaution to lock the door upon the Marquise and her men, and
+proceeding down a gloomy passage they gained the courtyard.  Here
+Marius was consoled to find some men of the garrison of Condillac a
+half-score, or so - all more or less armed, surrounding the horses
+of Garnache and his lackey.  At sight of the odd group that now
+appeared those ruffians stood at gaze, surprised, and with suspicions
+aroused by Garnache's naked sword, ready for anything their master
+might demand of them.
+
+Marius had in that instant a gleam of hope.  Thus far, Garnache had
+been master of the situation.  But surely the position would be
+reversed when Garnache and his man came to mount their horses,
+particularly considering how hampered they must be by Valerie.  This
+danger Garnache, however, was no less quick to perceive, and with a
+dismaying promptness did he take his measures.
+
+"Remember," he threatened Monsieur de Condillac, "if any of your men
+show their teeth it will be the worse for you."  They had come to a
+halt on the threshold of the courtyard.  "You will be so good as to
+bid them retreat through that doorway across the yard yonder."
+
+Marius hesitated.  "And if I refuse?" he demanded hardily, but
+keeping his back to Garnache.  The men stirred, and stray words of
+mingling wonder and anger reached the Parisian.
+
+"You will not," said Garnache, with quiet confidence.
+
+"I think you make too sure," Marius replied, and dissembled his
+misgivings in a short laugh.  Garnache became impatient.  His
+position was not being improved by delay.
+
+"Monsieur de Condillac," said he, speaking quickly and yet with an
+incisiveness of tone that made his words sound deliberate, "I am a
+desperate man in a desperate position.  Every moment that I tarry
+here increases my danger and shortens my temper.  If you think to
+temporize in the hope of gaining an opportunity of turning the
+tables upon me, you must be mad to dream that I shall permit it.
+Monsieur, you will at once order those men to leave the courtyard
+by that doorway, or I give you my word of honour that I shall run
+you through as you stand."
+
+"That would be to destroy yourself," said Marius with an attempted
+note of confidence.
+
+"I should be no less destroyed by delay," answered Garnache; and
+added more sharply, "Give the word, monsieur, or I will make an
+end."
+
+From the movement behind him Marius guessed almost by instinct that
+Garnache had drawn back for a lunge.  At his side Valerie looked
+over her shoulder, with eyes that were startled but unafraid.  For
+a second Marius considered whether he might not attempt to elude
+Garnache by a wild and sudden dash towards his men.  But the
+consequences of failure were too fearful.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and gave the order.  The men hesitated
+a moment, then shuffled away in the direction indicated.  But they
+went slowly, with much half-whispered, sullen conferring and many
+a backward glance at Marius and those with him.
+
+"Bid them go faster," snapped Garnache.  Marius obeyed him, and the
+men obeyed Marius, and vanished into the gloom of the archway.  After
+all, thought Monsieur de Condillac, they need go no farther than that
+doorway; they must have appreciated the situation by now; and he was
+confident they would have the sense to hold themselves in readiness
+for a rush in the moment of Garnache's mounting.
+
+But Garnache's next order shattered that last hope.
+
+"Rebecque," said he, without turning his head, "go and lock them in."
+Before bidding the men go that way, he had satisfied himself that
+there was a key on the outside of the door.  "Monsieur de Condillac,"
+he resumed to Marius, "you will order your men in no way to hinder
+my servant.  I shall act upon any menace of danger to my lackey
+precisely as I should were I, myself, in danger."
+
+Marius's heart sank within him, as sinks a stone through water.  He
+realized, as his mother had realized a little while before, that in
+Garnache they had an opponent who took no chances.  In a voice thick
+with the torturing rage of impotence he gave the order upon which
+the grim Parisian insisted.  There followed a silence broken by the
+fall of Rabecque's heavily shod feet upon the stones of the yard,
+as he crossed it to do his master's bidding.  The door creaked on
+its hinges; the key grated screaming in its lock, and Rabecque
+returned to Garnache's side even as Garnache tapped Marius on the
+shoulder.
+
+"This way, Monsieur de Condillac, if you please," said he, and as
+Marius turned at last to face him, he stood aside and waved his
+left hand towards the door through which they had lately emerged.
+A moment stood the youth facing his stern conqueror; his hands were
+clenched until the knuckles showed white; his face was a dull
+crimson.  Vainly he sought for words in which to vent some of the
+malicious chagrin that filled his soul almost to bursting-point.
+Then, despairing, with a shrug and an inarticulate mutter, he flung
+past the Parisian, obeying him as the cur obeys, with pendant tail
+and teeth-revealing snarl.
+
+Garnache closed the door upon him with a bang, and smiled quietly
+as he turned to Valerie.
+
+"I think we have won through, mademoiselle," said he, with pardonable
+vanity.  "The rest is easy, though you may be subjected to some
+slight discomfort between this and Grenoble."
+
+She smiled back at him, a pale, timid smile, like a gleam of sunshine
+from a wintry sky.  "That matters nothing," she assured him, and
+strove to make her voice sound brave.
+
+There was need for speed, and compliments were set aside by Garnache,
+who, at his best, was not felicitous with them.  Valerie felt herself
+caught by the wrist, a trifle roughly she remembered afterwards, and
+hurried across the cobbles to the tethered horses, with which
+Rabecque was already busy.  She saw Garnache raise his foot to the
+stirrup and hoist himself to the saddle.  Then he held down a hand
+to her, bade her set her foot on his, and called with an oath
+to Rabecque to lend her his assistance.  A moment later she was
+perched in front of Garnache, almost on the withers of his horse.
+The cobbles rattled under its hooves, the timbers of the drawbridge
+sent up a booming sound, they were across - out of Condillac - and
+speeding at a gallop down the white road that led to the river; after
+them pounded Rabecque, bumping horribly in his saddle, and attempting
+wildly, and with awful objurgations, to find his stirrups.
+
+They crossed the bridge that spans the Isere and took the road to
+Grenoble at a sharp pace, with scarce a backward glance at the grey
+towers of Condillac.  Valerie experienced an overwhelming inclination
+to weep and laugh, to cry and sing at one and the same time; but
+whether this odd emotion sprang from the happenings in which she had
+had her part, or from the exhilaration of that mad ride, she could
+not tell.  No doubt it sprang from both, owing a part to each.  She
+controlled herself, however.  A shy, upward glance at the stern, set
+face of the man whose arm encircled and held her fast had a curiously
+sobering effect upon her.  Their eyes met, and he smiled a friendly,
+reassuring smile, such as a father might have bestowed upon a
+daughter.
+
+"I do not think that they will charge me with blundering this time,"
+he said.
+
+"Charge you with blundering?" she echoed; and the inflection of the
+pronoun might have flattered him had he not reflected that it was
+impossible she could have understood his allusion.  And now she
+bethought her that she had not thanked him - and the debt was a
+heavy one.  He had come to her aid in an hour when hope seemed dead.
+He had come single-handed - save for his man Rabecque; and in a
+manner that was worthy of being made the subject of an epic, he had
+carried her out of Condillac, away from the terrible Dowager and her
+cut-throats.  The thought of them sent a shiver through her.
+
+"Do you feel the cold?" he asked concernedly; and that the wind
+might cut her less, he slackened speed.
+
+"No, no," she cried, her alarm waking again at the thought of the
+folk of Condillac.  "Make haste!  Go on, go on!  Mon Dieu! if they
+should overtake us!"
+
+He looked over his shoulder.  The road ran straight for over a
+half-mile behind them, and not a living thing showed upon it.
+
+"You need have no alarm," he smiled.  "We are not pursued.  They
+must have realized the futility of attempting to overtake us.
+Courage, mademoiselle.  We shall be in Grenoble presently, and once
+there, you will have nothing more to fear."
+
+"You are sure of that?" she asked, and there was doubt in her voice.
+
+He smiled reassuringly again.  "The Lord Seneschal shall supply us
+with an escort," he promised confidently.
+
+"Still," she said, "we shall not stay there, I hope, monsieur."
+
+"No longer than may be necessary to procure a coach for you."
+
+"I am glad of that," said she.  "I shall know no peace until Grenoble
+is a good ten leagues behind us.  The Marquise and her son are too
+powerful there."
+
+"Yet their might shall not prevail against the Queen's," he made
+reply.  And as now they rode amain she fell to thanking him, shyly
+at first, then, as she gathered confidence in her subject, with a
+greater fervour.  But he interrupted her ere she had gone far,
+"Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye," said he, "you overstate the matter."
+His tone was chilling almost; and she felt as she had been rebuked.
+"I am no more than the emissary of Her Majesty - it is to her that
+your thanks are due."
+
+"Ah, but, monsieur," she returned to the assault, "I owe some thanks
+to you as well.  What other in your place would have done what you
+have done?"
+
+"I know not that, nor do I greatly care," said he, and laughed, but
+with a laugh that jarred on her.  "That which I did I must have
+done, no matter whom it was a question of saving.  I am but an
+instrument in this matter, mademoiselle."
+
+His thought was to do no more than belittle the service he had
+rendered her, to stem her flow of gratitude, since, indeed, he felt,
+as he said, that it was to the Queen-Regent her thanks were due.
+All unwitting was it - out of his ignorance of the ways of thought
+of a sex with which he held the view that it is an ill thing to
+meddle - that he wounded her by his disclaimer, in which her
+sensitive maiden fancy imagined a something that was almost
+contemptuous.
+
+They rode in silence for a little spell, broken at last by Garnache
+in expression of the thoughts that had come to him as a consequence
+of what she had said.
+
+"On this same subject of thanks," said he - and as she raised her
+eyes again she found him smiling almost tenderly - "if any are due
+between us they are surely due from me to you."
+
+"From you to me?" she asked in wonder.
+
+"Assuredly," said he.  "Had you not come between me and the Dowager's
+assassins there had been an end to me in the hall of Condillac."
+
+Her hazel eyes were very round for a moment, then they narrowed, and
+little humorous lines formed at the corners of her lips.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache," said she, with a mock coldness that was a
+faint echo of his own recent manner, "you overstate the case.  That
+which I did I must have done, no matter whom it was a question of
+saving.  I was but an instrument in this matter, monsieur."
+
+His brows went up.  He stared at her a moment, gathering instruction
+from the shy mockery of her glance.  Then he laughed with genuine
+amusement.
+
+"True," he said.  "An instrument you were; but an instrument of
+Heaven, whereas in me you but behold the instrument of an earthly
+power.  We are not quite quits, you see."
+
+But she felt, at least, that she was quits with him in the matter
+of his repudiation of her own thanks, and the feeling bridged the
+unfriendly gap that she had felt was opening out between them; and
+for no reason in the world that she could think of, she was glad
+that this was so.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE KEEPS HIS TEMPER
+
+
+Night had fallen and it had begun to rain when Garnache and Valerie
+reached Grenoble.  They entered the town afoot, the Parisian not
+desiring to attract attention by being seen in the streets with a
+lady on the withers of his horse.
+
+With thought for her comfort, Monsieur de Garnache had divested
+himself of his heavy horseman's cloak and insisted upon her assuming
+it, so setting it about her that her head was covered as by a wimple.
+Thus was she protected not only from the rain, but from the gaze of
+the inquisitive.
+
+They made their way in the drizzle, through the greasy, slippery
+streets ashine with the lights that fell from door and window,
+Rabecque following closely with the horses.  Garnache made straight
+for his inn - the Auberge du Veau qui Tete - which enjoyed the
+advantage of facing the Palais Seneschal.
+
+The ostler took charge of the nags, and the landlord conducted them
+to a room above-stairs, which he placed at mademoiselle's disposal.
+That done, Garnache left Rabecque on guard, and proceeded to make
+the necessary arrangements for the journey that lay before them.  He
+began by what he conceived to be the more urgent measure, and
+stepping across to the Palais Seneschal, he demanded to see Monsieur
+de Tressan at once.
+
+Ushered into the Lord Seneschal's presence, he startled that obese
+gentleman by the announcement that he had returned from Condillac
+with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and that he would require an
+escort to accompany them to Paris.
+
+"For I am by no means minded to be exposed to such measures as the
+tigress of Condillac and her cub may take to recover their victim,"
+he explained with a grim smile.
+
+The Seneschal combed his beard and screwed up his pale eyes until
+they vanished in the cushions of his cheeks.  He was lost in
+amazement.  He could only imagine that the Queen's emissary had been
+duped more successfully this time.
+
+"I am to gather, then," said he, dissembling what was passing
+through his mind, "that you delivered the lady by force or strategy."
+
+"By both, monsieur," was the short answer.
+
+Tressan continued to comb his beard, and pondered the situation.
+If things were so, indeed, they could not have fallen out more to
+his taste.  He had had no hand in it, one way or the other.  He had
+run with the hare and hunted with the hounds, and neither party
+could charge him with any lack of loyalty.  His admiration and
+respect for Monsieur de Garnache grew enormously.  When the rash
+Parisian had left him that afternoon for the purpose of carrying his
+message himself to Condillac, Tressan had entertained little hope
+of ever again seeing him alive.  Yet there he stood, as calm and
+composed as ever, announcing that singlehanded he had carried out
+what another might well have hesitated to attempt with a regiment
+at his heels.
+
+Tressan's curiosity urged him to beg for the details of this marvel,
+and Garnache entertained him with a brief recital of what had taken
+place, whereat, realizing that Garnache had indeed outwitted them,
+the Seneschal's wonder increased.
+
+"But we are not out of the quagmire yet," cried Garnache; "and that
+is why I want an escort."
+
+Tressan became uneasy.  "How many men shall you require?" he asked,
+thinking that the Parisian would demand at least the half of a
+company.
+
+"A half-dozen and a sergeant to command them."
+
+Tressan's uneasiness was dissipated, and he found himself despising
+Garnache more for his rashness in being content with so small a
+number than he respected him for the boldness and courage he had so
+lately displayed.  It was not for him to suggest that the force
+might prove insufficient; rather was it for him to be thankful that
+Garnache had not asked for more.  An escort Tressan dared not refuse
+him, and yet refuse it him he must have done - or broken with the
+Condillacs - had he asked for a greater number.  But six men!  Pooh!
+they would be of little account.  So he very readily consented,
+inquiring how soon Garnache would require them.
+
+"At once," was the Parisian's answer.  "I leave Grenoble to-night.
+I hope to set out in an hour's time.  Meanwhile I'll have the
+troopers form a guard of honour.  I am lodged over the way."
+
+Tressan, but too glad to be quit of him, rose there and then to give
+the necessary orders, and within ten minutes Garnache was back at
+the Sucking Calf with six troopers and a sergeant, who had left their
+horses in the Seneschal's stables until the time for setting out.
+Meanwhile Garnache placed them on duty in the common-room of the inn.
+
+He called for refreshment for them, and bade them remain there at
+the orders of his man Rabecque.  His reason for this step was that
+it became necessary that he should absent himself for a while to
+find a carriage suitable for the journey; for as the Sucking Calf
+was not a post-house he must seek one elsewhere - at the Auberge
+de France, in fact, which was situate on the eastern side of the
+town by the Porte de Savoie - and he was not minded to leave the
+person of Valerie unguarded during his absence.  The half-dozen
+troopers he considered ample, as indeed they were.
+
+On this errand he departed, wrapped tightly in his cloak, walking
+briskly through the now heavier rain.
+
+But at the Auberge de France a disappointment awaited him.  The
+host had no horses and no carriage, nor would he have until the
+following morning.  He was sorrow-stricken that the circumstance
+should discompose Monsieur de Garnache; he was elaborate in his
+explanations of how it happened that he could place no vehicle at
+Monsieur de Garnache's disposal - so elaborate that it is
+surprising Monsieur de Garnache's suspicions should not have been
+aroused.  For the truth of the matter was that the folk of
+Condillac had been at the Auberge de France before him - as they
+had been elsewhere in the town wherever a conveyance might be
+procurable - and by promises of reward for obedience and threats
+of punishment for disobedience, they had contrived that Garnache
+should hear this same story on every hand.  His mistake had lain
+in his eagerness to obtain a guard from the Seneschal.  Had he
+begun by making sure of a conveyance, anticipating, as he should
+have done, this move on the part of the Condillacs - a move which
+he did not even now suspect - it is possible that he might have
+been spared much of the trouble that was to follow.
+
+An hour or so later, after having vainly ransacked the town for
+the thing he needed, he returned wet and annoyed to the Veau qui
+Tote.  In a corner of the spacious common-room - a corner by the
+door leading to the interior of the inn - he saw the six troopers
+at table, waxing a trifle noisy over cards.  Their sergeant sat a
+little apart, in conversation with the landlord's wife, eyes
+upturned adoringly, oblivious of the increasing scowl that gathered
+about her watchful husband's brow.
+
+At another table sat four gentlemen - seemingly travellers, by their
+air and garb - in a conversation that was hushed at Garnache's
+entrance.  But he paid no heed to them as he stalked with ringing
+step across the rushstrewn floor, nor observed how covertly and
+watchfully their glances followed him as returning, in passing the
+sergeant's prompt salute he vanished through the doorway leading
+to the stairs.
+
+He reappeared again a moment later, to call the host, and give him
+orders for the preparing of his own and Rabecque's supper.
+
+On the landing above he found Rabecque awaiting him.
+
+"Is all well?" he asked, and received from his lackey a reassuring
+answer.
+
+Mademoiselle welcomed him gladly.  His long absence, it appeared,
+had been giving her concern.  He told her on what errand he had
+been, and alarm overspread her face upon hearing its result.
+
+"But, monsieur," she cried, "you are not proposing that I should
+remain a night in Grenoble."
+
+"What alternative have we?" he asked, and his brows met, impatient
+at what he accounted no more than feminine whimsey.
+
+"It is not safe," she exclaimed, her fears increasing.  "You do
+not know how powerful are the Condillacs."
+
+He strode to the fire, and the logs hissed under the pressure of
+his wet boot.  He set his back to the blaze, and smiled down upon
+her.
+
+"Nor do you know how powerful are we," he answered easily.  "I
+have below six troopers and a sergeant of the Seneschal's regiment;
+with myself and Rabecque we are nine men in all.  That should be a
+sufficient guard, mademoiselle.  Nor do I think that with all their
+power the Condillacs will venture here to claim you at the
+sword point."
+
+"And yet," she answered, for all that she was plainly reassured,
+at least in part, "I would rather you had got me a horse, that we
+might have ridden to Saint Marcellin, where no doubt a carriage
+might be obtained."
+
+"I did not see the need to put you to so much discomfort," he
+returned.  "It is raining heavily."
+
+"Oh, what of that?" she flung back impatiently.
+
+"Besides," he added, "it seems there are no horses at the post-house.
+A benighted place this Dauphiny of yours, mademoiselle."
+
+But she never heeded the gibe at her native province.  "No horses?"
+she echoed, and her hazel eyes looked up sharply, the alarm returning
+to her face.  She rose, and approached him.  "Surely that is impossible."
+
+"I assure you that it is as I say - neither at the post-house nor at
+any of the inns I visited could I find me a spare horse."
+
+"Monsieur," she cried, "I see the hand of Condillac in this."
+
+"As how?" he inquired, and his tone again was quickened by impatience.
+
+"They have anticipated you.  They seek to keep you here - to keep us
+in Grenoble."
+
+"But to what end?" he asked, his impatience growing.  "The Auberge
+de France has promised me a carriage in the morning.  What shall it
+avail them at Condillac to keep us here to-night?"
+
+"They may have some project.  Oh, monsieur!  I am full of fears."
+
+"Dismiss them," he answered lightly; and to reassure her he added,
+smiling: "Rest assured we shall keep good watch over you, Rabecque
+and I and the troopers.  A guard shall remain in the passage
+throughout the night.  Rabecque and I will take turn about at
+sentry-go.  Will that give you peace?"
+
+"You are very good," she said, her voice quivering with feeling
+and real gratitude, and as he was departing she called after him.
+"You will be careful of yourself," she said.
+
+He paused under the lintel, and turned, surprised.  "It is a habit
+of mine," said he, with a glint of humour in his eye.
+
+But there was no answering smile from her.  Her face was all anxiety.
+
+"Beware of pitfalls," she bade him.  "Go warily; they are cruelly
+cunning, those folk of Condillac.  And if evil should befall you. . ."
+
+"There would still remain Rabecque and the troopers," he concluded.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.  "I implore you to be careful," she
+insisted.
+
+"You may depend upon me," he said, and closed the door.
+
+Outside he called Rabecque, and together they went below.  But
+mindful of her fears, he dispatched one of the troopers to stand
+sentry outside her door whilst he and his lackey supped.  That done,
+he called the host, and set himself at table, Rabecque at his elbow
+in attendance to hand him the dishes and pour his wine.
+
+Across the low-ceilinged room the four travellers still sat in talk,
+and as Garnache seated himself, one of them shouted for the host and
+asked in an impatient tone to know if his supper was soon to come.
+
+"In a moment, sir," answered the landlord respectfully, and he
+turned again to the Parisian.  He went out to bring the latter's
+meal, and whilst he was gone Rabecque heard from his master the
+reason of their remaining that night in Grenoble.  The inference
+drawn by the astute lackey - and freely expressed by him - from
+the lack of horses or carriages in Grenoble that night, coincided
+oddly with Valerie's.  He too gave it as his opinion that his master
+had been forestalled by the Dowager's people, and without presuming
+to advise Garnache to go warily - a piece of advice that Garnache
+would have resented, to the extent perhaps of boxing the fellow's
+ears - he determined, there and then, to keep a close watch upon
+his master, and under no circumstances, if possible, permit him to
+leave the Sucking Calf that night.
+
+The host returned, bearing a platter on which there steamed a ragout
+that gave out an appetizing odour; his wife followed with other
+dishes and a bottle of Armagnac under her arm.  Rabecque busied
+himself at once, and his hungry master disposed himself to satisfy
+the healthiest appetite in France, when suddenly a shadow fell
+across the table.  A man had come to stand beside it, his body
+screening the light of one of the lamps that hung from a rafter of
+the ceiling.
+
+"At last!" he exclaimed, and his voice was harsh with ill-humour.
+
+Garnache looked up, pausing in the very act of helping himself to
+that ragout.  Rabecque looked up from behind his master, and his
+lips tightened.  The host looked up from the act of drawing the cork
+of the flagon he had taken from his wife, and his eyes grew big as
+in his mind he prepared a judicious blend of apology and remonstrance
+wherewith to soothe this very impatient gentleman.  But before he
+could speak, Garnache's voice cut sharply into the silence.  An
+interruption at such a moment vexed him sorely.
+
+"Monsieur says?" quoth he.
+
+"To you, sir - nothing," answered the fellow impudently, and looked
+him straight between the eyes.
+
+With a flush mounting to his cheeks, and his brows drawn together
+in perplexity, Garnache surveyed him.  He was that same traveller
+who had lately clamoured to know when he might sup, a man of rather
+more than middle height, lithe and active of frame, yet with a
+breadth of shoulder and depth of chest that argued strength and
+endurance as well.  He had fair, wavy hair, which he wore rather
+longer than was the mode, brown eyes, and a face which, without
+being handsome, was yet more than ordinarily engaging by virtue of
+its strength and frank ingenuousness.  His dress was his worst
+feature.  It was flamboyant and showy; cheap, and tawdrily
+pretentious.  Yet he bore himself with the easy dignity of a man
+who counts more inferiors than superiors.
+
+Despite the arrogant manner of his address, Garnache felt
+prepossessed in the newcomer's favour.  But before he could answer
+him, the host was speaking.
+
+"Monsieur mistakes. . ." he began.
+
+"Mistakes?" thundered the other in an accent slightly foreign.  "It
+is you who mistake if you propose to tell me that this is not my
+supper.  Am I to wait all night, while every jackanapes who follows
+me into your pigsty is to be served before me?"
+
+"Jackanapes?" said Garnache thoughtfully, and looked the man in the
+face again.  Behind the stranger pressed his three companions now,
+whilst the troopers across the room forgot their card-play to watch
+the altercation that seemed to impend.
+
+The foreigner - for such, indeed, his French proclaimed him - turned
+half-contemptuously to the host, ignoring Garnache with an air that
+was studiously offensive.
+
+"Jackanapes?" murmured Garnache again, and he, too, turned to the
+host.  "Tell me, Monsieur l'Hote," said he, "where do the jackanapes
+bury their dead in Grenoble?  I may need the information."
+
+Before the distressed landlord could utter a word, the stranger had
+wheeled about again to face Garnache.  "What shall that mean?" he
+asked sharply, a great fierceness in his glance.
+
+"That Grenoble may be witnessing the funeral of a foreign bully by
+to-morrow, Monsieur l'Etranger," said Garnache, showing his teeth
+in a pleasant smile.  He became conscious in that moment of a
+pressure on his shoulder blade, but paid no heed to it, intent on
+watching the other's countenance.  It expressed surprise a moment,
+then grew dark with anger.
+
+"Do you mean that for me, sir?" he growled.
+
+Garnache spread his hands.  "If monsieur feels that the cap fits
+him, I shall not stay him in the act of donning it."
+
+The stranger set one hand upon the table, and leaned forward towards
+Garnache.  "May I ask monsieur to be a little more definite?" he
+begged.
+
+Garnache sat back in his chair and surveyed the man, smiling.  Quick
+though his temper usually might be, it was checked at present by
+amusement.  He had seen in his time many quarrels spring from the
+flimsiest of motives, but surely never had he seen one quite so
+self-begotten.  It was almost as if the fellow had come there of set
+purpose to pick it with him.
+
+A suspicion flashed across his mind.  He remembered the warning
+mademoiselle had given him.  And he wondered.  Was this a trick to
+lure him to some guet-apens?  He surveyed his man more closely; but
+the inspection lent no colour to his suspicions.  The stranger
+looked so frank and honest; then again his accent was foreign.  It
+might very well be that he was some Savoyard lordling unused to being
+kept waiting, and that his hunger made him irritable and impatient.
+If that were so, assuredly the fellow deserved a lesson that should
+show him he was now in France, where different manners obtained to
+those that he displayed; yet, lest he should be something else,
+Garnache determined to pursue a policy of conciliation.  It would
+be a madness to embroil himself just then, whether this fellow were
+of Condillac or not.
+
+"I have asked you, monsieur," the stranger insisted, "to be a little
+more definite."
+
+Garnache's smile broadened and grew more friendly.  "Frankly," said
+he, "I experience difficulty.  My remark was vague.  I meant it so
+to be."
+
+"But it offended me, monsieur," the other answered sharply.
+
+The Parisian raised his eyebrows, and pursed his lips.  "Then I
+deplore it," said he.  And now he had to endure the hardest trial of
+all.  The stranger's expression changed to one of wondering scorn.
+
+"Do I understand that monsieur apologizes?"
+
+Garnache felt himself crimsoning; his self-control was slipping from
+him; the pressure against his shoulder blade was renewed, and in
+time he became aware of it and knew it for a warning from Rabecque.
+
+"I cannot conceive, sir, that I have offended," said he at length,
+keeping a tight hand upon his every instinct - which was to knock
+this impertinent stranger down.  "But if I have, I beg that you will
+believe that I have done so unwittingly.  I had no such intent."
+
+The stranger removed his hand from the table and drew himself erect.
+
+"So much for that, then," said he, provokingly contemptuous.  "If
+you will be as amiable in the matter of the supper I shall be glad
+to terminate an acquaintance which I can see no honour to myself in
+pursuing."
+
+This, Garnache felt, was more than he could endure.  A spasm of
+passion crossed his face, another instant and despite Rabecque's
+frantic proddings he might have flung the ragout in the gentleman's
+face; when suddenly came the landlord unexpectedly to the rescue.
+
+"Monsieur, here comes your supper now," he announced, as his wife
+reentered from the kitchen with a laden tray.
+
+For a moment the stranger seemed out of countenance.  Then he looked
+with cold insolence from the dishes set before Garnache to those
+which were being set for himself.
+
+"Ah," said he, and his tone was an insult unsurpassable, "perhaps it
+is to be preferred.  This ragout grows cold, I think."
+
+He sniffed, and turning on his heel, without word or sign of
+salutation to Garnache, he passed to the next table, and sat down
+with his companions.  The Parisian's eyes followed him, and they
+blazed with suppressed wrath.  Never in all his life had he exercised
+such self-control as he was exercising then - which was the reason
+why he had failed to achieve greatness - and he was exercising it
+for the sake of that child above-stairs, and because he kept
+ever-present in his mind the thought that she must come to grievous
+harm if ill befell himself.  But he controlled his passion at the
+cost of his appetite.  He could not eat, so enraged was he.  And so
+he pushed the platter from him, and rose.
+
+He turned to Rabecque, and the sight of his face sent the lackey
+back a pace or two in very fear.  He waved his hand to the table.
+
+"Sup, Rabecque," said he.  "Then come to me above."
+
+And followed, as before, by the eyes of the stranger and his
+companions, Garnache strode out of the room, and mounting the stairs
+went to find solace in talk with Valerie.  But however impossible
+he might find it to digest the affront he had swallowed, no word of
+the matter did he utter to the girl, lest it should cause her fears
+to reawaken.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE OPENING OF THE TRAP
+
+Garnache spent a sleepless night at Grenoble, on guard throughout
+the greater part of it since nothing short of that would appease
+the fears of Valerie.  Yet it passed without any bellicose
+manifestation on the part of the Condillacs such as Valerie feared
+and such as Garnache was satisfied would not - could not, indeed -
+take place.
+
+Betimes next morning he dispatched Rabecque to the Auberge de
+France for the promised carriage, and broke his fast in the
+common-room what time he awaited his man's return.  The chamber
+was again occupied by the stranger of yesternight, who sat apart,
+however, and seemed no longer disposed to interfere with the
+Parisian.  Garnache wondered idly, might this be due to the
+circumstance that that same stranger was supported now by one
+single companion, and was therefore less valorous than when he had
+been in the company of three.
+
+At another table were two gentlemen, sprung he knew not whence,
+quiet in dress and orderly in manner, to whom he paid little heed
+until one of them a slender, swarthy, hawk-faced fellow - looking
+up suddenly, started slightly at sight of the Parisian and addressed
+him instantly by name.  Garnache paused in the act of rising from
+table, half-turned, and sharply scrutinized the swarthy gentleman,
+but failed to recognize him.  He advanced towards him.
+
+"I have the honour to be known to you, monsieur?" he half-stated,
+half-inquired.
+
+"Parbleu, Monsieur de Garnache!" exclaimed the other with a ready
+smile, the more winning since it lighted up a face that at rest was
+very sombre.  "Lives there a Parisian to whom you are not known?  I
+have seen you often at the Hotel de Bourgogne."
+
+Garnache acknowledged the courtesy by a slight inclination of the
+head.
+
+"And once," continued the other, "I had the honour to be presented
+to you by Monsieur le Duc himself.  My name is Gaubert - Fabre
+Gaubert."  And as he introduced himself he rose out of respect for
+Garnache, who had remained standing.  Garnache knew him not at all,
+yet never doubted that his tale was true; the fellow had a very
+courtly, winning air; moreover, Garnache was beginning to feel
+lonely in the wilds of Dauphiny, so that it rejoiced him to come
+into the company of one whom he might regard as something of a
+fellow-creature.  He held out his hand.
+
+"I am honoured in that you should have borne me in your memory,
+monsieur," said he.  He was about to add that he would be overjoyed
+if it should happen that Monsieur Gaubert was travelling to Paris,
+since he might give himself the pleasure of his company on that
+tedious journey; but he checked himself betimes.  He had no reason
+to suspect this gentleman; and yet, all things considered, he
+bethought him suddenly that he would do well to observe the greatest
+circumspection.  So with a pleasant but meaningless civility touching
+Monsieur Gaubert's presence in those parts, Garnache passed on and
+gained the door.  He paused in the porch, above which the rebus-like
+sign of the Sucking Calf creaked and grated in each gust of the
+chill wind that was blowing from the Alps.  The rain had ceased, but
+the sky was dark and heavy with great banks of scudding clouds.  In
+the street the men of his escort sat their horses, having mounted
+at his bidding in readiness for the journey.  A word or two he
+exchanged with the sergeant, and then with a great rumble the clumsy
+carriage from the Auberge de France heralded its approach.  It rolled
+up the street, a vast machine of wood and leather, drawn by three
+horses, and drew up at the door of the inn.  Out sprang Rabecque,
+to be immediately sent by his master to summon mademoiselle.  They
+would set out upon the instant.
+
+Rabecque turned to obey; but in that same moment he was thrust
+rudely aside by a man with the air of a servant, who issued from
+he inn carrying a valise; after him, following close upon his heels,
+with head held high and eyes that looked straight before him and
+took no heed of Garnache, came the foreigner of yesternight.
+
+Rabecque, his shoulders touching the timbers of the porch, against
+which he had been thrust, remained at gaze, following with
+resentful eye the fellow who had so rudely used him.  Garnache, on
+the other side, watched with some wonder the advent of the
+ingenuous-looking stranger, but as yet with no suspicion of his
+intent.
+
+Not until the servant had thrown open the door of the coach and
+deposited within the valise he carried, did Garnache stir.  Not,
+indeed, until the foreigner's foot was on the step preparatory to
+mounting did Garnache speak.
+
+"Hi! monsieur," he called to him, "what is your pleasure with my
+carriage?"
+
+The stranger turned, and stared at Garnache with a look of wonder
+that artfully changed to one of disdainful recognition.
+
+"Ah?" said he, and his eyebrows went up.  "The apologetic gentleman!
+You said?"
+
+Garnache approached him, followed a step not only by Rabecque, but
+also by Monsieur Gaubert, who had sauntered out a second earlier.
+Behind them, in the porch, lounged now the foreigner's friend, and
+behind him again was to be seen the great face and staring, somewhat
+startled eyes of the landlord.
+
+"I asked you, monsieur," said Garnache, already at grips with that
+quick temper of his, "what might be your pleasure with my coach?"
+
+"With your coach?" echoed the other, his superciliousness waxing
+more and more offensive.  "Voyons! on! my apologetic friend, do
+all things in Grenoble belong to you?"  He turned to the post-boy,
+who looked on stolidly.  "You are from the Auberge de France, are
+you not?" quoth he.
+
+"I am, monsieur," replied the man.  "This carriage was ordered last
+night by a gentleman lodging at the Veau qui Tete?"
+
+"Perfectly," replied the stranger, in a tone of finality.  "It was
+ordered by me." And he was about to turn away, when Garnache
+approached him by yet another step.
+
+"I will ask you to observe, monsieur," said he and for all that his
+tone and words were civil, that they were forcedly so was obvious
+from their quiver - "I will ask you to observe that the carriage
+was fetched by my own man there, who rode hither in it."
+
+The stranger looked him up and down with a curling lip.
+
+"It seems, sir," said he, with a broad sneer, "that you are one of
+those impertinent fellows who will be for ever thrusting themselves
+upon gentlemen with an eye to such profit as they can make."  He
+produced a purse and opened it.  "Last night it was my supper you
+usurped.  I suffered that.  Now you would do the same by my coach,
+and that I shall not suffer.  But there is for your pains, and to
+be quit of your company."  And he tossed a silver coin at the
+Parisian.
+
+There was an exclamation of horror in the background, and Monsieur
+de Gaubert thrust himself forward.
+
+"Sir, sir," he exclaimed in an agitated voice, "you cannot know
+whom you are addressing.  This is Monsieur Martin Marie Rigobert
+de Garnache, Mestre-de-Champ in the army of the King."
+
+"Of all those names the one I should opine might fit him best, but
+for his ugliness, is that of Marie," answered the foreigner,
+leering, and with a contemptuous shrug he turned again to mount
+the carriage.
+
+At that all Garnache's self-control deserted him, and he did a
+thing deplorable.  In one of his blind accesses of fury, heedless
+of the faithful and watchful Rabecque's arresting tug at his
+sleeve, he stepped forward, and brought a heavy hand down upon the
+supercilious gentleman's shoulder.  He took him in the instant in
+which, with one foot off the ground and the other on the step of
+the carriage, the foreigner was easily thrown' off his balance; he
+dragged him violently backward, span him round and dropped him
+floundering in the mire of the street-kennel.
+
+That done, there fell a pause - a hush that was ominous of things
+impending.  A little crowd of idlers that had gathered was quickly
+augmenting now, and from some there came a cry of "Shame!" at
+Garnache's act of violence.
+
+This is no moment at which to pause to moralize.  And yet, how
+often is it not so?  How often does not public sympathy go out to
+the man who has been assaulted without thought of the extent to
+which that man may have provoked and goaded his assailant.
+
+That cry of "Shame!" did no more than increase the anger that was
+mastering Garnache.  His mission in Grenoble was forgotten;
+mademoiselle above-stairs was forgotten; the need for caution and
+the fear of the Condillacs were forgotten; everything was thrust
+from his mind but the situation of the moment.
+
+Amid the hush that followed, the stranger picked himself slowly
+up, and sought to wipe the filth from his face and garments.  His
+servant and his friend flew to his aid, but he waved them aside,
+and advanced towards Garnache, eyes blazing, lips sneering.
+
+"Perhaps," said he, in that soft, foreign tone of his, laden now
+with fierce mock-politeness, "perhaps monsieur proposes to
+apologize again."
+
+"Sir, you are mad," interposed Gaubert.  "You are a foreigner, I
+perceive, else you would - "
+
+But Garnache thrust him quietly aside.  "You are very kind, Monsieur
+Gaubert," said he, and his manner now was one of frozen calm - a
+manner that betrayed none of the frenzy of seething passion
+underneath.  "I think, sir," said he to the stranger, adopting
+something of that gentleman's sardonic manner, "that it will be a
+more peaceful world without you.  It is that consideration restrains
+me from apologizing.  And yet, if monsieur will express regret for
+having sought, and with such lack of manners, to appropriate my
+carriage - "
+
+"Enough!" broke in the other.  "We are wasting time, and I have a
+long journey before me.  Courthon," said he, addressing his friend,
+"will you bring me the length of this gentleman's sword?  My name,
+sir," he added to Garnache, "is Sanguinetti."
+
+"Faith," said Garnache, "it sorts well with your bloody spirit."
+
+"And will sort well, no doubt, with his condition presently," put
+in hawk-faced Gaubert.  "Monsieur de Garnache, if you have no friend
+at hand to act for you, I shall esteem myself honoured."  And he
+bowed.
+
+"Why, thanks, sir.  You are most opportunely met.  You should be
+a gentleman since you frequent the Hotel de Bourgogne.  My thanks."
+
+Gaubert went aside to confer with Monsieur Courthon.  Sanguinetti
+stood apart, his manner haughty and impressive, his eye roaming
+scornfully through the ranks of what had by now become a crowd.
+Windows were opening in the street, and heads appearing, and across
+the way Garnache might have beheld the flabby face of Monsieur de
+Tressan among the spectators of that little scene.
+
+Rabecque drew near his master.
+
+"Have a care, monsieur," he implored him.  "If this should be a
+trap."
+
+Garnache started.  The remark sobered him, and brought to his mind
+his own suspicions of yesternight, which his present anger had for
+the moment lulled.  Still, he conceived that he had gone too far
+to extricate himself.  But he could at least see to it that he was
+not drawn away from the place that sheltered mademoiselle.  And so
+he stepped forward, joining Courthon and Gaubert, to insist that
+the combat should take place in the inn - either in the common room
+or in the yard.  But the landlord, overhearing this, protested
+loudly that he could not consent to it.  He had his house to think
+of.  He swore that they should not fight on his premises, and
+implored them in the same breath not to attempt it.
+
+At that Garnache, now thoroughly on his guard! was for putting off
+the encounter.
+
+"Monsieur Courthon," said he - and he felt a flush of shame mounting
+to his brow, and realized that it may need more courage to avoid an
+encounter than to engage in one - "there is something that in the
+heat of passion I forgot; something that renders it difficult for
+me to meet your friend at present."
+
+Courthon looked at him as he might look at an impertinent lackey.
+
+"And what may that be?" he inquired, mightily contemptuous.  There
+was a snigger from some in the crowd that pressed about them, and
+even Monsieur Gaubert looked askance.
+
+"Surely, sir," he began, "if I did not know you for Monsieur de
+Garnache - "
+
+But Garnache did not let him finish.
+
+"Give me air," he cried, and cuffed out to right and left of him
+at the grinning spectators, who fell back and grinned less broadly.
+"My reason, Monsieur de Courthon," said he, "is that I do not
+belong to my self at present.  I am in Grenoble on business of the
+State, as the emissary of the Queen-Regent, and so it would hardly
+become me to engage in private quarrels."
+
+Courthon raised his brows.
+
+"You should have thought of that before you rolled Monsieur
+Sanguinetti in the mud," he answered coldly.
+
+"I will tender him my apologies for that," Garnache promised,
+swallowing hard, "and if he still insists upon a meeting he shall
+have it in, say, a month's time."
+
+"I cannot permit - " began Courthon, very fiercely.
+
+"You will be so good as to inform your friend of what I have said,"
+Garnache insisted, interrupting him.
+
+Cowed, Courthon shrugged and went apart to confer with his friend.
+
+"Ah!" came Sanguinetti's soft voice, yet loud enough to be heard
+by all present.  "He shall have a caning then for his impertinence."
+And he called loudly to the post-boy for his whip.  But at that
+insult Garnache's brain seemed to take fire, and his cautious
+resolutions were reduced to ashes by the conflagration.  He stepped
+forward, and, virulent of tone and terrific of mien, he announced
+that since Monsieur Sanguinetti took that tone with him, he would
+cut his throat for him at once and wherever they should please.
+
+At last it was arranged that they should proceed there and then to
+the Champs aux Capuchins, a half-mile away behind the Franciscan
+convent.
+
+Accordingly they set out, Sanguinetti and Courthon going first, and
+Garnache following with Gaubert; the rear being brought up by a
+regiment of rabble, idlers and citizens, that must have represented
+a very considerable proportion of the population of Grenoble.  This
+audience heartened Garnache, to whom some measure of reflection had
+again returned.  Before such numbers it was unthinkable that these
+gentlemen - assuming them to be acting on behalf of Condillac -
+should dare to attempt foul measures with him.  For the rest he had
+taken the precaution of leaving Rabecque at the Sucking Calf, and he
+had given the sergeant strict injunctions that he was not to allow
+any of his men to leave their posts during his absence, and that the
+troopers were to hold themselves entirely at the orders of Rabecque.
+Comparatively easy therefore in his mind, and but little exercised
+by any thought of the coming encounter, Garnache walked briskly
+along.
+
+They came at last to the Champs aux Capuchins -a pleasant stretch
+of verdure covering perhaps half an acre and set about by a belt of
+beech-trees.
+
+The crowd disposed itself on the fringe of the sward, and the
+duellists went forward, and set about the preparations.  Principals
+and seconds threw off cloak and doublet, and Sanguinetti, Courthon,
+and Gaubert removed their heavy boots, whilst Garnache did no more
+than detach the spurs from his.
+
+Sanguinetti, observing this, drew the attention of the others to it,
+and an altercation arose.  It was Gaubert who came to beg Garnache
+that he should follow the example they had set him in that respect.
+But Garnache shook his head.
+
+"The turf is sodden."
+
+"But it is precisely on that account, sir," protested Gaubert very
+earnestly.  "In your boots you will be unable to stand firm; you
+will run the risk of slipping every time that you break ground."
+
+"I venture to think, sir, that that is my affair," said Garnache
+stiffly.
+
+"But it is not," the other cried.  "If you fight in your boots, we
+must all do the same, and for myself - well, I have not come here
+to commit suicide."
+
+"Look you, Monsieur Gaubert," said Garnache quietly, "your opponent
+will be Monsieur Courthon, and since he is in his stockinged feet,
+there is no reason why you yourself should not remain so too.  As
+for me, I retain my boots, and Monsieur Sanguinetti may have all
+the advantage that may give him.  Since I am content, in Heaven's
+name let the fight go forward.  I am in haste."
+
+Gaubert bowed in submission; but Sanguinetti, who had overheard,
+turned with an oath.
+
+"By God, no!" said he.  "I need no such advantage, sir.  Courthon,
+be so good as to help me on with my boots again."  And there was
+a fresh delay whilst he resumed them.
+
+At last, however, the four men came together, and proceeded to the
+measurement of swords.  It was found that Sanguinetti's was two
+inches longer than any of the other three.
+
+"It is the usual length in Italy," said Sanguinetti with a shrug.
+
+"If monsieur had realized that he was no longer in Italy, we might
+perhaps have been spared this very foolish business," answered
+Garnache testily.
+
+"But what are we to do?" cried the perplexed Gaubert.
+
+"Fight," said Garnache impatiently.  "Is there never to be an end
+to these preliminaries?"
+
+"But I cannot permit you to oppose yourself to a sword two inches
+longer than your own," cried Gaubert, almost in a temper.
+
+"Why not, if I am satisfied?" asked Garnache.  "Mine is the longer
+reach; thus matters will stand equal."
+
+"Equal?" roared Gaubert.  "Your longer reach is an advantage that
+you had from God, his longer sword is one he had from an armourer.
+Is that equality?"
+
+"He may have my sword, and I'll take his," cut in the Italian,
+also showing impatience.  "I too am in haste."
+
+"In haste to die, then," snapped Gaubert.
+
+"Monsieur, this is not seemly," Courthon reproved him.
+
+"You shall teach me manners when we engage," snapped the hawk-faced
+gentleman.
+
+"Sirs, sirs," Garnache implored them, "are we to waste the day in
+words?  Monsieur Gaubert, there are several gentlemen yonder wearing
+swords; I make no doubt that you will find one whose blade is of the
+same length as your own, sufficiently obliging to lend it to Monsieur
+Sanguinetti."
+
+"That is an office that my friend can do for me," interposed
+Sanguinetti, and thereupon Courthon departed, to return presently
+with a borrowed weapon of the proper length.
+
+At last it seemed that they might proceed with the business upon
+which they were come; but Garnache was wrong in so supposing.  A
+discussion now arose between Gaubert and Courthon as to the choice
+of spot.  The turf was drenched and slippery, and for all that they
+moved from place to place testing the ground, their principals
+following, nowhere could they find the conditions sufficiently
+improved to decide upon engaging.  To Garnache the utility of this
+was apparent from the first.  If these gentlemen had thought to
+avoid slippery ground, they should have elected to appoint the
+meeting elsewhere.  But having chosen the Champs aux Capuchins,
+it was idle to expect that one stretch of turf would prove firmer
+than another.
+
+Wearied at last by this delay, he gave expression to his thoughts.
+
+"You are quite right, monsieur," said Courthon.  "But your second
+is over-fastidious.  It would simplify matters so much if you would
+remove your boots."
+
+"Look you, sirs," said Garnache, taking a firm stand, "I will engage
+in my boots and on this very spot or not at all.  I have told you
+that I am in haste.  As for the slipperiness of the ground, my
+opponent will run no greater risks than I.  I am not the only
+impatient one.  The spectators are beginning to jeer at us.  We shall
+have every scullion in Grenoble presently saying that we are afraid
+of one another.  Besides which, sirs, I think I am taking cold."
+
+"I am quite of monsieur's mind, myself," drawled Sanguinetti.
+
+"You hear, sir," exclaimed Courthon, turning to Gaubert.  "You can
+scarce persist in finding objections now."
+
+"Why, since all are satisfied, so be it," said Gaubert, with a
+shrug.  "I sought to do the best for my principal.  As it is, I
+wash my hands of all responsibility, and by all means let us engage,
+sirs."
+
+They disposed themselves accordingly, Gaubert engaging Courthon,
+on Garnache's right hand, and Garnache himself falling on guard to
+receive the attack of Sanguinetti.  The jeers and murmurs that had
+been rising from the ever-growing crowd that swarmed about the
+outskirts of the place fell silent as the clatter of meeting swords
+rang out at last.  And then, scarce were they engaged when a voice
+arose, calling angrily:
+
+"Hold, Sanguinetti! Wait!"
+
+A big, broad-shouldered man, in a suit of homespun and a featherless
+hat, thrust his way rudely trough the crowd and broke into the space
+within the belt of trees.  The combatants had fallen apart at this
+commanding cry, and the newcomer now dashed forward, flushed and out
+of breath as if with running.
+
+"Vertudieu!  Sanguinetti," he swore, and his manner was half-angry,
+half-bantering; "do you call this friendship?"
+
+"My dear Francois" returned the foreigner, "you arrive most
+inopportunely."
+
+"And is that all the greeting you have for me?"
+
+Looking more closely, Garnache thought that he recognized in him
+one of Sanguinetti's companions of yesternight.
+
+"But do you not see that I am engaged?"
+
+"Ay; and that is my grievance that you should be engaged upon such
+an affair, and that I should have no share in it.  It is to treat
+me like a lackey, and have the right to feel offended.  Enfin!  It
+seems I an not come too late."
+
+Garnache cut in.  He saw the drift of the fellow's intentions, and
+he was not minded to submit to fresh delays; already more than half
+an hour was sped since he had left the Sucking Calf.  He put it
+plainly to them that more than enough delay had there been already
+and he begged the newcomer to stand aside and allow them to terminate
+the business on which they were met.  But Monsieur Francois - as
+Sanguinetti had called him - would not hear of it.  He proved,
+indeed, a very testy fellow, and he had, moreover, the support of
+the others, including even Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+"Let me implore you not to spoil sport, sir," the latter begged
+Garnache.  "I have a friend at the inn who would never forgive me
+if I permitted him to miss such a morning's diversion as this
+gentleman is willing to afford him.  Suffer me to go for him."
+
+"Look you, sir," answered Garnache sharply, "however you may view
+this meeting, it is not with me an affair of jest or sport.  I am
+in a quarrel that has been forced upon me, and - "
+
+"Surely not, sir," Courthon interrupted sweetly.  "You forget that
+you rolled Monsieur Sanguinetti in the mud.  That is hardly to have
+a quarrel forced upon you."
+
+Garnache bit his lip to the blood in his vexation.
+
+"However the quarrel may have originated," said Francois, with a
+great laugh, "I swear that it goes not forward until I am
+accommodated, too."
+
+"You had better accede, monsieur," murmured Gaubert.  "I shall not
+be gone five minutes, and it will save time in the end."
+
+"Oh, very well," cried poor Garnache in his despair.  "Anything to
+save time; anything!  In God's name fetch your friend, and I hope
+you and he and every man here will get his fill of fighting for
+once."
+
+Gaubert departed on his errand, and there were fresh murmurs in the
+mob until the reason of his going was understood.  Five minutes
+sped; ten minutes, and yet he returned not.  Grouped together were
+Sanguinetti and his two friends, in easy, whispered talk.  At a
+little distance from them, Garnache paced up and down to keep
+himself warm.  He had thrown his cloak over his shoulders again, and
+with sword tucked under arm and head thrust forward, he stamped
+backwards and forwards, the very picture of ill-humour.  Fifteen
+minutes passed; twelve o'clock boomed from the Church of Saint
+Francois d'Assisi and still Monsieur Gaubert returned not.  Garnache
+stood still a moment, in angry thought.  This must not go on.  There
+must be an end, and at once.  The tastes and inclinations of brawlers
+were no concern of his.  He had business of State - however unworthy
+ - to dispatch.  He turned, intending to demand of Monsieur
+Sanguinetti that they should engage at once and be done, when
+suddenly a fellow roughly dressed, with dirty face and a shock head
+of fair hair, pushed his way through the throng and advanced towards
+Monsieur Sanguinetti and his friends.  Garnache checked in his
+movement to look at the fellow, for he recognized in him the ostler
+of the Auberge de France: He spoke at that moment, and Garnache
+overheard the words he uttered.
+
+"Monsieur Sanguinetti," said he, addressing that gentleman, "my
+master sends to inquire if you shall want the carriage you ordered
+for to-day.  It has been standing for an hour at the door of the
+Auberge de France, awaiting you, and if you don't want it - "
+
+"Standing where?" asked Sanguinetti harshly.
+
+"At the door of the Auberge de France."
+
+"Peste, fool!" cried the foreigner, "why is it there, when I bade
+it be sent to the Sucking Calf?"
+
+"I don't know, sir.  I know no more than Monsieur l'Hote told me."
+
+"Now, a plague on Monsieur l'Hote," swore Sanguinetti, and in that
+moment his eye fell upon Garnache, standing there, attentive.  At
+sight of the Parisian he seemed lost in confusion.  He dropped
+his glance and appeared on the point of turning aside.  Then to
+the ostler: "I shall want the carriage, and I shall come for it
+anon.  Carry that message to your master."  And with that he turned
+and advanced to Garnache.  His whilom arrogance was all fallen from
+him; he wore instead an air of extreme contrition.
+
+"Monsieur, what shall I say to you?" he asked in a voice that was
+rather small.  "It seems there has been an error.  I am deeply
+grieved, believe me - "
+
+"Say no more, I beg," cried Garnache, immensely relieved that at
+last there should be a conclusion to an affair which had threatened
+to be interminable.  "Let me but express my regrets for the
+treatment you received at my hands."
+
+"I accept your expressions, and I admire their generosity," returned
+the other as courteous now as subservient, indeed, in his courtesy
+ - as he had been erstwhile fierce and intractable.  "As for the
+treatment I received, I confess that my mistake and my
+opinionativeness deserved it me.  I deplore to deprive these
+gentlemen of the entertainment to which they were looking forward,
+but unless you should prove of an excessive amiability I am afraid
+they must suffer with me the consequences of my error."
+
+Garnache assured him very briefly, and none too politely that he
+did not intend to prove of any excessive amiability.  He spoke
+whilst struggling into his doublet.  He felt that he could
+cheerfully have caned the fellow for the inconvenience he had
+caused him, and yet he realized that he had other more pressing
+matters to attend to.  He sheathed his sword, took up his cloak
+and hat, made those gentlemen the compliments that became the
+occasion, in terms a trifle more brief, perhaps, than were usual,
+and, still wondering why Monsieur de Gaubert had not yet returned,
+he stalked briskly away.  Followed by the booings of the
+disappointed crowd, he set out for the Sucking Calf at a sharp
+pace, taking the shorter way behind the Church and across the
+graveyard of Saint Francois.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE CLOSING OF THE TRAP
+
+Upon leaving the Champs aux Capuchins, hawk-faced Monsieur Gaubert
+had run every foot of the way to the Sucking Calf, and he had
+arrived there within some five minutes, out of breath and wearing
+every appearance of distress - of a distress rather greater than
+his haste to find his friend should warrant.
+
+At the door of the inn he found the carriage still waiting; the
+post-boy, however, was in the porch, leaning in talk with one of
+the drawers.  The troopers sat their horses in stolid patience,
+keeping guard, and awaiting, as they had been bidden, the return
+of Monsieur de Garnache.  Rabecque, very watchful, lounged in the
+doorway, betraying in his air none of the anxiety and impatience
+with which he looked for his master.
+
+At sight of Monsieur Gaubert, running so breathlessly, he started
+forward, wondering and uneasy.  Across the street, from the Palais
+Seneschal, came at that same moment Monsieur de Tressan with
+rolling gait.  He reached the door of the inn together with Monsieur
+Gaubert.
+
+Full of evil forebodings, Rabecque hailed the runner.
+
+"What has happened?" he cried.  "Where is Monsieur de Garnache?"
+
+Gaubert came to a staggering halt; he groaned and wrung his hands.
+
+"Killed!" he panted, rocking himself in a passion of distress.  "He
+has been butchered!  Oh! it was horrible!"
+
+Rabecque gripped him by the shoulder, and steadied him with a hand
+that hurt.  "What do you say?" he gasped, his face white to the lips.
+
+Tressan halted, too, and turned upon Gaubert, a look of incredulity
+in his fat countenance.  "Who has been killed?" he asked.  "Not
+Monsieur de Garnache?"
+
+"Helas! yes," groaned the other.  "It was a snare, a guet-apens to
+which they led us.  Four of them set upon us in the Champs aux
+Capuchins.  As long as he lived, I stood beside him.  But seeing
+him fallen, I come for help."
+
+"My God!" sobbed Rabecque, and loosed his grasp of Monsieur
+Gaubert's shoulder.
+
+"Who did it?" inquired Tressan, and his voice rumbled fiercely.
+
+"I know not who they were.  The man who picked the quarrel with
+Monsieur de Garnache called himself Sanguinetti.  There is a riot
+down there at present.  There was a crowd to witness the combat,
+and they have fallen to fighting among themselves.  Would to Heaven
+they had stirred in time to save that poor gentleman from being
+murdered."
+
+"A riot, did you say?" cried Tressan, the official seeming to
+awaken in him.
+
+"Aye," answered the other indifferently; "they are cutting one
+another's throats."
+
+"But . . . But . . . Are you sure that he is dead, monsieur?"
+inquired Rabecque; and his tone was one that implored contradiction.
+
+Gaubert looked and paused, seeming to give the matter a second's
+thought.  "I saw him fall," said he.  "It may be that he was no more
+than wounded."
+
+"And you left him there?" roared the servant.  "You left him there?"
+
+Gaubert shrugged his shoulders.  "What could I do against four?
+Besides, the crowd was interfering already, and it seemed best to
+me to come for help.  These soldiers, now - "
+
+"Aye," cut in Tressan, and he turned about and called the sergeant.
+"This becomes my affair."  And he announced his quality to Monsieur
+Gaubert.  "I am the Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny."
+
+"I am fortunate in finding you," returned Gaubert, and bowed.  "I
+could place the matter in no better hand."
+
+But Tressan, without heeding him, was already ordering the sergeant
+to ride hard with his troopers for the Champs aux Capuchins.
+Rabecque, however, thrust himself suddenly forward.
+
+"Not so, Monsieur le Seneschal," he interposed in fresh alarm, and
+mindful of his charge.  "These men are here to guard Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye.  Let them remain.  I will go to Monsieur de Garnache."
+
+The Seneschal stared at him with contemptuously pouting underlip.
+"You will go?" said he.  "And what can you do alone?  Who are you?"
+he asked.
+
+"I am Monsieur de Garnache's servant."
+
+"A lackey?  Ah!"  And Tressan turned aside and resumed his orders
+as if Rabecque did not exist or had never spoken.  "To the Champs
+aux Capuchins!" said he.  "At the gallop, Pommier!  I will send
+others after you."
+
+The sergeant rose in his stirrups and growled an order.  The
+troopers wheeled about; another order, and they were off, their
+cantering hoofs thundering down the narrow street.
+
+Rabecque clutched at the Lord Seneschal's arm.
+
+"Stop them, monsieur!" he almost screamed in his excitement.  "Stop
+them!  There is some snare, some trick in this."
+
+"Stop them?" quoth the Seneschal.  "Are you mad?"  He shook off
+Rabecque's detaining hand, and left him, to cross the street again
+with ponderous and sluggish haste, no doubt to carry out his
+purpose of sending more troopers to the scene of the disturbance.
+
+Rabecque swore angrily and bitterly, and his vexation had two
+entirely separate sources.  On the one hand his anxiety and affection
+for his master urged him to run at once to his assistance, whilst
+Tressan's removal of the troopers rendered it impossible for him to
+leave Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye unguarded - though what he should
+do with her if Garnache came not back at all, he did not at this
+stage pause to consider.  On the other hand, an instinctive and
+growing suspicion of this Monsieur Gaubert - who was now entering
+the inn - inspired him with the opinion that the fat Seneschal had
+been duped by a wild tale to send the troopers from the spot where
+they might presently become very necessary.
+
+Full of fears, anxiety, and mistrust, it was a very dispirited
+Rabecque that now slowly followed Monsieur Gaubert into the inn.
+But as he set his foot across the threshold of the common-room, a
+sight met his eyes that brought him to a momentary standstill,
+and turned to certainty all his rising suspicions.  He found it
+tenanted by a half-dozen fellows of very rude aspect, all armed
+and bearing an odd resemblance in air and accoutrements to the
+braves he had seen at Condillac the day before.  As to how they
+came there, he could only surmise that they had entered through
+the stable-yard, as otherwise he must have observed their approach.
+They were grouped now at the other end of the long, low chamber,
+by the door leading to the interior of the inn.  A few paces
+distant the landlord watched them with uneasy eyes.
+
+But what dismayed Garnache's servant most of all was to see the
+man who called himself Gaubert standing in talk with a slender,
+handsome youth, magnificently arrayed, in whom he recognized
+Marius de Condillac.
+
+Rabecque checked in his advance, and caught in that moment from
+Marius the words: "Let her be told that it is Monsieur de Garnache
+wishes her to descend."
+
+At that Rabecque stepped towards them, very purposeful of mien.
+Gaubert turned at his approach, and smiled.  Marius looked up
+quickly; then made a sign to the men.  Instantly two of them went
+out by the door they guarded, and ere it swung back again Rabecque
+saw that they were making for the stairs.  The remaining four
+ranged themselves shoulder to shoulder across the doorway, plainly
+with intent to bar the way.  Gaubert, followed immediately by
+Marius, stepped aside and approached the landlord with arms akimbo
+and a truculent smile on his pale hawk face.  What he and Marius
+said, Rabecque could not make out, but he distinctly heard the
+landlord's answer delivered with a respectful bow to Marius:
+
+"Bien, Monsieur de Condillac.  I would not interfere in your
+concerns - not for the world.  I will be blind and deaf."
+
+Marius acknowledged the servile protestation by a sneer, and
+Rabecque, stirring at last, went forward boldly towards the doorway
+and its ugly, human barrier.
+
+"By your leave, sirs," said he - and he made to thrust one of them
+aside.
+
+"You cannot pass this way, sir," he was answered, respectfully but
+firmly.
+
+Rabecque stood still, clenching and unclenching his hands and
+quivering with anger.  It was in that moment that he most fervently
+cursed Tressan and his stupid meddling.  Had the troopers still
+been there, they could have made short work of these tatter-demalions.
+As it was, and with Monsieur de Garnache dead, or at least absent,
+everything seemed at an end.  He might have contended that, his
+master being slain, it was no great matter what he did, for in the
+end the Condillacs must surely have their way with Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye.  But he never paused to think of that just then.  His
+sense of trust was strong; his duty to his master plain.  He stepped
+back, and drew his sword.
+
+"Let me pass!" he roared.  But at the same instant there came the
+soft slither of another weapon drawn, and Rabecque was forced to
+turn to meet the onslaught of Monsieur Gaubert.
+
+"You dirty traitor," cried the angry lackey, and that was all they
+left him breath to say.  Strong arms gripped him from behind.  The
+sword was wrenched from his hand.  He was flung down heavily, and
+pinned prone in a corner by one of those bullies who knelt on his
+spine.  And then the door opened again, and poor Rabecque groaned
+in impotent anguish to behold Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye pause
+white-faced and wide-eyed on, the threshold at sight of Monsieur
+de Condillac bowing low before her.
+
+She stood there a moment between the two ruffians who had been
+sent to fetch her, and her eyes travelling round that room
+discovered Rabecque in his undignified and half; strangled
+condition.
+
+"Where . . . Where is Monsieur de Garnache?" she faltered.
+
+"He is where all those who cross the will of Condillac must sooner
+or later find themselves," said Marius airily.  "He is . . .
+disposed of."
+
+"Do you mean that he is dead?" she cried.
+
+"I think it very probable by now," he smiled.  "So you see,
+mademoiselle, since the guardian the Queen appointed you has . . .
+deserted you, you would do well to return to my mother's roof.  Let
+me assure you that we shall very gladly welcome your return.  We
+blame none but Garnache for your departure, and he has paid for
+the brutality of his abduction of you."
+
+She turned in despair from that mocking gentleman, and attempted
+to make appeal to the landlord, as though he could help her who
+could not help himself.
+
+"Monsieur l'Hote - " she began, but Marius cut in sharply.
+
+"Take her out that way," he said, and pointed back down the passage
+by the stairs.  "To the coach.  Make haste."
+
+She sought to resist them now; but they dragged her back, and there
+was a rush of the others following through the doorway, the rear
+being brought up by Gaubert.
+
+"Follow presently," was his parting command to the man who still
+knelt upon Rabecque, and with that he vanished too.
+
+Their steps died away in the passage; a door banged in the distance.
+There followed a silence, disturbed only by the sound of Rabecque's
+laboured breathing; then came a stir outside the door of the inn;
+some one shouted an order.  There was a movement of hoofs, a creak
+and crunch of wheels, and presently the rumble of a heavy carriage
+being driven rapidly away.  But too well did Rabecque surmise what
+had taken place.
+
+The ruffian released him at last, and, leaping to his feet, was gone
+before Rabecque could rise.  Once up, however, the lackey darted to
+the door.  In the distance he saw his late assailant running hard;
+the coach had disappeared.  He turned, and his smouldering eye fell
+upon the landlord.
+
+"O pig!" he apostrophized him, snarling at him to vent some of his
+pent-up rage.  "O cowardly pig."
+
+"What would you?" expostulated the frightened taverner.  "They had
+cut my throat if I resisted them."
+
+Rabecque poured abuse upon him, until for very lack of words he was
+forced to cease, then, with a final bark of contempt, he went to
+recover his sword, which had been flung into a corner of the room.
+He was stooping in the act, when a quick step rang behind him on the
+threshold, an angry voice harsh and metallic pronounced his name:
+
+"Rebecque!"
+
+The sword clattered from Rabecque's hand suddenly gone nerveless -
+nerveless with sheer joy, all else forgotten in the perception that
+there, safe and sound, stood his beloved master.
+
+"Monsieur!" he cried, and the tears welled up to the rough servant's
+eyes.  "Monsieur!" he cried again, and then with the tears streaming
+down his cheeks, sallow and wrinkled as parchment, "Oh, thank God!"
+he blubbered.  "Thank God!"
+
+"For what?" asked Garnache, coming forward, a scowl like a
+thunder-cloud upon his brow.  "Where is the coach, where the troopers?
+Where is mademoiselle?  Answer me!"
+
+He caught Rabecque's wrist in a grip that threatened to snap it.
+His face was livid, his eyes aflame.
+
+"They - they -" stammered Rabecque.  He had not the courage to tell
+the thing that had happened.  He feared Garnache would strike him
+dead.
+
+And then out of his terror he gathered an odd daring.  He spoke to
+Garnache as never he had dreamt to speak to him, and it may well be
+that by his tone and by what he said he saved his life just then.
+
+"You fool," he cried to him.  "I told you to be on your guard.  I
+warned you to go warily.  But you would not heed me.  You know
+better than Rabecque.  You would have your way.  You must go
+a-brawling.  And they duped you, they fooled you to the very top
+of their bent, monsieur."
+
+Garnache dropped the servant's hand and stood back a pace.  That
+counter-blast of passion and that plain speaking from a quarter so
+unexpected served, in part at least, to sober him.  He understood
+the thing that had happened, the thing that already he suspected
+must have happened; but he understood too that he alone was to blame
+for it - he and his cursed temper.
+
+"Who - who fooled me?" he stammered.
+
+"Gaubert - the fellow that calls himself Gaubert.  He and his
+friends.  They fooled you away.  Then Gaubert returned with a tale
+that you had been killed and that there was a disturbance in the
+Champs aux Capuchins.  Monsieur de Tressan was here, as ill-luck
+would have it, and Gaubert implored him to send soldiers thither
+to quell the riot.  He dispatched the escort.  I sought in vain to
+stay them.  He would not listen to me.  The troopers went, and then
+Monsieur Gaubert entered the inn, to join Monsieur de Condillac and
+six of his braves who were waiting there.  They overpowered me, and
+carried mademoiselle off in the coach.  I did what I could, but - "
+
+"How long have they been gone?" Garnache interrupted him to inquire.
+
+"But few minutes before you came."
+
+"It would be, then, the coach that passed me near the Porte de
+Savoie.  We must go after them, Rabecque.  I made a short cut across
+the graveyard of Saint Francis, or I must have met the escort.  Oh,
+perdition!" he cried, smiting his clenched right hand into his open
+left.  "To have so much good work undone by a moment's unguardedness."
+Then abruptly he turned on his heels.  "I am going to Monsieur de
+Tressan," said he over his shoulder, and went out.
+
+As he reached the threshold of the porch, the escort rode up the
+street, returned at last.  At sight of him the sergeant broke into
+a cry of surprise.
+
+"At least you are safe, monsieur," he said.  "We had heard that
+you were dead, and I feared it must be so, for all that the rest of
+the story that was told us was clearly part of a very foolish jest."
+
+"Jest?  It was no jest, Vertudieu!" said Garnache grimly.  "You had
+best return to the Palais Seneschal.  I have no further need of an
+escort," he added bitterly.  "I shall require a larger force."
+
+And he stepped out into the rain, which had begun again a few
+minutes earlier, and was now falling in a steady downpour.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE SENESCHAL'S ADVICE
+
+
+Straight across the Palais Seneschal went Garnache.  And sorely
+though his temper might already have been tried that day,
+tempestuously though it had been vented, there were fresh trials
+in store for him, fresh storms for Tressan.
+
+"May I ask, Monsieur le Seneschal," he demanded arrogantly, "to what
+end it was that you permitted yourself to order from its post the
+escort you had placed under my command?"
+
+"To what end?" returned the Seneschal, between sorrow and
+indignation.  "Why, to the end that it might succour you if still
+in time.  I had heard that if not dead already, you were in danger
+of your life."
+
+The answer was one that disarmed Garnache, in spite of his mistrust
+of Tressan, and followed as it now was by the Seneschal's profuse
+expressions of joy at seeing Garnache safe and well, it left him
+clearly unable to pursue the subject of his grievance in this
+particular connection.  Instead, he passed on to entertain Tressan
+with the recital of the thing that had been done; and in reciting
+it his anger revived again, nor did the outward signs of sympathetic
+perturbation which the Seneschal thought it judicious to display do
+aught to mollify his feelings.
+
+"And now, monsieur," he concluded, "there remains but one course to
+be pursued - to return in force, and compel them at the sword-point
+to surrender me mademoiselle.  That accomplished, I shall arrest the
+Dowager and her son and every jackanapes within that castle.  Her
+men can lie in Grenoble gaol to be dealt with by yourself for
+supporting her in an attempt to resist the Queen's authority.  Madame
+and her son shall go with me to Paris to answer there for their
+offence."
+
+The Seneschal looked grave.  He thoughtfully combed his beard with
+his forefinger, and his little eyes peered a shade fearfully at
+Garnache through his horn-rimmed spectacles - Garnache had found
+him at his never-failing pretence of work.
+
+"Why, yes," he agreed, speaking slowly, "that way lies your duty."
+
+"I rejoice, monsieur, to hear you say so.  For I shall need your aid."
+
+"My aid?" The Seneschal's face assumed a startled look.
+
+"I shall require of you the necessary force to reduce that garrison."
+
+The Seneschal blew out his cheeks almost to bursting point, then
+wagged his head and smiled wistfully.
+
+"And where," he asked, "am I to find such a force?"
+
+"You have upwards of ten score men in quarters at Grenoble."
+
+"If I had those men - which I have not - what, think you, could
+they do against a fortress such as Condillac?  Monsieur deludes
+himself.  If they resist, you'll need ten times that number to
+bring them to their senses.  They are well victualled; they have
+an excellent water-supply.  My friend, they would just draw up the
+bridge, and laugh at you and your soldiers from the ramparts."
+
+Garnache looked at him from under lowering brows.  But for all his
+mistrust of the man - a mistrust most excellently founded - he was
+forced to confess that there was wisdom in what Tressan said.
+
+"I'll sit down and besiege them if need be," he announced.
+
+Again the Seneschal wagged his head.  "You would have to be prepared
+to spend your winter there in that case, and it can be cold in the
+valley of Isere.  Their garrison is small - some twenty men at most;
+but it is sufficient for their defence, and not too many mouths to
+feed.  No, no, monsieur, if you would win your way by force you must
+count upon more than ten score men."
+
+And now a flash of inspiration helped Tressan.  It was his aim, as
+we know, to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds.  Break with
+Madame de Condillac his foolish hopeful heart would not permit him.
+Break with this man, who personified authority and the King, he
+dared not.  He had sought - and it had given him much to do - to
+steer a middle course, serving the Dowager and appearing not to
+withstand the Parisian.  Now it almost seemed to him as if he were
+come to an impasse beyond which he could no longer pursue that
+course, but must halt and declare his side.  But the notion that
+now occurred to him helped him to win through this difficulty.  For
+Madame de Condillac's schemes he cared not a jot; whether they came
+safe to harbour or suffered shipwreck on the way was all one to him;
+whether Valerie de La Vauvraye married Marius de Condillac or the
+meanest cobbler in Grenoble was, similarly, a matter that never
+disturbed his mind.  He would not even be concerned if he, himself,
+were to help the Dowager's schemes to frustration, so long as she
+were to remain in ignorance of his defection, so long as outwardly
+he were to appear faithful to her interests.
+
+"Monsieur," said he gravely, "the only course that promises you
+success is to return to Paris, and, raising sufficient men, with
+guns and other modern siege appliances such as we possess not here,
+come back and batter down the walls of Condillac."
+
+There the Seneschal spoke good sense.  Garnache realized it, so much
+so that he almost began to doubt whether he had not done the man an
+injustice in believing him allied to the other party.  But, however
+fully he might perceive the wisdom of the advice, such a step was
+one that must wound his pride, must be an acknowledgment that his
+own resources, upon which the Queen had relied when she sent him
+single-handed to deal with this situation, had proved insufficient.
+
+He took a turn in the apartment without answering, tugging at his
+mustachios and pondering the situation what time the Seneschal
+furtively watched him in the candle-light.  At last he came abruptly
+to a standstill by the Seneschal's writing-table, immediately
+opposite Tressan.  His hand fell to his side, his eyes took on a
+look of determination.
+
+"As a last resource your good advice may guide me, Monsieur le
+Seneschal," said he.  "But first I'll see what can be done with
+such men as you have here."
+
+"But I have no men," answered Tressan, dismayed to see the failure
+of his effort.
+
+Garnache stared at him in an unbelief that was fast growing to
+suspicion.  "No men?" he echoed dully.  "No men?"
+
+"I might muster a score - no more than that."
+
+"But, monsieur, it is within my knowledge that you have at least
+two hundred.  I saw at least some fifty drawn up in the courtyard
+below here yesterday morning."
+
+"I had them, monsieur," the Seneschal made haste to cry, his hands
+upheld, his body leaning forward over his table.  "I had them.  But,
+unfortunately, certain disturbances in the neighbourhood of
+Montelimar have forced me to part with them.  They were on the point
+of setting out when you saw them."
+
+Garnache looked at him a moment without speaking.  Then, sharply:
+
+"They must be recalled, monsieur," said he.
+
+And now the Seneschal took refuge in a fine pretence of indignation.
+
+"Recalled?" he cried, and besides indignation there was some horror
+in his voice.  "Recalled?  And for what?  That they may assist you
+in obtaining charge of a wretched girl who is so headstrong as to
+wish to marry other than her guardians have determined.  A pretty
+affair that, as God's my life!  And for the adjustment of such a
+family dispute as this, a whole province is to go to ruin, a
+conflagration of rebellion is to spread unquenched?  On my soul,
+sir, I begin to think that this mission of yours has served to turn
+your head.  You begin to see it out of all proportion to its size."
+
+"Monsieur, it may have turned my head, or it may not; but I shall
+not be amazed if in the end it be the means of losing you yours.
+Tell me now: What is the disturbance you speak of in Montelimar?"
+That was a question all Tressan's ingenuity could not answer.
+
+"What affair is it of yours?" he demanded.  "Are you Seneschal of
+Dauphiny, or am I?  If I tell you that there is a disturbance, let
+that suffice.  In quelling it I do but attend to my own business.
+Do you attend to yours - which seems to be that of meddling in
+women's matters."
+
+This was too much.  There was such odious truth in it that the
+iron sank deep into Garnache's soul.  The very reflection that
+such a business should indeed be his, was of itself enough to put
+him in a rage, without having it cast in his teeth as Tressan had
+none too delicately done.
+
+He stormed and raged; he waved his arms and thumped the table, and
+talked of cutting men to ribbons - among which men no doubt he
+counted my Lord the Seneschal of Dauphiny.  But from the storm of
+fierce invective, of threats and promises with which he filled the
+air, the Seneschal gathered with satisfaction the one clear
+statement that he would take his advice.
+
+"I'll do as you say," Garnache had ended.  "I'll get me back to
+Paris as fast as horse can carry me.  When I return woe betide
+Condillac!  And I shall send my emissaries into the district of
+Montelimar to inquire into these disturbances you tell of.  Woe
+betide you if they find the country quiet.  You shall pay a heavy
+price for having dispatched your soldiers thither to the end that
+they might not be here to further the Queen's business."
+
+With that he caught up his rain-sodden hat, flung it on his head,
+and stalked out of the room, and, so, out of the Palace.
+
+He left Grenoble next morning, and it was a very tame and
+crestfallen Garnache who quitted the Auberge du Veau qui Tete and
+rode out of the town to take the road to Paris.  How they would
+laugh at him at the Luxembourg!  Not even an affair of this kind
+was he fit to carry through; not even as a meddler in women's
+matters as Tressan had called him - could he achieve success.
+Rabecque, reflecting his master's mood - as becomes a good lackey
+ - rode silent and gloomy a pace or two in the rear.
+
+By noon they had reached Voiron, and here, at a quiet hostelry,
+they descended to pause awhile for rest and refreshment.  It was a
+chill, blustering day, and although the rain held off, the heavens
+were black with the promise of more to come.  There was a fire
+burning in the general-room of the hostelry, and Garnache went to
+warm him at its cheerful blaze.  Moodily he stood there, one hand
+on the high mantel shelf, one foot upon an andiron, his eyes upon
+the flames.
+
+He was disconsolately considering his position; considering how
+utterly, how irrevocably he had failed; pondering the gibes he
+would have to stomach on his return to Paris, the ridicule it
+would incumb him to live down.  It had been a fine thing to
+breathe fire and blood and vengeance to Tressan yesterday, to tell
+him of the great deeds he would perform on his return.  It was odds
+he never would return.  They would send another in his place, if
+indeed they sent at all.  For, after all, before he could reach
+Paris and the force required be in Dauphiny, a fortnight must
+elapse, let them travel never so quickly.  By that time they must
+be singularly sluggish at Condillac if they did not so contrive
+that no aid that came should come in time for mademoiselle, now that
+they were warned that the Queen was stirring in the matter.
+
+Oh! he had blundered it all most cursedly.  Had he but kept his
+temper yesterday at Grenoble; had he but had the wit to thwart their
+plans, by preserving an unruffled front to insult, he might have won
+through and carried mademoiselle out of their hands.  As it was - !
+he let his arms fall to his sides in his miserable despair.
+
+"Your wine, monsieur," said Rabecque at his elbow.  He turned, and
+took the cup of mulled drink from his servant.  The beverage warmed
+him in body; but it would need a butt of it to thaw the misery from
+his soul.
+
+"Rabecque," he said with a pathetic grimness, "I think I am the most
+cursed blunderer that ever was entrusted with an errand."
+
+The thing so obsessed his mind that he must speak of it, if it be
+only to his lackey.  Rabecque's sharp face assumed a chastened look.
+He sighed most dutifully.  He sought for words of consolation.  At
+last:
+
+"At least, monsieur has made them fear him up there at Condillac,"
+said he.
+
+"Fear me?" laughed Garnache.  "Pish! Deride me, you would say."
+
+"Fear you, I repeat, monsieur.  Else why are they at such pains
+to strengthen the garrison?"
+
+"Eh?" he questioned.  But his tone was not greatly interested.  "Are
+they doing that?  Are they strengthening it?  How know you?"
+
+"I had it from the ostler at the Veau qui Tete that a certain
+Captain Fortunio - an Italian soldier of fortune who commands the
+men at Condillac - was at the Auberge de France last night, offering
+wine to whomsoever would drink with him, and paying for it out of
+Madame la Marquise's purse.  To such as accepted his hospitality he
+talked of the glory of a military career, particularly a free-lance's;
+and to those who showed interest in what he said he offered a pike
+in his company."
+
+"Enrolled he many, did you learn?"
+
+"Not one, monsieur, the ostler told me; and it seems he spent the
+evening watching him weave his spider's web.  But the flies were
+over-wary.  They knew whence he came; they knew the business for
+which he desired to enrol them - for a rumour had gone round that
+Condillac was in rebellion against the Queen's commands - and there
+were none so desperate at the Auberge de France as to risk their
+necks by enlisting, no matter what the wage he offered."
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.  "No matter," said he.  "Get me
+another cup of wine."  But as Rabecque turned away to obey him there
+came a sudden gleam into the eye of Monsieur de Garnache which
+lightened the depression of his countenance.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE RECRUIT
+
+In the great hall of the Chateau de Condillac sat the Dowager, her
+son, and the Lord Seneschal, in conference.
+
+It was early in the afternoon of the last Thursday in October,
+exactly a week since Monsieur de Garnache all but broken-hearted at
+the failure of his mission - had departed from Grenoble.  They had
+dined, and the table was still strewn with vessels and the fragments
+of their meal, for the cloth had not yet been raised.  But the three
+of them had left the board - the Seneschal with all that reluctance
+with which he was wont to part company with the table, no matter
+how perturbed in spirit he might to - and they had come to group
+themselves about the great open fireplace.
+
+A shaft of pale October sunshine entering through the gules of an
+escutcheon on the mullioned windows struck a scarlet light into
+silver aid glass upon the forsaken board.
+
+Madame was speaking.  She was repeating words that she had uttered
+at least twenty times a day during the past week.
+
+"It was a madness to let that fellow go.  Had we but put him and
+his servant out of the way, we should be able now to sleep tranquil
+in our beds.  I know their ways at Court.  They might have marvelled
+a little at first that he should tarry so long upon his errand, that
+he should send them no word of its progress; but presently, seeing
+him no more, he would little by little have been forgotten, and with
+him the affair in which the Queen has been so cursedly ready to
+meddle.
+
+"As it is, the fellow will go back hot with the outrage put upon
+him; there will be some fine talk of it in Paris; it will be spoken
+of as treason, as defiance of the King's Majesty, as rebellion.  The
+Parliament may be moved to make outlaws of us, and the end of it
+all - who shall foresee?"
+
+"It is a long distance from Condillac to Paris, madame," said her
+son, with a shrug.
+
+"And you will find them none so ready to send soldiers all this way,
+Marquise," the Seneschal comforted her.
+
+"Bah! You make too sure of your security.  You make too sure of what
+they will do, what leave undone.  Time will show, my friends; and,
+mor-dieu! I am much at fault if you come not both to echo my regret
+that we did not dispose of Monsieur de Garnache and his lackey when
+we had them in our power."
+
+Her eye fell with sinister promise upon Tressan, who shivered
+slightly and spread his hands to the blaze, as though his shiver
+had been of cold.  But Marius did not so readily grow afraid.
+
+"Madame," he said, "at the worst we can shut our gates and fling
+defiance at them.  We are well-manned, and Fortunio is seeking
+fresh recruits."
+
+"Seeking them, yes," she sneered.  "For a week has the fellow been
+spending money like water, addling the brains of half Grenoble with
+the best wine at the Auberge de France, yet not a single recruit
+has come in, so far."
+
+Marius laughed.  "Your pessimism leads you into rash conclusions,"
+he cried.  "You are wrong.  One recruit has come in."
+
+"One!" she echoed.  "A thousand devils!  A brave number that!  A
+fine return for the river of wine with which we have washed the
+stomachs of Grenoble."
+
+"Still, it is a beginning," ventured the Seneschal.
+
+"Aye, and, no doubt, an ending," she flashed back at him.  "And
+what manner of fool may this one be, whose fortunes were so
+desperate that he could throw them in with ours?"
+
+"He is an Italian - a Piedmontese who has tramped across Savoy and
+was on his way to Paris to make his fortune, when Fortunio caught
+him and made it clear to him that his fortune was made for him at
+Condillac.  He is a lusty, stalwart fellow, speaking no word of
+French, who was drawn to Fortunio by discovering in him a
+fellow-countryman."
+
+Mockery flashed from the Dowager's beautiful eyes.
+
+"In that you have the reason of his enrolling himself.  He knew
+no word of French, poor devil, so could not learn how rash his
+venture was.  Could we find more such men as this one it might
+be well.  But where shall we find them?  Pish! my dear Marius,
+matters are little mended, nor ever will be, for the mistake we
+made in allowing Garnache to go his ways."
+
+"Madame;" again ventured Tressan, "I think that you want for
+hopefulness."
+
+"At least, I do not want for courage, Monsieur le Comte," she
+answered him; "and I promise you that while I live - to handle a
+sword if need be - no Paris men shall set foot in Condillac."
+
+"Aye," grumbled Marius, "you can contemplate that, and it is all
+you do contemplate.  You will not see, madame that our position is
+far from desperate; that, after all, there may be no need to resist
+the King.  It is three months since we had news of Florimond.  Much
+may happen in three months when a man is warring.  It may well be
+that he is dead."
+
+"I wish I knew he was - and damned," she snapped, with a tightening
+of her scarlet lips.
+
+"Yes," agreed Marius, with a sigh, "that were an end to all our
+troubles."
+
+"I'm none so sure.  There is still mademoiselle, with her new-formed
+friends in Paris - may a pestilence blight them all!  There are
+still the lands of La Vauvraye to lose.  The only true end to our
+troubles as they stand at present lies in your marrying this
+headstrong baggage."
+
+"That the step should be rendered impossible, you can but blame
+yourself," Marius reminded her.
+
+"How so?" she cried, turning sharply upon him.
+
+"Had you kept friends with the Church, had you paid tithes and
+saved us from this cursed Interdict, we should have no difficulty
+in getting hither a priest, and settling the matter out of hand,
+be Valerie willing or not."
+
+She looked at him, scorn kindling in her glance.  Then she swung
+round to appeal to Tressan.
+
+"You hear him, Count," said she.  "There is a lover for you!  He
+would wed his mistress whether she love him or not - and he has
+sworn to me that he loves the girl."
+
+"How else should the thing be done since she opposes it?" asked
+Marius, sulkily.
+
+"How else?  Do you ask me how else?  God!  Were I a man, and had
+I your shape and face, there is no woman in the world should
+withstand me if I set my heart on her.  It is address you lack.
+You are clumsy as a lout where a woman is concerned.  Were I in
+your place, I had taken her by storm three months ago, when first
+she came to us.  I had carried her out of Condillac, out of France,
+over the border into Savoy, where there are no Interdicts to plague
+you, and there I would have married her."
+
+Marius frowned darkly, but before he could speak, Tressan was
+insinuating a compliment to the Marquise.
+
+"True, Marius," he said, with pursed lips.  "Nature has been very
+good to you in that she has made you the very counterpart of your
+lady mother.  You are as comely a gentleman as is to be found in
+France - or out of it."
+
+"Pish!" snapped Marius, too angered by the reflection cast upon his
+address, to be flattered by their praises of his beauty.  "It is an
+easy thing to talk; an easy thing to set up arguments when we
+consider but the half of a question.  You forget, madame, that
+Valerie is betrothed to Florimond and that she clings faithfully to
+her betrothal."
+
+"Vertudieu!" swore the Marquise, "and what is this betrothal, what
+this faithfulness?  She has not seen her betrothed for three years.
+She was a child at the time of their fiancailles.  Think you her
+faithfulness to him is the constancy of a woman to her lover?  Go
+your ways, you foolish boy.  It is but the constancy to a word, to
+the wishes of her father.  Think you constancy that has no other
+base than that would stand between her and any man who - as you
+might do, had you the address - could make her love him?"
+
+"I do say so," answered Marius firmly.
+
+She smiled the pitying smile of one equipped with superior knowledge
+when confronted with an obstinate, uninformed mind.
+
+"There is a droll arrogance about you, Marius," she told him,
+quietly.  "You, a fledgling, would teach me, a woman, the ways of
+a woman's heart!  It is a thing you may live to regret."
+
+"As how?" he asked.
+
+"Once already has mademoiselle contrived to corrupt one of our men,
+and send him to Paris with a letter.  Out of that has sprung our
+present trouble.  Another time she may do better.  When she shall
+have bribed another to assist her to escape; when she, herself,
+shall have made off to the shelter of the Queen-mother, perhaps
+you will regret that my counsel should have fallen upon barren
+ground."
+
+"It is to prevent any such attempt that we have placed her under
+guard," said he.  "You are forgetting that."
+
+"Forgetting it?  Not I.  But what assurance have you that she will
+not bribe her guard?"
+
+Marius laughed, rose, and pushed back his chair.
+
+"Madame," said he, "you are back at your contemplation of the worst
+side of this affair; you are persisting in ccnsidering only how we
+may be thwarted.  But set your mind at rest.  Gilles is her sentinel.
+Every night he sleeps in her anteroom.  He is Fortunio's most
+trusted man.  She will not corrupt him."
+
+The Dowager smiled pensively, her eyes upon the fire.  Suddenly she
+raised them to his face.  "Berthaud was none the less trusted.  Yet,
+with no more than a promise of reward at some future time should she
+succeed in escaping from us, did she bribe him to carry her letter
+to the Queen.  What happened to Berthaud that may not happen to
+Gilles?"
+
+"You might change her sentry nightly," put in the Seneschal.
+
+"Yes, if we knew whom we could trust; who would be above corruption.
+As it is" - she shrugged her shoulders "that would be but to afford
+her opportunities to bribe them one by one until they were all ready
+to act in concert."
+
+"Why need she any sentinel at all?" asked Tressan, with some show
+of sense.
+
+"To ward off possible traitors," she told him, and Marius smiled and
+wagged his head.
+
+"Madame is never done foreseeing the worst, monsieur."
+
+"Which shows my wisdom.  The men in our garrison are mercenaries,
+all attached to us only because we pay them.  They all know who she
+is and what her wealth."
+
+"Pity you have not a man who is deaf and dumb," said Tressan, half
+in jest.  But Marius looked up suddenly, his eyes serious.
+
+"We have as good," said he.  "There is the Italian knave Fortunio
+enrolled yesterday, as I have told you.  He knows neither her wealth
+nor her identity; nor if he did could he enter into traffic with her,
+for he knows no French, and she no Italian."
+
+The Dowager clapped her hands.  "The very man!" she cried.
+
+But Marius, either from sheer perverseness, or because he did not
+share her enthusiasm, made answer: "I have faith in Gilles."
+
+"Yes," she mocked him, "and you had faith in Berthaud.  Oh, if you
+have faith in Gilles, let him remain; let no more be said."
+
+The obstinate boy took her advice, and shifted the subject, speaking
+to Tressan of some trivial business connected with the Seneschalship.
+
+But madame, woman-like, returned to the matter whose abandoning she
+had herself suggested.  Marius, for all his affected disdain of it,
+viewed it with a certain respect.  And so in the end they sent for
+the recruit.
+
+Fortunio - who was no other than the man Garnache had known as
+"Sanguinetti" - brought him, still clad in the clothes in which he
+had come.  He was a tall, limber fellow, with a very swarthy skin
+and black, oily-looking hair that fell in short ringlets about his
+ears and neck, and a black, drooping mustache which gave him a rather
+hang-dog look.  There was a thick stubble of beard of several days'
+growth about his chin and face; his eyes were furtive in their
+glances, but of a deep blue that contrasted oddly with his blackness
+when he momentarily raised them.
+
+He wore a tattered jerkin, and his legs, in default of stockings,
+were swathed in soiled bandages and cross-gartered from ankle to knee.
+He stood in a pair of wooden shoes, from one of which peeped forth
+some wisps of straw, introduced, no doubt, to make the footgear fit.
+He slouched and shuffled in his walk, and he was unspeakably dirty.
+Nevertheless, he was girt with a sword in a ragged scabbard hanging
+from a frayed and shabby belt of leather.
+
+Madame scanned him with interest.  The fastidious Marius eyed him
+with disgust.  The Seneschal peered at him curiously through
+shortsighted eyes.
+
+"I do not think I have ever seen a dirtier ruffian," said he.
+
+"I like his nose," said madame quietly.  "It is the nose of an
+intrepid man."
+
+"It reminds me of Garnache's," laughed the Seneschal.
+
+"You flatter the Parisian," commented Marius.
+
+The mercenary, meanwhile, stood blandly smiling at the party,
+showing at least a fine array of teeth, and wearing the patient,
+attentive air of one who realizes himself to be under discussion,
+yet does not understand what is being said.
+
+"A countryman of yours, Fortunio?" sneered Marius.
+
+The captain, whose open, ingenuous countenance dissembled as
+villainous a heart as ever beat in the breast of any man, disowned
+the compatriotism with a smile.
+
+"Hardly, monsieur," said he.  "'Battista' is a Piedmontese."
+Fortunio himself was a Venetian.
+
+"Is he to be relied upon, think you?" asked madame.  Fortunio
+shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands.  It was not his habit
+to trust any man inordinately.
+
+"He is an old soldier," said he.  "He has trailed a pike in the
+Neapolitan wars.  I have cross-questioned him, and found his answers
+bore out the truth of what he said."
+
+"And what brings him to France?" asked Tressan.  The captain smiled
+again, and there came again that expressive shrug of his.  "A little
+over-ready with the steel," said he.
+
+They told Fortunio that they proposed to place him sentry over
+mademoiselle instead of Gilles, as the Italian's absolute lack of
+French would ensure against corruption.  The captain readily agreed
+with them.  It would be a wise step.  The Italian fingered his
+tattered hat, his eyes on the ground.
+
+Suddenly madame spoke to him.  She asked him for some account of
+himself and whence he came, using the Italian tongue, of which she
+had a passing knowledge.  He followed her questions very attentively,
+at times with apparent difficulty, his eyes on her face, his head
+craned a little forward.
+
+Now and then Fortunio had to intervene, to make plainer to this
+ignorant Piedmontese mind the Marquise's questions.  His answers
+came in a deep, hoarse voice, slurred by the accent of Piedmont,
+and madame - her knowledge of Italian being imperfect - had
+frequently to have recourse to Fortunio to discover the meaning
+of what he said.
+
+At last she dismissed the pair of them, bidding the captain see that
+he was washed and more fittingly clothed.
+
+An hour later, after the Seneschal had taken his departure to ride
+home to Grenoble, it was madame herself, accompanied by Marius and
+Fortunio, who conducted Battista - such was the name the Italian
+had given - to the apartments above, where mademoiselle was now
+confined practically a prisoner.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+VALERIE'S GAOLER
+
+
+My child, said the Dowager, and her eyes dwelt on Valerie with a
+look of studied gentleness, "why will you not be reasonable?"
+
+The constant reflection that Garnache was at large, making his way
+back to Paris to stir up vengeance for the outrage put upon him,
+was not without a certain chastening effect upon the Dowager.  She
+had a way of saying that she had as good a stomach for a fight as
+any man in France, and a fight there should be if it came to it and
+Garnache should return to assail Condillac.  Yet a certain pondering
+of the consequences, a certain counting of the cost - ordinarily
+unusual to her nature led her to have recourse to persuasion and to
+a gentleness no less unusual.
+
+Valerie's eyes were raised to hers with a look that held more scorn
+than wonder.  They were standing in the antechamber of Valerie's
+room.  Yonder at his post lounged the recruit "Battista," looking a
+trifle cleaner than when first he had been presented to the Marquise,
+but still not clean enough for a lady's antechamber.  He was leaning
+stolidly against the sill of the window, his eyes on the distant
+waters of the Isere, which shone a dull copper colour in the
+afterglow of the October sunset.  His face was vacant, his eyes
+pensive, as he stood there undisturbed by the flow of a language he
+did not understand.
+
+Fortunio and Marius had departed, and the Marquise - played upon by
+her unusual tremors - had remained behind for a last word with the
+obstinate girl.
+
+"In what, madame," asked Valerie, "does my conduct fall short of
+reasonableness?"
+
+The Dowager made a movement of impatience.  If at every step she
+were to be confronted by these questions, which had in them a savour
+of challenge, she was wasting time in remaining.
+
+"You are unreasonable, in this foolish clinging to a promise given
+for you."
+
+"Given by me, madame," the girl amended, knowing well to what
+promise the Dowager referred.
+
+"Given by you, then; but given at an age when you could not
+understand the nature of it.  They had no right to bind you so."
+
+"If it is for any to question that right, it is for me," Valerie
+made answer, her eyes ever meeting the Dowager's unflinchingly.
+"And I am content to leave that right unquestioned.  I am content
+to fill the promise given.  In honour I could not do less."
+
+"Ah!  In honour!" The Dowager sighed.  Then she came a step nearer,
+and her face grew sweetly wistful.  "But your heart, child; what of
+your heart?"
+
+"My heart concerns myself.  I am the betrothed of Florimond - that
+is all that concerns the world and you.  I respect and admire him
+more than any living man, and I shall be proud to become his wife
+when he returns, as his wife I shall become in spite of all that
+you and your son may do."
+
+The Dowager laughed softly, as if to herself.
+
+"And if I tell you that Florimond is dead?"
+
+"When you give me proof of that, I shall believe it," the girl
+replied.  The Marquise looked at her, her face manifesting no
+offence at the almost insulting words.
+
+"And if I were to lay that proof before you?" she inquired, sadly
+almost.
+
+Valerie's eyes opened a trifle wider, as if in apprehension.  But
+her answer was prompt and her voice steady.  "It still could have
+no effect upon my attitude towards your son."
+
+"This is foolishness, Valerie - "
+
+"In you it is, madame," the girl broke in; "a foolishness to think
+you can constrain a girl, compel her affections, command her love,
+by such means as you have employed towards me.  You think that it
+predisposes me to be wooed, that it opens my heart to your son, to
+see myself gaoled that he may pay me his court."
+
+"Gaoled, child?  Who gaols you?" the Dowager cried, as if the most
+surprising utterance had fallen from Valerie's lips.
+
+Mademoiselle smiled in sorrow and some scorn.
+
+"Am I not gaoled, then?" she asked.  "What call you this?  What does
+that fellow there?  He is to lie outside my door at nights to see
+that none holds communication with me.  He is to go with me each
+morning to the garden, when, by your gracious charity I take the
+air.  Sleeping and waking the man is ever within hearing of any word
+that I may utter - "
+
+"But if he has no French!" the Dowager protested.
+
+"To ensure, no doubt, against any attempt of mine to win him to my
+side, to induce him to aid me escape from this prison.  Oh, madame,
+I tell you you do but waste time, and you punish me and harass
+yourself to little purpose.  Had Marius been such a man as I might
+have felt it in my nature to love which Heaven forbid! - these means
+by which you have sought to bring that thing about could but have
+resulted in making me hate him as I do."
+
+The Dowager's fears were banished from her mind at that, and with
+them went all thought of conciliating Valerie.  Anger gleamed in her
+eyes; the set of her lips grew suddenly sneering and cruel, so that
+the beauty of her face but served to render it hateful the more.
+
+"So that you hate him, ma mie?" a ripple of mockery on the current
+of her voice, "and he a man such as any girl in France might be
+proud to wed.  Well, well, you are not to be constrained, you say."
+And the Marquise's laugh was menacing and unpleasant.  "Be not so
+sure, mademoiselle.  Be not so sure of that.  It may well betide
+that you shall come to beg upon your knees for this alliance with
+a man whom you tell me that you hate.  Be not so sure you cannot be
+constrained."
+
+Their eyes met; both women were white to the lips, but it was
+curbed passion in the one, and deadly fear in the other; for what
+the Dowager's words left unsaid her eyes most eloquently conveyed.
+The girl shrank back, her hands clenched, her lip caught in her
+teeth.
+
+"There is a God in heaven, madame," she reminded the Marquise.
+
+"Aye - in heaven," laughed the Marquise, turning to depart.  She
+paused by the door, which the Italian had sprung forward to open
+for her.
+
+"Marius shall take the air with you in the morning if it is fine.
+Ponder meanwhile what I have said."
+
+"Does this man remain here, madame?" inquired the girl, vainly
+seeking to render her voice steady.
+
+"In the outer anteroom is his place: but as the key of this room is
+on his side of the door, he may enter here when he so pleases, or
+when he thinks that he has reason to.  If the sight of him displeases
+you, you may lock yourself from it in your own chamber yonder."
+
+The same she said in Italian to the man, who bowed impassively, and
+followed the Dowager into the outer room, closing the door upon
+mademoiselle.  It was a chamber almost bare of furniture, save for
+a table and chair which had been placed there, so that the gaoler
+might take his meals.
+
+The man followed the Marquise across the bare floor, their steps
+resounding as they went, and he held the outer door for her.
+
+Without another word she left him, and where he stood he could hear
+her steps as she tripped down the winding staircase of stone.  At
+last the door of the courtyard closed with a bang, and the grating
+of a key announced to the mercenary that he and his charge were both
+imprisoned in that tower of the Chateau de Condillac.
+
+Left alone in the anteroom, mademoiselle crossed to the window and
+dropped limply into a chair.  Her face was still very white, her
+heart beating tumultuously, for the horrid threat that had been
+conveyed in the Dowager's words had brought her her first thrill of
+real fear since the beginning of this wooing-by-force three months
+ago, a wooing which had become more insistent and less like a wooing
+day by day, until it had culminated in her present helpless position.
+
+She was a strong-souled, high-spirited girl, but tonight hope seemed
+extinguished in her breast.  Florimond, too, seemed to have abandoned
+her.  Either he had forgotten her, or he was dead, as the Dowager
+said.  Which might be the true state of things she did not greatly
+care.  The realization of how utterly she was in the power of Madame
+de Condillac and her son, and the sudden chance discovery of how
+unscrupulously that power might be wielded, filled her mind to the
+exclusion of all else.
+
+By the window she sat, watching, without heeding them, the fading
+colours in the sky.  She was abandoned to these monsters, and it
+seemed they would devour her.  She could hope for no help from
+outside since they had as she believed - slain Monsieur de Garnache.
+Her mind dwelt for a moment on that glimpse of rescue that had been
+hers a week ago, upon the few hours of liberty which she had enjoyed,
+but which only seemed now to increase the dark hopelessness of her
+imprisonment.
+
+Again with the eyes of her mind she beheld that grim, stalwart
+figure, saw his great nose, his greying hair, his fierce mustachios
+and his stern, quick eyes.  Again she heard the rasp of his metallic
+voice with its brisk derision.  She saw him in the hall below, his
+foot upon the neck of that popinjay of Condillac daring them all to
+draw a breath, should he forbid it; again in fancy she rode on the
+withers of his horse at the gallop towards Grenoble.  A sigh escaped
+her.  Surely that was the first man who was indeed a man she had ever
+set eyes on since her father died.  Had Garnache been spared, she
+would have felt courage and she would have hoped, for there was
+something about him that suggested energy and resource such as it is
+good to lean upon in times of stress.  Again she heard that brisk,
+metallic voice: "Are you content, madame?  Have you had fine deeds
+enough for one day?"
+
+And then, breaking in upon her musings came the very voice of her
+day-dream, so suddenly, sounding so natural and lifelike that she
+almost screamed, so startled was she.
+
+"Mademoiselle," it said, "I beg that you'll not utterly lose heart.
+I have come back to the thing Her Majesty bade me do, and I'll do
+it, in spite of that tigress and her cub."
+
+She sat still as a statue, scarce breathing, her eyes fixed upon
+the violet sky.  The voice had ceased, but still she sat on.  Then
+it was slowly borne in upon her that that was no dream-voice, no
+trick of her overburdened mind.  A voice, a living, actual voice
+had uttered those words in this room, here at her elbow.
+
+She turned, and again she almost screamed; for there, just behind
+her, his glittering eyes fixed upon her with singular intentness,
+stood the swarthy, black-haired Italian gaoler they had given her
+because he had no French.
+
+He had come up so quietly behind her that she had not heard his
+approach, and he was leaning forward now, with an odd suggestion of
+crouching in his attitude, like a beast about to spring.  Yet his
+gaze riveted hers as with a fascination.  And so, while she looked,
+his lips moved, and from them, in that same voice of her dreams,
+came from this man who had no French, the words:
+
+"Be not afraid, mademoiselle.  I am that blunderer, Garnache, that
+unworthy fool whose temper ruined what chance of saving you he had
+a week ago."
+
+She stared like one going mad.
+
+"Garnache!" said she, in a husky whisper.  "You Garnache?"
+
+Yet the voice, she knew, was Garnache's and none other.  It was a
+voice not easily mistaken.  And now, as she looked and looked, she
+saw that the man's nose was Garnache's, though oddly stained, and
+those keen eyes, they were Garnache's too.  But the hair that had
+been brown and flecked with grey was black; the reddish mustachios
+that had bristled like a mountain cat's were black, too, and they
+hung limp and hid from sight the fine lines of his mouth.  A
+hideous stubble of unshorn beard defaced his chin and face, and
+altered its sharp outline; and the clear, healthy skin that she
+remembered was now a dirty brown.
+
+Suddenly the face smiled, and it was a smile that reassured her and
+drove away the last doubt that she had.  She was on her feet in an
+instant.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," was all that she could say; but her longing
+was to fling her arms about the neck of this man, as she might have
+flung them about the neck of a brother or a father, and sob out upon
+his shoulder the sudden relief and revulsion that his presence
+brought.
+
+Garnache saw something of her agitation, and to relieve it he smiled
+and began to tell her the circumstances of his return and his
+presentation to Madame as a knave who had no French.
+
+"Fortune was very good to me, mademoiselle," said he.  "I had little
+hope that such a face as mine could be disguised, but I take no
+pride in what you see.  It is the handiwork of Rabecque, the most
+ingenious lackey that ever served a foolish master.  It helped me
+that having been ten years in Italy when I was younger, I acquired
+the language so well as to be able to impose even upon Fortunio.  In
+that lay a circumstance which at once disarmed suspicion, and if I
+stay not so long as it shall take the dye to wear from my hair and
+beard and the staining from my face, I shall have little to fear."
+
+"But, monsieur," she cried, "you have everything to fear!"  And
+alarm grew in her eyes.
+
+But he laughed again for answer.  "I have faith in my luck,
+mademoiselle, and I think I am on the tide of it at present.  I
+little hoped when I made my way into Condillac in this array that
+I should end, by virtue of my pretended ignorance of French, in
+being appointed gaoler to you.  I had some ado to keep the joy from
+my eyes when I heard them planning it.  It is a thing that has made
+all else easy."
+
+"But what can you do alone, monsieur?" she asked him; and there was
+a note almost of petulance in her voice.
+
+He moved to the window, and leaned his elbow on the sill.  The light
+was fast fading.  "I know not yet.  But I am here to contrive a
+means.  I shall think and watch."
+
+"You know in what hourly peril I am placed," she cried, and suddenly
+remembering that he must have overheard and understood the Dowager's
+words, a sudden heat came to her cheeks to recede again and leave
+them marble-pale.  And she thanked Heaven that in the dusk and in
+the shadow where she stood he could but ill make out her face.
+
+"If you think that I have been rash in returning - "
+
+"No, no, not rash, monsieur; noble and brave above all praise.  I
+would indeed I could tell you how noble and brave I account your
+action."
+
+"It is as nothing to the bravery required to let Rabecque do this
+hideous work upon a face for which I have ever entertained some
+measure of respect."
+
+He jested, sooner than enlighten her that it was his egregious pride
+had fetched him back when he was but a few hours upon his journey
+Pariswards, his inability to brook the ridicule that would be his
+when he announced at the Luxembourg that failure had attended him.
+
+"Ah, but what can you do alone?" she repeated.
+
+"Give me at least a day or two to devise some means; let me look
+round and take the measure of this gaol.  Some way there must be.
+I have not come so far and so successfully to be beaten now.  Still,"
+he continued, "if you think that I overrate my strength or my
+resource, if you would sooner that I sought men and made an assault
+upon Condillac, endeavouring to carry it and to let the Queen's will
+prevail by force of arms, tell me so, and I am gone tomorrow."
+
+"Whither would you go?" she cried, her voice strained with sudden
+affright.
+
+"I might seek help at Lyons or Moulins.  I might find loyal soldiers
+who would be willing to follow me by virtue of my warrant to levy
+such help as I may require, if I but tell them that the help was
+refused me in Grenoble.  I am not sure that it would be so, for,
+unfortunately, my warrant is for the Seneschal of Dauphiny only.
+Still, I might make the attempt."
+
+"No, no," she implored him, and in her eagerness to have him put
+all thought of leaving her from his mind, she caught him by the arm
+and raised a pleading face to his.  "Do not leave me here, monsieur;
+of your pity do not leave me alone amongst them.  Think me a coward
+if you will, monsieur: I am no less.  They have made a coward of me."
+
+He understood the thing she dreaded, and a great pity welled up
+from his generous heart for this poor unfriended girl at the mercy
+of the beautiful witch of Condillac and her beautiful rascally son.
+He patted the hand that clutched his arm.
+
+"I think, myself, that it will be best if I remain, now that I
+have come so far," he said.  "Let me ponder things.  It may well
+be that I shall devise some way."
+
+"May Heaven inspire you, monsieur.  I shall spend the night in
+prayer, I think, imploring God and His saints to show you the way
+you seek."
+
+"Heaven, I think, should hear your prayers, mademoiselle," he
+answered musingly, his glance upon the white, saintly face that
+seemed to shine in the deepening gloom.  Then, suddenly he
+stirred and bent to listen.
+
+"Sh!  Some one is coming," he whispered.  And he sped quickly from
+her side and into the outer room, where he sank noiselessly on to
+his chair as the steps ascended the stone staircase and a glow of
+yellow light grew gradually in the doorway that opened on to it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE
+
+
+That he might inspire the more confidence in the Dowager and her
+son Garnache organized and performed a little comedy at Condillac
+a couple of nights after his appointment as mademoiselle's gaoler.
+He gave an alarm at dead midnight, and when half-clad men, followed
+presently by madame and Marian, rushed into the anteroom where he
+stood, a very picture of the wildest excitement, he drew their
+attention to two twisted sheets, tied end to end, hanging from the
+window which overlooked the moat; and in answer to the marquise's
+questions he informed her that he had been disturbed by sounds of
+movements and upon entering the chamber he had discovered
+mademoiselle making these preparations for departure.
+
+Valerie, locked in the inner chamber, refused to come forth as the
+Marquise bade her, but her voice reassured Madame de Condillac of
+her presence, and so, since her attempt had failed, madame was
+content to let her be.
+
+"The little fool," she said, peering down from the window into the
+night; "she would have been killed for certain.  Her rope of sheets
+does not reach more than a third of the way down.  She would have
+had over thirty feet to fall, and if that had not been enough to
+finish her, she would of a certainty have, been drowned in the moat."
+
+She signified her satisfaction with the faithful "Battista's"
+vigilance by a present of some gold pieces in the morning, and
+since the height of the window and the moat beneath it did not
+appear sufficient obstacles to mademoiselle's attempts at effecting
+her escape, the Dowager had the window nailed down.  Thus, only by
+breaking it could egress be obtained, and the breaking of it could
+not be effected without such a noise as must arouse "Battista."
+
+Under Garnache's instructions the comedy was carried a little
+further.  Mademoiselle affected for her gaoler a most unconquerable
+aversion, and this she took pains to proclaim.
+
+One morning, three days after her attempted escape, she was taking
+the air in the garden of Condillac, "Battista," ever watchful, a
+few paces behind her, when suddenly she was joined by Marius - a
+splendid, graceful figure in a riding-suit of brown velvet and
+biscuit-coloured hose, his points tipped with gold, his long boots
+of the finest marroquin leather, his liver-coloured hound at his
+heels.  It was the last day of October, but the weather, from cold
+and wet that it had been for the past fortnight, had taken on a
+sudden improvement.  The sun shone, the air was still and warm,
+and but for the strewn leaves and the faint smell of decay with
+which the breath of autumn is ever laden, one might have fancied
+it a day of early spring.
+
+It was not Valerie's wont to pause when Marius approached.  Since
+she might not prevent him from walking where he listed, she had long
+since abandoned the futility of bidding him begone when he came near
+her.  But, at least, she had never stopped in her walk, never altered
+its pace; she had suffered what she might not avoid, but she had worn
+the outward air of suffering it with indifference.  This morning,
+however, she made a departure from her long habit.  Not only did she
+pause upon observing his approach, but she called to him as if she
+would have him hasten to her side.  And hasten he did, a new light
+in his eyes that was mostly of surprise, but a little, also, of hope.
+
+She was gracious to him for once, and gave him good morning in a
+manner that bordered upon the pleasant.  Wondering, he fell into
+step beside her, and they paced together the yew-bordered terrace,
+the ever-vigilant but discreet "Battista" following them, though
+keeping now a few paces farther in the rear.
+
+For a little while they appeared constrained, and their talk was of
+the falling leaves and the grateful change that had so suddenly come
+upon the weather.  Suddenly she stopped and faced him.
+
+"Will you do me a favour, Marius?" she asked.  He halted too, and
+turned to her, studying her gentle face, seeking to guess her mind
+in the clear hazel eyes she raised to his.  His eyebrows lifted
+slightly with surprise.  Nevertheless -
+
+"There is in all the world, Valerie, nothing you could ask me that
+I would not do," he protested.
+
+She smiled wistfully.  "How easy it is to utter words!" she sighed.
+
+"Marry me," he answered, leaning towards her, his eyes devouring
+her now, "and you shall find my words very quickly turned to deeds."
+
+"Ah," said she, and her smile broadened and took on a scornful twist,
+"you make conditions now.  If I will marry you, there is nothing you
+will not do for me; so that, conversely, I may take it that if I do
+not marry you, there is nothing you will do.  But in the meantime,
+Marius, until I resolve me whether I will marry you or not, would
+you not do a little thing that I might ask of you?"
+
+"Until you resolve?" he cried, and his face flushed with the sudden
+hope he gathered from those words.  Hitherto there had been no
+suggestion of a possible modification of attitude towards his suit.
+It had been repulsion, definite and uncompromising.  Again he studied
+her face.  Was she fooling him, this girl with the angel-innocence
+of glance?  The thought of such a possibility cooled him instantly.
+"What is it you want of me?" he asked, his voice ungracious.
+
+"Only a little thing, Marius." Her glance travelled back over her
+shoulder to the tall, limber fellow in leather jerkin and with
+cross-gartered legs who lounged a dozen steps behind them.  "Rid
+me of that ruffian's company," said she.
+
+Marius looked back at "Battista," and from him to Valerie.  Then
+he smiled and made a slight movement with his shoulders.
+
+"But to what end?" he asked, as one who pleadingly opposes an
+argument that is unreasonable.  "Another would replace him, and
+there is little to choose among the men that garrison Condillac."
+
+"Little, perhaps; but that little matters."  Sure of her ground, and
+gathering from his tone and manner that the more ardently she begged
+this thing the less likely would it be that she should prevail, she
+pursued her intercessions with a greater heat.  "Oh," she cried, in
+a pretended rage, "it is to insult me to give me that unclean knave
+for perpetual company.  I loathe and detest him.  The very sight of
+him is too much to endure."
+
+"You exaggerate," said he coldly.
+
+"I do not; indeed I do not," she rejoined, looking frankly,
+pleadingly into his face.  "You do not realize what it is to suffer
+the insolent vigilance of such as he; to feel that your every step
+is under surveillance; to feel his eyes ever upon you when you are
+within his sight.  Oh, it is insufferable!"
+
+Suddenly he gripped her arm, his face within a hand's breadth of
+her own, his words falling hot and quickly on her ear.
+
+"It is yours to end it when you will, Valerie," he passionately
+reminded her.  "Give yourself into my keeping.  Let it be mine to
+watch over you henceforth.  Let me - "
+
+Abruptly he ceased.  She had drawn back her head, her face was white
+to the lips, and in her eyes, as they dwelt on his at such close
+quarters, there appeared a look of terror, of loathing unutterable.
+He saw it, and releasing her arm he fell back as if she had struck
+him.  The colour left his face too.
+
+"Or is it," he muttered thickly, "that I inspire you, with much the
+same feeling as does he?"
+
+She stood before him with lowered eyelids, her bosom heaving still
+from the agitation of fear his closeness had aroused in her.  He
+studied her in silence a moment, with narrowing eyes and tightening
+lips.  Then anger stirred in him, and quenched the sorrow with which
+at first he had marked the signs of her repulsion.  But anger in
+Marius de Condillac was a cold and deadly emotion that vented itself
+in no rantings, uttered no loud-voiced threats or denunciations,
+prompted no waving of arms or plucking forth of weapons.
+
+He stooped towards her again from his stately, graceful height.  The
+cruelty hidden in the beautiful lines of his mouth took instant
+prominence in the smile that flickered round it.
+
+"I think that Battista makes a very excellent watchdog," he said,
+and you would have thought him amused, as if at the foolish
+subterfuge of some little child.  "You may be right to dislike him.
+He knows no French, so that it may not be yours to pervert and bribe
+him with promises of what you will do if he assists you to escape;
+but you will see that this very quality which renders him detestable
+to you renders him invaluable to us."
+
+He laughed softly, as one well pleased with his own astuteness,
+doffed his hat with a politeness almost exaggerated, and whistling
+his dog he abruptly left her.
+
+Thus were Marius and his mother - to whom he bore the tale of
+Valerie's request - tricked further into reposing the very fullest
+trust in the watchful, incorruptible "Battista."  Realizing that
+this would be so, Garnache now applied himself more unreservedly to
+putting into effect the plans he had been maturing.  And he went
+about it with a zest that knew no flagging, with a relish that
+nothing could impair.  Not that it was other than usual for Garnache
+to fling himself whole-heartedly into the conduct of any enterprise
+he might have upon his hands; but he had come into this affair at
+Condillac against his will; stress of circumstances it was had
+driven him on, step by step, to take a personal hand in the actual
+deliverance of Valerie.
+
+It was vanity and pride that had turned him back when already he
+was on the road to Paris; not without yet a further struggle would
+he accept defeat.  To this end had he been driven, for the first
+time in his life, to the indignity of his foul disguise; and he,
+whose methods had ever been direct, had been forced to have recourse
+to the commonest of subterfuges.  It was with anger in his heart
+that he had proceeded to play the part he had assumed.  He felt it
+to be a thing unworthy of him, a thing that derogated from his
+self-respect.  Had he but had the justification of some high political
+aim, he might have endured it with a better resignation; the
+momentous end to be served might have sanctioned the ignoble means
+adopted.  But here was a task in itself almost as unworthy of him
+as the methods by which he now set about accomplishing it.  He was
+to black his face and dye his beard and hair, stain his skin and
+garb himself in filthy rags, for no better end than that he might
+compass the enlargement of a girl from the captivity into which she
+had been forced by a designing lady of Dauphiny.  Was that a task
+to set a soldier, a man of his years and birth and name?  He had
+revolted at it; yet that stubborn pride of his that would not brook
+his return to Paris to confess himself defeated by a woman over
+this woman's business, held him relentlessly to his distasteful
+course.
+
+And gradually the distaste of it had melted.  It had begun to fall
+away five nights ago, when he had heard what passed between Madame
+de Condillac and Valerie.  A great pity for this girl, a great
+indignation against those who would account no means too base to
+achieve their ends with her, a proper realization of the indignities
+she was suffering, caused him to shed some of his reluctance, some
+of his sense of injury to himself.
+
+His innate chivalry, that fine spirit of his which had ever prompted
+him to defend the weak against the oppressor, stirred him now, and
+stirred him to such purpose that, in the end, from taking up the
+burden of his task reluctantly, he came to bear it zestfully and
+almost gladly.  He was rejoiced to discover himself equipped with
+histrionic gifts of which he had had no suspicion hitherto, and it
+delighted him to set them into activity.
+
+Now it happened that at Condillac there was a fellow countryman of
+"Battista's," a mercenary from Northern Italy, a rascal named
+Arsenio, whom Fortunio had enlisted when first he began to increase
+the garrison a month ago.  Upon this fellow's honesty Garnache had
+formed designs.  He had closely observed him, and in Arsenio's
+countenance he thought he detected a sufficiency of villainy to
+augur well for the prosperity of any scheme of treachery that might
+be suggested to him provided the reward were adequate.
+
+Garnache went about sounding the man with a wiliness peculiarly his
+own.  Arsenio being his only compatriot at Condillac it was not
+wonderful that in his few daily hours of relief from his gaoler's
+duty "Battista" should seek out the fellow and sit in talk with him.
+The pair became intimate, and intercourse between them grew more
+free and unrestrained.  Garnache waited, wishing to risk nothing by
+precipitancy, and watched for his opportunity.  It came on the
+morrow of All Saints.  On that Day of the Dead, Arsenio, whose
+rearing had been that of a true son of Mother Church, was stirred
+by the memory of his earthly mother, who had died some three years
+before.  He was silent and moody, and showed little responsiveness
+to Garnache's jesting humour.  Garnache, wondering what might be
+toward in the fellow's mind, watched him closely.
+
+Suddenly the little man - he was a short, bowlegged, sinewy fellow
+ - heaved a great sigh as he plucked idly at a weed that grew
+between two stones of the inner courtyard, where they were seated
+on the chapel steps.
+
+"You are a dull comrade to-day, compatriot," said Garnache, clapping
+him on the shoulder.
+
+"It is the Day of the Dead," the fellow answered him, as though that
+were an ample explanation.  Garnache laughed.
+
+"To those that are dead it no doubt is; so was yesterday, so will
+to-morrow be.  But to us who sit here it is the day of the living."
+
+"You are a scoffer," the other reproached him, and his rascally face
+was oddly grave.  "You don't understand."
+
+"Enlighten me, then.  Convert me."
+
+"It is the day when our thoughts turn naturally to the dead, and
+mine are with my mother, who has lain in her grave these three
+years.  I am thinking of what she reared me and of what I am."
+
+Garnache made a grimace which the other did not observe.  He stared
+at the little cut-throat, and there was some dismay in his glance.
+What ailed the rogue?  Was he about to repent him of his sins, and
+to have done with villainy and treachery; was he minded to slit no
+more gullets in the future, be faithful to the hand that paid him,
+and lead a godlier life?  Peste!  That was a thing that would nowise
+suit Monsieur de Garnache's ends just then.  If Arsenio had a mind
+to reform, let him postpone that reformation until Garnache should
+have done with him.  So he opened his lips and let out a deep guffaw
+of mockery.
+
+"We shall have you turning monk," said he, "a candidate for
+canonization going barefoot, with flagellated back and shaven head.
+No more wine, no more dice, no more wenches, no more - "
+
+"Peace!" snapped the other.
+
+"Say 'Pax,"' suggested Garnache, "'Pax tecum,' or `vobiscum.' It is
+thus you will be saying it later."
+
+"If my conscience pricks me, is it aught to you?  Have you no
+conscience of your own?"
+
+"None.  Men wax lean on it in this vale of tears.  It is a thing
+invented by the great to enable them to pursue the grinding and
+oppression of the small.  If your master pays you ill for the dirty
+work you do for him and another comes along to offer you some rich
+reward for an omission in that same service, you are warned that if
+you let yourself be tempted, your conscience will plague you
+afterwards.  Pish!  A clumsy, childish device that, to keep you
+faithful."
+
+Arsenio looked up.  Words that defamed the great were ever welcome
+to him; arguments that showed him he was oppressed and imposed upon
+sounded ever gratefully in his ears.  He nodded his approval of
+"Battista's" dictum.
+
+"Body of Bacchus!" he swore, "you are right in that, compatriot.
+But my case is different.  I am thinking of the curse that Mother
+Church has put upon this house.  Yesterday was All Saints, and never
+a Mass heard I.  To-day is All Souls, and never a prayer may I offer
+up in this place of sin for the rest of my mother's soul."
+
+"How so?" quoth Garnache, looking in wonder at this religiously
+minded cut-throat.
+
+"How so?  Is not the House of Condillac under excommunication, and
+every man who stays in it of his own free will?  Prayers and
+Sacraments are alike forbidden here."
+
+Garnache received a sudden inspiration.  He leapt to his feet, his
+face convulsed as if at the horror of learning of a hitherto
+undreamt-of state of things.  He never paused to give a moment's
+consideration to the cut-throat's mind, so wonderfully constituted
+as to enable him to break with impunity every one of the commandments
+every day of the week for the matter of a louis d'or or two, and yet
+be afflicted by qualms of conscience at living under a roof upon
+which the Church had hurled her malediction.
+
+"What are you saying, compatriot?  What is it that you tell me?"
+
+"The truth," said Arsenio, with a shrug. "Any man who wilfully
+abides in the services of Condillac" - and instinctively he
+lowered his voice lest the Captain or the Marquise should be
+within earshot - , "is excommunicate."
+
+"By the Host!" swore the false Piedmontese.  "I am a Christian man
+myself, Arsenio, and I have lived in ignorance of this thing?"
+
+"That ignorance may be your excuse.  But now that you know - "
+Arsenio shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Now that I know, I, had best have a care of my soul and look about
+me for other employment."
+
+"Alas!" sighed Arsenio; "it is none so easy to find."
+
+Garnache looked at him.  Garnache began to have in his luck a still
+greater faith than hitherto.  He glanced stealthily around; then he
+sat down again, so that his mouth was close to Arsenio's ear.
+
+"The pay is beggarly here, yet I have refused a fortune offered me
+by another that I might remain loyal to my masters at Condillac.
+But this thing that you tell me alters everything.  By the Host!
+yes."
+
+"A fortune?" sneered Arsenio.
+
+"Aye, a fortune - at least, fifty pistoles.  That is a fortune to
+some of us."
+
+Arsenio whistled.  "Tell me more," said he.
+
+Garnache rose with the air of one about to depart.
+
+"I must think of it," said he, and he made shift to go.  But the
+other's hand fell with a clenching grip upon his arm.
+
+"Of what must you think, fool?" said he.  "Tell me this service you
+have been offered.  I have a conscience that upbraids me.  If you
+refuse these fifty pistoles, why should not I profit by your folly?"
+
+"There would not be the need.  Two men are required for the thing I
+speak of, and there are fifty pistoles for each.  If I decide to
+undertake the task, I'll speak of you as a likely second."
+
+He nodded gloomily to his companion, and shaking off his hold he set
+out to cross the yard.  But Arsenio was after him and had fastened
+again upon his arm, detaining him.
+
+"You fool!" said he; "you'd not refuse this fortune?"
+
+"It would mean treachery," whispered Garnache.
+
+"That is bad," the other agreed, and his face fell.  But remembering
+what Garnache had said, he was quick to brighten again.  "Is it to
+these folk here at Condillac?" he asked.  Garnache nodded.  "And
+they would pay - these people that seek our service would pay you
+fifty pistoles?"
+
+"They seek my service only, as yet.  They might seek yours were I
+to speak for you."
+
+"And you will, compatriot.  You will, will you not?  We are comrades,
+we are friends, and we are fellow-countrymen in a strange land.  There
+is nothing I would not do for you, Battista.  Look, I would die for
+you if there should come the need!  Body of Bacchus! I would.  I am
+like that when I love a man."
+
+Garnache patted his shoulder.  "You are a good fellow, Arsenio."
+
+"And you will speak for me?"
+
+"But you do not know the nature of the service," said Garnache.
+"You may refuse it when it is definitely offered you."
+
+"Refuse fifty pistoles?  I should deserve to be the pauper that I
+am if such had been my habits.  Be the service what it may, my
+conscience pricks me for serving Condillac.  Tell me how the fifty
+pistoles are to be earned, and you may count upon me to put my hand
+to anything."
+
+Garnache was satisfied.  But he told Arsenio no more that day,
+beyond assuring him he would speak for him and let him know upon the
+morrow.  Nor on the morrow, when they returned to the subject at
+Arsenio's eager demand, did Garnache tell him all, or even that the
+service was mademoiselle's.  Instead he pretended that it was some
+one in Grenoble who needed two such men as they.
+
+"Word has been brought me," he said mysteriously.  "You must not
+ask me how."
+
+"But how the devil are we to reach Grenoble?  The Captain will never
+let us go," said Arsenio, in an ill-humour.
+
+"On the night that you are of the watch, Arsenio, we will depart
+together without asking the Captain's leave.  You shall open the
+postern when I come to join you here in the courtyard."
+
+"But what of the man at the door yonder?"  And he jerked his thumb
+towards the tower where mademoiselle was a captive, and where at
+night "Battista" was locked in with her.  At the door leading to
+the courtyard a sentry was always posted for greater security.  That
+door and that sentry were obstacles which Garnache saw the futility
+of attempting to overcome without aid.  That was why he had been
+forced to enlist Arsenio's assistance.
+
+"You must account for him, Arsenio," said he.
+
+"Thus?" inquired Arsenio coolly, and he passed the edge of his hand
+significantly across his throat.  Garnache shook his head.
+
+"No," said he; "there will be no need for that.  A blow over the
+head will suffice.  Besides, it may be quieter.  You will find the
+key of the tower in his belt.  When you have felled him, get it and
+unlock the door; then whistle for me.  The rest will be easy."
+
+"You are sure he has the key?"
+
+"I have it from madame herself.  They were forced to leave it with
+him to provide for emergencies.  Mademoiselle's attempted escape by
+the window showed them the necessity for it."  He did not add that
+it was the implicit confidence they reposed in "Battista" himself
+that had overcome their reluctance to leave the key with the sentry.
+
+To seal the bargain, and in earnest of all the gold to come, Garnache
+gave Arsenio a couple of gold louis as a loan to be repaid him when
+their nameless employer should pay him his fifty pistoles in Grenoble.
+
+The sight and touch of the gold convinced Arsenio that the thing was
+no dream.  He told Garnache that he believed he would be on guard-duty
+on the night of the following Wednesday - this was Friday - and so for
+Wednesday next they left the execution of their plans unless, meantime,
+a change should be effected in the disposition of the sentries.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE COURIER
+
+
+Monsieur de Garnache was pleased with the issue of his little affair
+with Arsenio.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he told Valerie that evening, "I was right to have
+faith in my luck, right to believe that the tide of it is flowing.
+All we need now is a little patience; everything has become easy."
+
+It was the hour of supper.  Valerie was at table in her anteroom,
+and "Battista" was in attendance.  It was an added duty they had
+imposed upon him, for, since her attempt to escape, mademoiselle's
+imprisonment had been rendered more rigorous than ever.  No servant
+of the chateau was allowed past the door of the outer anteroom, now
+commonly spoken of as the guardroom of the tower.  Valerie dined
+daily in the salon with Madame de Condillac and Marius, but her
+other meals were served her in her own apartments.  The servants
+who brought the meals from the kitchen delivered them to "Battista"
+in the guardroom, and he it was who laid the cloth and waited upon
+mademoiselle.  At first this added duty had irritated him more than
+all that he had so far endured.  Had he Martin Marie Rigobert de
+Garnache lived to discharge the duties of a lackey, to bear dishes
+to a lady's table and to remain at hand to serve her?  The very
+thought had all but set him in a rage.  But presently he grew
+reconciled to it.  It afforded him particular opportunities of being
+in mademoiselle's presence and of conferring with her; and for the
+sake of such an advantage he might well belittle the unsavoury part
+of the affair.
+
+A half-dozen candles burned in two gleaming silver sconces on the
+table; in her tall-backed leather chair mademoiselle sat, and ate
+and drank but little, while Garnache told her of the preparations
+he had made.
+
+"If my luck but holds until Wednesday next," he concluded, "you may
+count upon being well out of Condillac.  Arsenio does not dream that
+you come with us, so that even should he change his mind, at least
+we have no cause to fear a betrayal.  But he will not change his
+mind.  The prospect of fifty pistoles has rendered it immutable."
+
+She looked up at him with eyes brightened by hope and by the
+encouragement to count upon success which she gathered from his
+optimism.
+
+"You have contrived it marvellously well," she praised him.  "If we
+succeed - "
+
+"Say when we succeed, mademoiselle," he laughingly corrected her.
+
+"Very well, then - when we shall have succeeded in leaving Condillac,
+whither am I to go?"
+
+"Why, with me, to Paris, as was determined.  My man awaits me at
+Voiron with money and horses.  No further obstacle shall rise to
+hamper us once our backs are turned upon the ugly walls of Condillac.
+The Queen shall make you welcome and keep you safe until Monsieur
+Florimond comes to claim his bride."
+
+She sipped her wine, then set down the glass and leaned her elbow
+on the table, taking her chin in her fine white hand.  "Madame tells
+me that he is dead," said she, and Garnache was shocked at the
+comparative calmness with which she said it.  He looked at her
+sharply from under his sooted brows.  Was she, after all, he
+wondered, no different from other women?  Was she cold and
+calculating, and had she as little heart as he had come to believe
+was usual with her sex, that she could contemplate so calmly the
+possibility of her lover being dead?  He had thought her better,
+more natural, more large-hearted and more pure.  That had encouraged
+him to stand by her in these straits of hers, no matter at what loss
+of dignity to himself.  It began to seem that his conclusions had
+been wrong.
+
+His silence caused her to look up, and in his face she read
+something of what was passing in his thoughts.  She smiled rather
+wanly.
+
+"You are thinking me heartless, Monsieur de Garnache?"
+
+"I am thinking you - womanly."
+
+"The same thing, then, to your mind.  Tell me, monsieur, do you
+know much of women?"
+
+"God forbid!  I have found trouble enough in my life."
+
+"And you pass judgment thus upon a sex with which you have no
+acquaintance?"
+
+"Not by acquaintance only is it that we come to knowledge.  There
+are ways of learning other than by the road of experience.  One
+may learn of dangers by watching others perish.  It is the fool
+who will be satisfied alone with the knowledge that comes to him
+from what he undergoes himself."
+
+"You are very wise, monsieur," said she demurely, so demurely that
+he suspected her of laughing at him.  "You were never wed?"
+
+"Never, mademoiselle," he answered stiffly, "nor ever in any danger
+of it."
+
+"Must you, indeed, account it a danger?"
+
+"A deadly peril, mademoiselle," said he; whereupon they both laughed.
+
+She pushed back her chair and rose slowly.  Slowly she passed from
+the table and stepped towards the window.  Turning she set her back
+to it, and faced him.
+
+"Monsieur de Garnache," said she, "you are a good man, a true and
+noble gentleman.  I would that you thought a little better of us.
+All women are not contemptible, believe me.  I will pray that you
+may yet mate with one who will prove to you the truth of what I say."
+
+He smiled gently, and shook his head.
+
+"My child," said he, "I am not half the noble fellow you account me.
+I have a stubborn pride that stands me at times in the stead of
+virtue.  It was pride brought me back here, for instance.  I could
+not brook the laughter that would greet me in Paris did I confess
+that I was beaten by the Dowager of Condillac.  I tell you this to
+the end that, thinking less well of me, you may spare me prayers
+which I should dread to see fulfilled.  I have told you before,
+mademoiselle, Heaven is likely to answer the prayers of such a heart
+as yours."
+
+"Yet but a moment back you deemed me heartless," she reminded him.
+
+"You seemed so indifferent to the fate of Florimond de Condillac."
+
+"I must have seemed, then, what I am not," she told him, "for I am
+far from indifferent to Florimond's fate.  The truth is, monsieur,
+I do not believe Madame de Condillac.  Knowing me to be under a
+promise that naught can prevail upon me to break, she would have me
+believe that nature has dissolved the obligation for me.  She thinks
+that were I persuaded of Florimond's death, I might turn an ear to
+the wooing of Marius.  But she is mistaken, utterly mistaken; and
+so I sought to convince her.  My father willed that I should wed
+Florimond.  Florimond's father had been his dearest friend.  I
+promised him that I would do his will, and by that promise I am
+bound.  But were Florimond indeed dead, and were I free to choose,
+I should not choose Marius were he the only man in all the world."
+
+Garnache moved nearer to her.
+
+"You speak," said he, "as if you were indifferent in the matter of
+wedding Florimond, whilst I understand that your letter to the
+Queen professed you eager for the alliance.  I may be impertinent,
+but, frankly, your attitude puzzles me."
+
+"I am not indifferent," she answered him, but calmly, without
+enthusiasm.  "Florimond and I were playmates, and as a little child
+I loved him and admired him as I might have loved and admired a
+brother perhaps.  He is comely, honourable, and true.  I believe he
+would be the kindest husband ever woman had, and so I am content to
+give my life into his keeping.  What more can be needed?"
+
+"Never ask me, mademoiselle; I am by no means an authority," said
+he.  "But you appear to have been well schooled in a most excellent
+philosophy." And he laughed outright.  She reddened under his
+amusement.
+
+"It was thus my father taught me," said she, in quieter tones; "and
+he was the wisest man I ever knew, just as he was the noblest and
+the bravest."
+
+Garnache bowed his head.  "God rest his soul!" said he with
+respectful fervour.
+
+"Amen," the girl replied, and they fell silent.
+
+Presently she returned to the subject of her betrothed.
+
+"If Florimond is living, this prolonged absence, this lack of news
+is very strange.  It is three months since last we heard of him -
+four months, indeed.  Yet he must have been apprised of his father's
+death, and that should have occasioned his return."
+
+"Was he indeed apprised of it?" inquired Garnache.  "Did you,
+yourself, communicate the news to him?"
+
+"I?" she cried.  "But no, monsieur.  We do not correspond."
+
+"That is a pity," said Garnache, "for I believe that the knowledge
+of the Marquis's death was kept from him by his stepmother."
+
+"Mon Dieu!" she exclaimed, in horror.  "Do you mean that he may
+still be in ignorance of it?"
+
+"Not that.  A month ago a courier was dispatched to him by the
+Queen-Mother.  The last news of him some four months old, as you
+have said - reported him at Milan in the service of Spain.  Thither
+was the courier sent to find him and to deliver him letters setting
+forth what was toward at Condillac."
+
+"A month ago?" she said.  "And still we have no word.  I am full of
+fears for him, monsieur."
+
+"And I," said Garnache, "am full of hope that we shall have news of
+him at any moment."
+
+That he was well justified of his hope was to be proven before they
+were many days older.  Meanwhile Garnache continued to play his part
+of gaoler to the entire satisfaction and increased confidence of the
+Condillacs, what time he waited patiently for the appointed night
+when it should be his friend Arsenio's turn to take the guard.
+
+On that fateful Wednesday "Battista" sought out - as had now become
+his invariable custom - his compatriot as soon as the time of his
+noontide rest was come, the hour at which they dined at Condillac.
+He found Arsenio sunning himself in the outer courtyard, for it
+seemed that year that as the winter approached the warmth increased.
+Never could man remember such a Saint Martin's Summer as was this.
+
+In so far as the matter of their impending flight was concerned,
+"Battista" was as brief as he could be.
+
+"Is all well?" he asked.  "Shall you be on guard to-night?"
+
+"Yes.  It is my watch from sunset till dawn.  At what hour shall we
+be stirring?"
+
+Garnache pondered a moment, stroking that firm chin of his, on which
+the erstwhile stubble had now grown into a straggling, unkempt beard
+ - and it plagued him not a little, for a close observer might have
+discovered that it was of a lighter colour at the roots.  His hair,
+too, was beginning to lose its glossy blackness.  It was turning
+dull, and presently, no doubt, it would begin to pale, so that it was
+high time he spread his wings and took flight from Condillac.
+
+"We had best wait until midnight.  It will give them time to be
+soundly in their slumbers.  Though, should there be signs of any one
+stirring even then, you had better wait till later.  It were foolish
+to risk having our going prevented for the sake of leaving a half-hour
+earlier."
+
+"Depend upon me," Arsenio answered him.  "When I open the door of
+your tower I shall whistle to you.  The key of the postern hangs on
+the guardroom wall.  I shall possess myself of that before I come."
+
+"Good," said Garnache, "we understand each other."
+
+And on that they might have parted there and then, but that there
+happened in that moment a commotion at the gate.  Men hurried from
+the guardhouse, and Fortunio's voice sounded loud in command.  A
+horseman had galloped up to Condillac, walked his horse across the
+bridge - which was raised only at night - and was knocking with the
+butt of his whip an imperative summons upon the timbers of the gate.
+
+By Fortunio's orders it was opened, and a man covered with dust,
+astride a weary, foam-flecked horse, rode under the archway of the
+keep into the first courtyard of the chateau.
+
+Garnache eyed him in surprise and inquiry, and he read in the man's
+appearance that he was a courier.  The horseman had halted within a
+few paces of the spot where "Battista" and his companion stood, and
+seeing in the vilely clad Garnache a member of the Condillac
+household, he flung him his reins, then got down stiffly from his
+horse.
+
+Fortunio, bristling with importance, his left hand on the hilt of
+his rapier, the fingers of his right twirling at his long fair
+mustachios, at once confronted him and craved his business.
+
+"I am the bearer of letters for Madame the Dowager Marquise de
+Condillac," was the reply; whereupon, with an arrogant nod, Fortunio
+bade the fellow go with him, and issued an order that his horse
+should be cared for.
+
+Arsenio was speaking in Garnache's ear.  The man's nature was
+inquisitive, and he was indulging idle conjectures as to what might
+be the news this courier brought.  Garnache's mind, actuated by
+very different motives, was engaged upon the same task, so much so
+that not a word heard he of what his supposed compatriot was
+whispering.  Whence came this courier?  Why had not that fool
+Fortunio asked him, so that Garnache might have overheard his answer?
+Was he from Paris and the Queen, or was he, perchance, from Italy
+and Florimond?  These were questions to which it imported him to
+have the answers.  He must know what letters the fellow brought.
+The knowledge might guide him now; might even cause him to alter the
+plans he had formed.
+
+He stood in thought whilst, unheeded by him, Arsenio prattled at
+his elbow.  He bethought him of the old minstrel's gallery at the
+end of the hall in which the Condillacs were dining and whither the
+courier would be conducted.  He knew the way to that gallery, for
+he had made a very close study of the chateau against the time when
+he might find himself in need of the knowledge.
+
+With a hurried excuse to Arsenio he moved away, and, looking round
+to see that he was unobserved, he was on the point of making his way
+to the gallery when suddenly he checked himself.  What went he there
+to do?  To play the spy?  To become fellow to the lackey who listens
+at keyholes?  Ah, no! That was something no service could demand of
+him.  He might owe a duty to the Queen, but there was also a duty
+that he owed himself, and this duty forbade him from going to such
+extremes.  Thus spake his Pride, and he mistook its voice for that
+of Honour.  Betide what might, it was not for Garnache to play the
+eavesdropper.  Not that, Pardieu!
+
+And so he turned away, his desires in conflict with that pride of
+his, and gloomily he paced the courtyard, Arsenio marvelling what
+might have come to him.  And well was it for him that pride should
+have detained him; well would it seem as if his luck were indeed in
+the ascendant and had prompted his pride to save him from a deadly
+peril.  For suddenly some one called "Battista!"
+
+He heard, but for the moment, absorbed as he was in his own musings,
+he overlooked the fact that it was the name to which he answered at
+Condillac.
+
+Not until it was repeated more loudly, and imperatively, did he turn
+to see Fortunio beckoning him.  With a sudden dread anxiety, he
+stepped to the captain's side.  Was he discovered?  But Fortunio's
+words set his doubts to rest at once.
+
+"You are to re-conduct Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye to her apartments
+at once."
+
+Garnache bowed and followed the captain up the steps and into the
+chateau that he might carry out the order; and as he went he
+shrewdly guessed that it was the arrival of that courier had
+occasioned the sudden removal of mademoiselle.
+
+When they were alone together - he and she - in her anteroom in the
+Northern Tower, she turned to him before he had time to question
+her as he was intending.
+
+"A courier has arrived," said she.
+
+"I know; I saw him in the courtyard.  Whence is he?  Did you learn
+it?"
+
+"From Florimond." She was white with agitation.
+
+"From the Marquis de Condillac?" he cried, and he knew not whether
+to hope or fear.  "From Italy?"
+
+"No, monsieur.  I do not think from Italy.  From what was said I
+gathered that Florimond is already on his way to Condillac.  Oh, it
+made a fine stir.  It left them no more appetite for dinner, and
+they seem to have thought it could have left me none for mine, for
+they ordered my instant return to my apartments."
+
+"Then you know nothing - save that the courier is from the Marquis?"
+
+"Nothing; nor am I likely to," she answered, and her arms dropped
+limply to her sides, her eyes looked entreatingly up into his gloomy
+face.
+
+But Garnache could do no more than rap out an oath.  Then he stood
+still a moment, his eyes on the window, his chin in his hand,
+brooding.  His pride and his desire to know more of that courier's
+message were fighting it out again in his mind, just as they fought
+it out in the courtyard below.  Suddenly his glance fell on her,
+standing there, so sweet, so frail, and so disconsolate.  For her
+sake he must do the thing, repulsive though it might be.
+
+"I must know more," he exclaimed.  "I must learn Florimond's
+whereabouts, if only that we may go to meet him when we leave
+Condillac to-night."
+
+"You have arranged definitely for that?" she asked, her face
+lighting.
+
+"All is in readiness," he assured her.  Then, lowering his voice
+without apparent reason, and speaking quickly and intently, "I
+must go find out what I can," he said.  "There may be a risk, but
+it is as nothing to the risk we run of blundering matters through
+ignorance of what may be afoot.  Should any one come - which is
+unlikely, for all those interested will be in the hall until the
+courier is dealt with - and should they inquire into my absence,
+you are to know nothing of it since you have no Italian and I no
+French.  All that you will know will be that you believe I went
+but a moment since to fetch water.  You understand?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Then lock yourself in your chamber till I return."
+
+He caught up a large earthenware vessel in which water was kept
+for his own and mademoiselle's use, emptied it through the
+guard-room window into the moat below, then left the room and made
+his way down the steps to the courtyard.
+
+He peered out.  Not a soul was in sight.  This inner courtyard
+was little tenanted at that time of day, and the sentry at the
+door of the tower was only placed there at nightfall.  Alongside
+this there stood another door, opening into a passage from which
+access might be gained to any part of the chateau.  Thrusting
+behind that door the earthenware vessel that he carried, Garnache
+sped swiftly down the corridor on his eavesdropping errand.  Still
+his mind was in conflict.  At times he cursed his slowness, at
+times his haste and readiness to undertake so dirty a business,
+wishing all women at the devil since by the work of women was he
+put to such a shift as this.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+FLORIMOND'S LETTER
+
+
+In the great hall of Condillac, where the Marquise, her son, and
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye had been at dinner, a sudden confusion
+had been spread by the arrival of that courier so soon as it was
+known that he bore letters from Florimond, Marquis de Condillac.
+
+Madame had risen hastily, fear and defiance blending in her face,
+and she had at once commanded mademoiselle's withdrawal.  Valerie
+had wondered might there not be letters - or, leastways, messages
+ - for herself from her betrothed.  But her pride had suppressed
+the eager question that welled up to her lips.  She would, too, have
+questioned the courier concerning Florimond's health; she would have
+asked him how the Marquis looked, and where the messenger had left
+him.  But of all this that she craved to know, nothing could she
+bring herself to ask before the Marquise.
+
+She rose in silence upon hearing the Dowager order Fortunio to
+summon Battista that he might re-conduct mademoiselle to her
+apartments, and she moved a few paces down the hall, towards the
+door, in proud, submissive readiness to depart.  Yet she could not
+keep her eyes from the dust-stained courier, who, having flung his
+hat and whip upon the floor, was now opening his wallet, the
+Dowager standing before him to receive his papers.
+
+Marius, affecting an insouciance he did not feel, remained at table,
+his page behind his chair, his hound stretched at his feet; and he
+now sipped his wine, now held it to the light that he might observe
+the beauty of its deep red colour.
+
+At last Fortunio returned, and mademoiselle took her departure, head
+in the air and outwardly seeming nowise concerned in what was taking
+place.  With her went Fortunio.  And the Marquise, who now held the
+package she had received from the courier, bade the page depart
+also.
+
+When the three were at last alone, she paused before opening the
+letter and turned again to the messenger.  She made a brave figure
+in the flood of sunlight that poured through the gules and azures
+of the long blazoned windows, her tall, lissome figure clad in a
+close-fitting robe of black velvet, her abundant glossy black hair
+rolled back under its white coif, her black eyes and scarlet lips
+detaching from the ivory of her face, in which no trace of emotion
+showed, for all the anxiety that consumed her.
+
+"Where left you the Marquis de Condillac?" she asked the fellow.
+
+"At La Rochette, madame," the courier answered,' and his answer
+brought Marius to his feet with an oath.
+
+"So near?" he cried out.  But the Dowager's glance remained calm
+and untroubled.
+
+"How does it happen that he did not hasten himself, to Condillac?"
+she asked.
+
+"I do not know, madame.  I did not see Monsieur le Marquis.  It
+was his servant brought me that letter with orders to ride hither."
+
+Marius approached his mother, his brow clouded.
+
+"Let us see what he says," he suggested anxiously.  But his mother
+did not heed him.  She stood balancing the package in her hand.
+
+"Can you tell us, then, nothing of Monsieur le Marquis?"
+
+"Nothing more than I have told you, madame."
+
+She bade Marius call Fortunio, and then dismissed the courier,
+bidding her captain see to his refreshment.
+
+Then, alone at last with her son, she hastily tore the covering
+from the letter, unfolded it and read.  And Marius, moved by
+anxiety, came to stand beside and just behind her, where he too
+might read.  The letter ran:
+
+"MY VERY DEAR MARQUISE, - I do not doubt but that it will pleasure
+you to hear that I am on my way home, and that but for a touch of
+fever that has detained us here at La Rochette, I should be at
+Condillac as soon as the messenger who is the bearer of these
+presents.  A courier from Paris found me a fortnight since in Milan,
+with letters setting forth that my father had been dead six months,
+and that it was considered expedient at Court that I should return
+home forthwith to assume the administration of Condillac.  I am
+lost in wonder that a communication of this nature should have been
+addressed to me from Paris instead of from you, as surely it must
+have been your duty to advise me of my father's decease at the time
+of that untoward event.  I am cast down by grief at this evil news,
+and the summons from Court has brought me in all haste from Milan.
+The lack of news from Condillac has been for months a matter of
+surprise to me.  My father's death may be some explanation of this,
+but scarcely explanation enough.  However, madame, I count upon it
+that you will be able to dispel such doubts as I am fostering.  I
+count too, upon being at Condillac by the end of week, but I beg
+that neither you nor my dear Marius will allow this circumstance
+to make any difference to yourselves, just as, although I am
+returning to assume the government of Condillac as the Court has
+suggested to me, I hope that yourself and my dear brother will
+continue to make it your home for as long as it shall pleasure you.
+So long shall it pleasure me.
+
+"I am, my dear marquise, your very humble and very affectionate
+servant and stepson,
+
+                                                        "FLORIMOND"
+
+When she had read to the end, the Dowager turned back and read aloud
+the passage: "However, madame, I count upon it that you will be able
+to dispel such doubts as I am fostering."  She looked at her son,
+who had shifted his position, so that he was now confronting her.
+
+"He has his suspicions that all is not as it should be," sneered
+Marius.
+
+"Yet his tone is amiable throughout.  It cannot be that they said
+too much in that letter from Paris."  A little trill of bitter
+laughter escaped her.  "We are to continue to make this our home for
+as long as it shall pleasure us.  So long shall it pleasure him!"
+
+Then, with a sudden seriousness, she folded the letter and, putting
+her hands behind her, looked up into her son's face.
+
+"Well?" she asked.  "What are you going to do?"
+
+"Strange that he makes no mention of Valerie" said Marius pensively.
+
+"Pooh!  A Condillac thinks lightly of his women.  What are you going
+to do?"
+
+His handsome countenance, so marvellously like her own, was overcast.
+He looked gloomily at his mother for a moment; then with a slight
+twitch of the shoulders he turned and moved past her slowly in the
+direction of the hearth.  He leaned his elbow on the overmantel and
+rested his brow against his clenched right hand, and stood so awhile
+in moody thought.  She watched him, a frown between her arrogant
+eyes.
+
+"Aye, ponder it," said she.  "He is at La Rochette, within a day's
+ride, and only detained there by a touch of fever.  In any case he
+promises to be here by the end of the week.  By Saturday, then,
+Condillac will have passed out of our power; it will be lost to you
+irretrievably.  Will you lose La Vauvraye as well?"
+
+He let his hand fall to his side, and turned, fully to face her.
+
+"What can I do?  What can we do?" he asked, a shade of petulance in
+his question.
+
+She stepped close up to him and rested her hand lightly upon his
+shoulder.
+
+"You have had three months in which to woo that girl, and you have
+tarried sadly over it, Marius.  You have now at most three days in
+which to accomplish it.  What will you do?"
+
+"I have been maladroit perhaps," he said, with bitterness.  "I have
+been over-patient with her.  I have counted too much upon the chance
+of Florimond's being dead, as seemed from the utter lack of news of
+him.  Yet what could I do?  Carry her off by force and compel at the
+dagger's point some priest to marry us?"
+
+She moved her hand from his shoulder and smiled, as if she derided
+him and his heat.
+
+"You want for invention, Marius," said she.  "And yet I beg that
+you will exert your mind, or Sunday next shall find us well-nigh
+homeless.  I'll take no charity from the Marquis de Condillac, nor,
+I think, will you."
+
+"If all fails," said he, "we have still your house in Touraine."
+
+"My house?" she echoed, her voice shrill with scorn.  "My hovel,
+you would say.  Could you abide there - in such a sty?"
+
+"Vertudieu!  If all else failed, we might be glad of it."
+
+"Glad of it?  Not I, for one.  Yet all else will fail unless you
+bestir yourself in the next three days.  Condillac is as good as
+lost to you already, since Florimond is upon the threshold.  La
+Vauvraye most certainly will be lost to you as well unless you make
+haste to snatch it in the little moment that is left you."
+
+"Can I achieve the impossible, madame?" he cried, and his impatience
+waxed beneath this unreasonable insistence of his mother's.
+
+"Who asks it of you?"
+
+"Do not you, madame?"
+
+"I?  Pish!  All that I urge is that you take Valerie across the
+border into Savoy where you can find a priest to marry you, and get
+it done this side of Saturday."
+
+"And is not that the impossible?  She will not go with me, as you
+well know, madame."
+
+There was a moment's silence.  The Dowager shot him a glance; then
+her eyes fell.  Her bosom stirred as if some strange excitement
+moved her.  Fear and shame were her emotions; for a way she knew by
+which mademoiselle might be induced to go with him - not only
+willingly, but eagerly, she thought - to the altar.  But she was his
+mother, and even her harsh nature shuddered before the task of
+instructing him in this vile thing.  Why had the fool not wit enough
+to see it for himself?
+
+Observing her silence Marius smiled sardonically.
+
+"You may well ponder it," said he.  "It is an easy matter to tell me
+what I should do.  Tell me, rather, how it should be done."
+
+His blindness stirred her anger, and her anger whelmed her hesitation.
+
+"Were I in your place, Marius, I should find a way," said she, in a
+voice utterly expressionless, her eyes averted ever from his own.
+
+He scanned her curiously.  Her agitation was plain to him, and it
+puzzled him, as did the downcast glance of eyes usually so bold and
+insolent in their gaze.  Then he pondered her tone, so laden with
+expression by its very expressionlessness, and suddenly a flood of
+light broke upon his mind, revealing very clearly and hideously her
+meaning.  He caught his breath with a sudden gasp and blenched a
+little.  Then his lips tightened suddenly.
+
+"In that case, madame," he said, after a pause, and speaking as if
+he were still without revelation of her meaning, "I can but regret
+that you are not in my place.  For, as it is, I am thinking we shall
+have to make the best of the hovel in Touraine."
+
+She bit her lip in the intensity of her chagrin and shame.  She was
+no fool, nor did she imagine from his words that her meaning had
+been lost upon him.  She knew that he had understood, and that he
+chose to pretend that he had not.  She looked up suddenly, her dark
+eyes blazing, a splash of colour in either cheek.
+
+"Fool!" she snapped at him; "you lily-livered fool!  Are you indeed
+my son?  Are you - by God! - that you talk so lightly of yielding?"
+She advanced a step in his direction.  "Through your cowardice you
+may be content to spend your days in beggary; not so am I; nor shall
+I be, so long as I have an arm and a voice.  You may go hence if
+your courage fails you outright; but I'll throw up the bridge and
+entrench myself within these walls.  Florimond de Condillac sets no
+foot in here while I live; and if he should come within range of
+musket-shot, it will be the worse for him."
+
+"I think you are mad, madame - mad so to talk of resisting him, as
+you are mad to call me coward.  I'll leave you till you are come to
+a more tranquil frame of mind."  And turning upon his heel, his
+face on fire from the lash of her contempt, he strode down the hall
+and passed out, leaving her alone.
+
+White again, with heaving bosom and clenched hands, she stood a
+moment where he had left her, then dropped into a chair, and taking
+her chin in her hand she rested her elbow on her knee.  Thus she
+remained, the firelight tinting her perfect profile, on which little
+might be read of the storm that was raging in her soul.  Another
+woman in her place would have sought relief in tears, but tears came
+rarely to the beautiful eyes of the Marquise de Condillac.
+
+She sat there until the sun had passed from the windows behind her
+and the corners of the room were lost in the quickening shadows.  At
+last she was disturbed by the entrance of a lackey, who announced
+that Monsieur le Comte de Tressan, Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny, was
+come to Condillac.
+
+She bade the fellow call help to clear the board, where still was
+set their interrupted noontide meal, and then to admit the Seneschal.
+With her back to the stirring, bustling servants she stood, pensively
+regarding the flames, and a smile that was mocking rather than aught
+else spread upon her face.
+
+If all else failed her, she told herself, there would be no Touraine
+hovel for her.  She could always be Comtesse de Tressan.  Let Marius
+work out alone the punishment of his cowardice.
+
+Away in the Northern Tower, where mademoiselle was lodged, she sat
+in eager talk with Garnache, who had returned unobserved and
+successful from his journey of espionage.
+
+He had told her what from the conversation of Marius and his mother
+he had learned touching the contents of that letter.  Florimond lay
+as near as La Rochette, detained there by a touch of fever, but
+promising to be at Condillac by the end of the week.  Since that
+was so, Valerie opined there was no longer the need to put themselves
+to the trouble of the escape they had planned.  Let them wait until
+Florimond came.
+
+But Garnache shook his head.  He had heard more; and for all that
+he accounted her at present safe from Marius, yet he made no false
+estimate of that supple gentleman's character, was not deluded by
+his momentary show of niceness.  As the time of Florimond's
+arrival grew nearer, he thought it very possible that Marius might
+be rendered desperate.  There was grave danger in remaining.  He
+said naught of this, yet he convinced mademoiselle that it were
+best to go.
+
+"Though there will no longer be the need of a toilsome journey as
+far as Paris," he concluded.  "A four hours' ride to La Rochette,
+and you may embrace your betrothed."
+
+"Did he speak of me in his letter, know you, monsieur?" she
+inquired.
+
+"I heard them say that he did not," Garnache replied.  "But it may
+well be that he had good reason.  He may suspect more than he has
+written."
+
+"In that case," she asked - and there was a wounded note in her voice
+ - "Why should a touch of fever keep him at La Rochette?  Would a
+touch of fever keep you from the woman you loved, monsieur, if you
+knew, or even suspected, that she was in durance?"
+
+"I do not know, mademoiselle.  I am an old man who has never loved,
+and so it would be unfair of me to pass judgment upon lovers.  That
+they think not as other folk is notorious; their minds are for the
+time disordered."
+
+Nevertheless he looked at her where she sat by the window, so gentle,
+so lissome, so sweet, and so frail, and he had a shrewd notion that
+were he Florimond de Condillac, whether he feared her in durance or
+not, not the fever, nor the plague itself should keep him for the
+best part of a week at La Rochette within easy ride of her.
+
+She smiled gently at his words, and turned the conversation to the
+matter that imported most.
+
+"Tonight then, it is determined that we are to go?"
+
+"At midnight or a little after.  Be in readiness, mademoiselle, and
+do not keep me waiting when I rap upon your door.  Haste may be of
+importance."
+
+"You may count upon me, my friend," she answered him, and stirred
+by a sudden impulse she held out her hand.  "You have been very
+good to me, Monsieur de Garnache.  You have made life very different
+for me since your coming.  I had it in my mind to blame you once
+for your rashness in returning alone.  I was a little fool.  You
+can never know the peace that has come to me from having you at
+hand.  The fears, the terrors that possessed me before you came
+have all been dispelled in this last week that you have been my
+sentry in two senses."
+
+He took the hand she held out to him, and looked down at her out of
+his grimy, disfigured face, an odd tenderness stirring him.  He felt
+as might have felt a father towards his daughter - at least, so
+thought he then.
+
+"Child," he answered her, "you overrate it.  I have done no less
+than I could do, no more than any other would have done."
+
+"Yet more than Florimond has done - and he my betrothed.  A touch
+of fever was excuse enough to keep him at La Rochette, whilst the
+peril of death did not suffice to deter you from coming hither."
+
+"You forget, mademoiselle, that, maybe, he does not know your
+circumstances."
+
+"Maybe he does not," said she, with a half-sigh.  Then she looked
+up into his face again.  "I am sad at the thought of going,
+monsieur," she surprised him by saying.
+
+"Sad?" he cried.  Then he laughed.  "But what can there be to
+sadden you?"
+
+"This, monsieur: that after to-night it is odds I shall never see
+you more."  She said it without hesitation and without coquetry,
+for her upbringing had been simple and natural in an atmosphere
+different far from that in which had been reared the courtly women
+he had known.  "You will return to Paris and the great world, and
+I shall live out my life in this, little corner of Dauphiny.  You
+will forget me in the bustle of your career, monsieur; but I shall
+always hold your memory very dear and very gratefully.  You are the
+only friend I have ever known since my father died excepting
+Florimond, though it is so long since I have seen him, and he never
+came to me in times of stress as you have done."
+
+"Mademoiselle," he answered, touched despite himself more touched
+than he could have believed possible to his callous, world-worn
+nature - "you make me very proud; you make me feel a little better
+than I am, for if I have earned your regard and friendship, there
+must be some good in old Garnache.  Believe me, mademoiselle, I too
+shall not forget."
+
+And thereafter they remained a spell in silence, she sitting by
+the window, gazing out into the bright October sky, he standing by
+her chair, thoughtfully considering her brown head so gracefully
+set upon her little shoulders.  A feeling came to him that was odd
+and unusual; he sought to interpret it, and he supposed it to mean
+that he wished that at some time in the dim past he might have
+married some woman who would have borne him for daughter such a
+one as this.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+THE CONFERENCE
+
+
+The matter that brought Monsieur de Tressan to Condillac - and
+brought him in most fearful haste - was the matter of the courier
+who had that day arrived at the chateau.
+
+News of it had reached the ears of my Lord Seneschal.  His mind had
+been a prey to uneasiness concerning this business of rebellion in
+which he had so rashly lent a hand, and he was anxious to know
+whence came this courier and what news he brought.  But for all his
+haste he had paused - remembering it was the Marquise he went to
+visit - to don the gorgeous yellow suit with the hanging sleeves
+which he had had from Paris, and the crimson sash he had bought at
+Taillemant's, all in the very latest mode.
+
+Thus arrayed, his wig well curled and a clump of it caught in ribbon
+of flame-coloured silk on the left side, his sword hanging from belt
+and carriages richly wrought with gold, and the general courtier-like
+effect rather marred by the heavy riding-boots which he would have
+liked to leave behind yet was constrained to wear, he presented
+himself before the Dowager, hiding his anxiety in a melting smile,
+and the latter in the profoundest of bows.
+
+The graciousness of his reception overwhelmed him almost, for in his
+supreme vanity he lacked the wit to see that this cordiality might
+be dictated by no more than the need they had of him at Condillac.
+A lackey placed a great chair for him by the fire that he might
+warm himself after his evening ride, and the Dowager, having ordered
+lights, sat herself opposite him with the hearth between them.
+
+He simpered awhile and toyed with trivialities of speech before he
+gave utterance to the matter that absorbed him.  Then, at last,
+when they were alone, he loosed the question that was bubbling on
+his lips.
+
+"I hear a courier came to Condillac to-day."
+
+For answer she told him what he sought to learn, whence came that
+courier, and what the message that he brought.
+
+"And so, Monsieur de Tressan," she ended, "my days at Condillac are
+numbered."
+
+"Why so?" he asked, "since you say that Florimond has adopted
+towards you a friendly tone.  Surely he would not drive his father's
+widow hence?"
+
+She smiled at the fire in a dreamy, pensive manner.
+
+"No," said she, "he would not drive me hence.  He has offered me
+the shelter of Condillac for as long as it may pleasure me to make
+it my home."
+
+"Excellent!" he exclaimed, rubbing his little fat hands and screwing
+the little features of his huge red face into the grotesque
+semblance of a smile.  "What need to talk of going, then?"
+
+"What need?" she echoed, in a voice dull and concentrated.  "Do you
+ask that, Tressan?  Do you think I should elect to live upon the
+charity of this man?"
+
+For all that the Lord Seneschal may have been dull-witted, yet he
+had wit enough to penetrate to the very marrow of her meaning.
+
+"You must hate Florimond very bitterly," said he.  She shrugged her
+shoulders.
+
+"I possess, I think, the faculty of feeling strongly.  I can love
+well, monsieur, and I can hate well.  It is one or the other with
+me.  And as cordially as I love my own son Marius, as cordially do
+I detest this coxcomb Florimond."
+
+She expressed no reasons for her hatred of her late husband's elder
+son.  Hers were not reasons that could easily be put into words.
+They were little reasons, trivial grains of offence which through
+long years had accumulated into a mountain.  They had their
+beginning in the foolish grievance that had its birth with her own
+son, when she had realized that but for that rosy-cheeked,
+well-grown boy borne to the Marquis by his first wife, Marius would
+have been heir to Condillac.  Her love of her own child and her
+ambitions for him, her keen desire to see him fill an exalted
+position in the world, caused her a thousand times a day to wish
+his half-brother dead.  Yet Florimond had flourished and grown, and
+as he grew he manifested a character which, with all its
+imperfections, was more lovable than the nature of her own offspring.
+And their common father had never seen aught but the faults of
+Marius and the virtues of Florimond.  She had resented this, and
+Marius had resented it; and Marius, having inherited with his
+mother's beauty his mother's arrogant, dominant spirit, had returned
+with insolence such admonitions as from time to time his father
+gave him, and thus the breach had grown.  Later, since he could not
+be heir to Condillac, the Marquise's eyes, greedy of advancement
+for him, had fallen covetously upon the richer La Vauvraye, whose
+lord had then no son, whose heiress was a little girl.
+
+By an alliance easy to compass, since the lords of Condillac and La
+Vauvraye were lifelong friends, Marius's fortunes might handsomely
+have been mended.  Yet when she herself bore the suggestion of it
+to the Marquis, he had seized upon it, approved it, but adopted it
+for Florimond's benefit instead.
+
+Thereafter war had raged fiercely in the family of Condillac - a
+war between the Marquis and Florimond on the one side, and the
+Marquise and Marius on the other.  And so bitterly was it waged
+that it was by the old Marquis's suggestion that at last Florimond
+had gone upon his travels to see the world and carry arms in
+foreign service.
+
+Her hopes that he would take his death, as was a common thing when
+warring, rose high - so high as to become almost assurance, a
+thing to be reckoned with.  Florimond would return no more, and
+her son should fill the place to which he was entitled by his
+beauty of person and the high mental gifts his doting mother saw
+in him.
+
+Yet the months grew into years, and at long intervals
+full of hope for the Marquise news came of Florimond, and the news
+was ever that he was well and thriving, gathering honours and
+drinking deep of life.
+
+And now, at last, when matters seemed to have been tumbled into her
+lap that she might dispose of them as she listed; now, when in her
+anxiety to see her son supplant his step-brother in the possession
+of La Vauvraye - if not, perhaps, in that of Condillac as well she
+had done a rashness which might end in making her and Marius
+outlaws, news came that this hated Florimond was at the door;
+tardily returned, yet returned in time to overthrow her schemes
+and to make her son the pauper that her husband's will had seemed
+to aim at rendering him.
+
+Her mind skimmed lightly over all these matters, seeking somewhere
+some wrong that should stand out stark and glaring, upon which she
+might seize, and offer it to the Seneschal as an explanation of her
+hatred.  But nowhere could she find the thing she sought.  Her
+hatred had for foundation a material too impalpable to be fashioned
+into words.  Tressan's voice aroused her from her thoughts.
+
+"Have you laid no plans, madame?" he asked her.  "It were surely a
+madness now to attempt to withstand the Marquis."
+
+"The Marquis?  Ah yes - Florimond."  She sat forward out of the
+shadows in which her great chair enveloped her, and let candle and
+firelight play about the matchless beauty of her perfect face.
+There was a flush upon it, the flush of battle; and she was about
+to tell the Seneschal that not while one stone of Condillac should
+stand upon another, not while a gasp of breath remained in her
+frail body, would she surrender.  But she checked her rashness.
+Well might it be that in the end she should abandon such a purpose.
+Tressan was ugly as a toad, the most absurd, ridiculous bridegroom
+that ever led woman to the altar.  Yet rumour ran that he was rich,
+and as a last resource, for the sake of his possessions she might
+bring herself to endure his signal shortcomings.
+
+"I have taken no resolve as yet," said she, in a wistful voice.
+"I founded hopes upon Marius which Marius threatens to frustrate.
+I think I had best resign myself to the poverty of my Touraine home."
+
+And then the Seneschal realized that the time was now.  The
+opportunity he might have sought in vain was almost thrust upon him.
+In the spirit he blessed Florimond for returning so opportunely; in
+the flesh he rose from the chair and, without more ado, he cast
+himself upon his knees before the Dowager.  He cast himself down,
+and the Dowager experienced a faint stirring of surprise that she
+heard no flop such as must attend the violent falling of so fat a
+body.  But the next instant, realizing the purpose of his absurd
+posture, she shrank back with a faint gasp, and her face was
+mercifully blurred to his sight once more amid the shadows of her
+chair.  Thus was he spared the look of utter loathing, of
+unconquerable, irrepressible disgust that leapt into her countenance.
+
+His voice quivered with ridiculous emotion, his little fat red
+fingers trembled as he outheld them in a theatrical gesture of
+supplication.
+
+"Never contemplate poverty, madame, until you have discarded me,"
+he implored her.  "Say but that you will, and you shall be lady of
+Tressan.  All that I have would prove but poor adornment to a
+beauty such as yours, and I should shrink from offering it you,
+were it not that, with it all, I can offer you the fondest heart
+in France.  Marquise - Clotilde, I cast myself humbly at your feet.
+Do with me as you will.  I love you."
+
+By an effort she crushed down her loathing of him - a loathing that
+grew a hundredfold as she beheld him now transformed by his
+amorousness into the semblance almost of a satyr -and listened to
+his foolish rantings.
+
+As Marquise de Condillac it hurt her pride to listen and not have
+him whipped for his audacity; as a woman it insulted her.  Yet the
+Marquise and the woman she alike repressed.  She would give him no
+answer - she could not, so near was she to fainting with disdain
+of him - yet must she give him hope against the time when, should
+all else fail, she might have to swallow the bitter draught he was
+now holding to her lips.  So she temporized.
+
+She controlled her voice into a tone of gentle sadness; she set a
+mask of sorrow upon her insolent face.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur," she sighed, and so far overcame her nausea
+as for an instant to touch his hand in a little gesture of caress,
+"you must not speak so to a widow of six months, nor must I listen."
+
+The quivering grew in his hands and voice; but no longer did they
+shake through fear of a rebuff: they trembled now in the eager
+strength of the hope he gathered from her words.  She was so
+beautiful, so peerless, so noble, so proud - and he so utterly
+unworthy - that naught but her plight had given him courage to
+utter his proposal.  And she answered him in such terms!
+
+"You give me hope, Marquise?  If I come again - ?"
+
+She sighed, and her face, which was once more within the light,
+showed a look of sad inquiry.
+
+"If I thought that what you have said, you have said out of pity,
+because you fear lest my necessities should hurt me, I could give
+you no hope at all.  I have my pride, mon ami.  But if what you
+have said you would still have said though I had continued mistress
+of Condillac, then, Tressan, you may repeat it to me hereafter, at
+a season when I may listen."
+
+His joy welled up and overflowed in him as overflows a river in
+time of spate.
+
+He bent forward, caught her hand, and bore it to his lips.
+
+"Clotilde!" he cried, in a smothered voice; then the door opened,
+and Marius stepped into the long chamber.
+
+At the creaking sound of the opening door the Seneschal bestirred
+himself to rise.  Even the very young care not so to be surprised,
+how much less, then, a man well past the prime of life?  He came
+up laboriously - the more laboriously by virtue of his very efforts
+to show himself still nimble in his mistress's eyes.  Upon the
+intruder he turned a crimson, furious face, perspiration gleaming
+like varnish on brow and nose.  At sight of Marius, who stood
+arrested, scowling villainously upon the pair, the fire died
+suddenly from his glance.
+
+"Ah, my dear Marius," said he, with a flourish and an air of being
+mightily at his ease.  But the young man's eyes went over and
+beyond him to rest in a look of scrutiny upon his mother.  She had
+risen too, and he had been in time to see the startled manner of
+her rising.  In her cheeks there was a guilty flush, but her eyes
+boldly met and threw back her son's regard.
+
+Marius came slowly down the room, and no word was spoken.  The
+Seneschal cleared his throat with noisy nervousness.  Madame stood
+hand on hip, the flush fading slowly, her glance resuming its
+habitual lazy insolence.  By the fire Marius paused and kicked
+the logs into a blaze, regardless of the delicate fabric of his
+rosetted shoes.
+
+"Monsieur le Seneschal," said madame calmly, "came to see us in the
+matter of the courier."
+
+"Ah!" said Marius, with an insolent lifting of his brows and a
+sidelong look at Tressan; and Tressan registered in his heart a vow
+that when he should have come to wed the mother, he would not
+forget to take payment for that glance from her pert son.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte will remain and sup with us before riding back
+to Grenoble," she added.
+
+"Ah!" said he again, in the same tone.  And that for the moment was
+all he said.  He remained by the fire, standing between them where
+he had planted himself in the flesh, as if to symbolize the
+attitude he intended in the spirit.
+
+But one chance he had, before supper was laid, of a word alone with
+his mother, in her own closet.
+
+"Madame," he said, his sternness mingling with alarm, "are you mad
+that you encourage the suit of this hedgehog Tressan?"
+
+She looked him up and down with a deliberate eye, her lip curling
+a little.
+
+"Surely, Marius, it is my own concern."
+
+"Not so," he answered her, and his grasp fastened almost viciously
+on her wrist.  "I think that it is mine as well.  Mother, bethink
+you," and his tone changed to an imploring key, "bethink you what
+you would do!  Would you - you - mate with such a thing as that?"
+
+His emphasis of the pronoun was very eloquent.  Not in all the
+words of the French language could he have told her better how high
+he placed her in his thoughts, how utterly she must fall, how
+unutterably be soiled by an alliance with Tressan.
+
+"I had hoped you would have saved me from it, Marius," she answered
+him, her eyes seeming to gaze down into the depths of his.  "At La
+Vauvraye I had hoped to live out my widowhood in tranquil dignity.
+But - "  She let her arms fall sharply to her sides, and uttered a
+little sneering laugh.
+
+"But, mother," he cried, "between the dignity of La Vauvraye and
+the indignity of Tressan, surely there is some middle course?"
+
+"Aye," she answered scornfully, "starvation on a dunghill in
+Touraine - or something near akin to it, for which I have no
+stomach."
+
+He released her wrist and stood with bent head, clenching and
+unclenching his long white hands, and she watched him, watching
+in him the working of his proud and stubborn spirit.
+
+"Mother," he cried at last, and the word sounded absurd between
+them, by so little did he seem the younger of the twain, "mother,
+you shall not do it you must not!"
+
+"You leave me little alternative - alas!" sighed she.  "Had you been
+more adroit you had been wed by now, Marius, and the future would
+give us no concern.  As it is, Florimond comes home, and we - "
+She spread her hands and thrust out her nether lip in a grimace that
+was almost ugly.  Then: "Come," she said briskly.  "Supper is laid,
+and my Lord Seneschal will be awaiting us."
+
+And before he could reply she had swept past him and taken her way
+below.  He followed gloomily, and in gloom sat he at table, never
+heeding the reckless gaiety of the Seneschal and the forced mirth
+of the Marquise.  He well understood the sort of tacit bargain that
+his mother had made with him.  She had seen her advantage in his
+loathing of the proposed union with Tressan, and she had used it
+to the full.  Either he must compel Valerie to wed him this side
+of Saturday or resign himself to see his mother - his beautiful,
+peerless mother - married to this skin of lard that called itself
+a man.
+
+Living, he had never entertained for his father a son's respect,
+nor, dead, did he now reverence his memory as becomes a son.  But
+in that hour, as he sat at table, facing this gross wooer of his
+mother's, his eyes were raised to the portrait of the florid-visaged
+haughty Marquis de Condillac, where it looked down upon them from
+the panelled wall, and from his soul he offered up to that portrait
+of his dead sire an apology for the successor whom his widow
+destined him.
+
+He ate little, but drank great draughts, as men will when their mood
+is sullen and dejected, and the heat of the wine, warming his veins
+and lifting from him some of the gloom that had settled over him,
+lent him anon a certain recklessness very different from the manner
+of his sober moments.
+
+Chancing suddenly to raise his eyes from the cup into which he had
+been gazing, absorbed as gazes a seer into his crystal, he caught
+on the Seneschal's lips so odious a smile, in the man's eyes so
+greedy, hateful a leer as he bent them on the Marquise, that he
+had much ado not to alter the expression of that flabby face by
+hurling at it the cup he held.
+
+He curbed himself; he smiled sardonically upon the pair; and in that
+moment he swore that be the cost what it might, he would frustrate
+the union of those two.  His thoughts flew to Valerie, and the road
+they took was fouled with the mud of ugly deeds.  A despair, grim
+at first, then mocking, took possession of him.  He loved Valerie
+to distraction.  Loved her for herself, apart from all worldly
+advantages that must accrue to him from an alliance with her.  His
+mother saw in that projected marriage no more than the acquisition
+of the lands of La Vauvraye, and she may even have thought that he
+himself saw no more.  In that she was wrong; but because of it she
+may have been justified of her impatience with him at the tardiness,
+the very clumsiness with which he urged his suit.  How was she to
+know that it was just the sincerity of his passion made him clumsy?
+For like many another, normally glib, self-assured, and graceful,
+Marius grew halting, shy, and clumsy only where he loved.
+
+But in the despair that took him now the quality of his passion
+seemed to change.  Partly it was the wine, partly the sight of this
+other lover - of whom there must be an end - whose very glance
+seemed to him an insult to his mother.  His imagination had taken
+fire that night, and it had ripened him for any villainy.  The
+Seneschal and the wine, between them, had opened the floodgates of
+all that was evil in his nature, and that evil thundered out in a
+great torrent that bid fair to sweep all before it.
+
+And suddenly, unexpectedly for the others, who were by now resigned
+to his moody silence, the evil found expression.  The Marquise had
+spoken of something - something of slight importance - that must be
+done before Florimond returned.  Abruptly Marius swung round in his
+seat to face his mother.  "Must this Florimond return?" he asked,
+and for all that he uttered no more words, so ample in their
+expression were those four that he had uttered and the tone of them,
+that his meaning left little work to the imagination.
+
+Madame turned to stare at him, surprise ineffable in her glance -
+not at the thing that he suggested, but at the abruptness with
+which the suggestion came.  The cynical, sneering tone rang in her
+ears after the words were spoken, and she looked in his face for a
+confirmation of their full purport.
+
+She observed the wine-flush on his cheek, the wine-glitter in his
+eye, and she remarked the slight smile on his lips and the cynical
+assumption of nonchalance with which he fingered the jewel in his
+ear as he returned her gaze.  She beheld now in her son a man more
+purposeful than she had ever known before.
+
+A tense silence had followed his words, and the Lord Seneschal
+gaped at him, some of the colour fading from his plethoric
+countenance, suspecting as he did the true drift of Marius's
+suggestion.  At last it was madame who spoke - very softly, with
+a narrowing of the eyes.
+
+"Call Fortunio," was all she said, but Marius understood full well
+the purpose for which she would have Fortunio called.
+
+With a half-smile he rose, and going to the door he bade his page
+who was idling in the anteroom go summon the captain.  Then he paced
+slowly back, not to the place he had lately occupied at table, but
+to the hearth, where he took his stand with his shoulders squared to
+the overmantel.
+
+Fortunio came, fair-haired and fresh-complexioned as a babe, his
+supple, not ungraceful figure tawdrily clad in showy clothes of poor
+material the worse for hard usage and spilt wine.  The Countess bade
+him sit, and with her own hands she poured a cup of Anjou for him.
+
+In some wonder, and, for all his ordinary self-possession, with a
+little awkwardness, the captain did her bidding, and with an
+apologetic air he took the seat she offered him.
+
+He drank this wine, and here was a spell of silence till Marius,
+grown impatient, brutally put the thing for which the Marquise
+sought delicate words.
+
+"We have sent for you, Fortunio," said he, in a blustering tone,
+"to inquire of you what price you'd ask to cut the throat of my
+brother, the Marquis de Condillac."
+
+The Seneschal sank back in his chair with a gasp.  The captain, a
+frown between his frank-seeming, wide-set eyes, started round to
+look at the boy.  The business was by no means too strong for the
+ruffler's stomach, but the words in which it was conveyed to him
+most emphatically were.
+
+"Monsieur de Condillac," said he, with an odd assumption of dignity,
+"I think you have mistaken your man.  I am a soldier, not a
+cut-throat."
+
+"But yes," the Marquise soothed him, throwing herself instantly into
+the breach, and laying a long, slender hand upon the frayed green
+velvet of the captain's sleeve.  "What my son means and what he says
+are vastly different things."
+
+"It will sorely tax your wits, madame," laughed Marius brutally, "to
+make clear that difference."
+
+And then the Seneschal nervously cleared his throat and muttering
+that it waxed late and he must be riding home, made shift to rise.
+Him, too, the Marquise at once subdued.  She was not minded that he
+should go just yet.  It might be useful to her hereafter to have
+had him present at this conference, into which she meant to draw him
+until she should have made him one with them, a party to their guilt.
+For the task she needed not over many words: just one or two and a
+melting glance or so, and the rebellion in his bosom was quelled at
+once.
+
+But with the captain her wiles were not so readily successful.  He
+had no hopes of winning her to wife - haply no desire, since he was
+not a man of very great ambitions.  On the other hand, he had
+against him the very worst record in France, and for all that he
+might embark upon this business under the auspices of the Lord
+Seneschal himself, he knew not how far the Lord Seneschal might dare
+to go thereafter to save him from a hanging, should it come to that.
+
+He said as much in words.  In a business of this kind, he knew from
+experience, the more difficulties he advanced, the better a bargain
+he drove in the end; and if he was to be persuaded to risk his neck
+in this, he should want good payment.  But even for good payment on
+this occasion he was none too sure as yet that he would let himself
+be persuaded.
+
+"Monsieur Fortunio," the Marquise said, very softly, "heed not
+Monsieur Marius's words.  Attend to me.  The Marquis de Condillac,
+as no doubt you will have learned for yourself, is lying at La
+Rochette.  Now it happens that he is noxious to us - let the reasons
+be what they may.  We need a friend to put him out of our way.  Will
+you be that friend?"
+
+"You will observe," sneered Marius, "how wide a difference there is
+between what the Marquise suggests and my own frank question of what
+price you would take to cut my brother's throat."
+
+"I observe no difference, which is what you would say," Fortunio
+answered truculently, his head well back, his brown eyes resentful
+of offence - for none can be so resentful of imputed villainy as
+your villain who is thorough-paced.  "And," he concluded, "I return
+you the same answer, madame - that I am no cut-throat."
+
+She repressed her anger at Marius's sneering interference, and made
+a little gesture of dismay with her eloquent white hands.
+
+"But we do not ask you to cut a throat."
+
+"I have heard amiss, then," said he, his insolence abating nothing.
+
+"You have heard aright, but you have understood amiss.  There are
+other ways of doing these things.  If it were but the cutting of a
+throat, should we have sent for you?  There are a dozen in the
+garrison would have sufficed for our purpose."
+
+"What is it, then, you need?" quoth he.
+
+"We want an affair contrived with all decency.  The Marquis is at
+the Sanglier Noir at La Rochette.  You can have no difficulty in
+finding him, and having found him, less difficulty still in giving
+or provoking insult."
+
+"Excellent," murmured Marius from the background.  "It is such an
+enterprise as should please a ready swordsman of your calibre,
+Fortunio."
+
+"A duel?" quoth the fellow, and his insolence went out of him,
+thrust out by sheer dismay; his mouth fell open.  A duel was another
+affair altogether.  "But, Sangdieu! what if he should slay me?  Have
+you thought of that?"
+
+"Slay you?" cried the Marquise, her eyes resting on his face with
+an expression as of wonder at such a question.  "You jest,
+Fortunio."
+
+"And he with the fever," put in Marius, sneering.
+
+"Ah!" muttered Fortunio.  "He has the fever?  The fever is something.
+But - but - accidents will happen."
+
+"Florimond was ever an indifferent swordsman," murmured Marius
+dreamily, as if communing with himself.
+
+The captain wheeled upon him once more.
+
+"Why, then, Monsieur Marius," said he, "since that is so and you
+are skilled - as skilled as am I, or more - and he has a fever,
+where is the need to hire me to the task?"
+
+"Where?" echoed Marius.  "What affair may that be of yours?  We
+ask you to name a price on which you will do this thing.  Have
+done with counter-questions."
+
+Marius was skilled with the foils, as Fortunio said, but he cared
+not for unbaited steel, and he was conscious of it, so that the
+captain's half-sneer had touched him on the raw.  But he was
+foolish to take that tone in answer.  There was a truculent,
+Southern pride in the ruffler which sprang immediately into life
+and which naught that they could say thereafter would stamp out.
+
+"Must I say again that you mistake your man?" was his retort, and
+as he spoke he rose, as though to signify that the subject wearied
+him and that his remaining to pursue it must be idle.  "I am not
+of those to whom you can say: `I need such an one killed, name me
+the price at which you'll be his butcher."'
+
+The Marquise wrung her hands in pretty mimicry of despair, and
+poured out soothing words, as one might pour oil upon stormy
+waters.  The Seneschal sat in stolid silence, a half-scared
+spectator of this odd scene, what time the Marquise talked and
+talked until she had brought Fortunio back to some measure of
+subjection.
+
+Such reasoning as she made use of she climaxed by an offer of no
+less a sum than a hundred pistoles.  The captain licked his lips
+and pulled at his mustachios.  For all his vaunted scorn of being
+a butcher at a price, now that he heard the price he seemed not
+half so scornful.
+
+"Tell me again the thing that you need doing and the manner of it,"
+said he, as one who was moved to reconsider.  She told him, and
+when she had done he made a compromise.
+
+"If I go upon this business, madame, I go not alone."
+
+"Oh, as for that," said Marius, "it shall be as you will.  Take what
+men you want with you."
+
+"And hang with them afterwards, maybe," he sneered, his insolence
+returning.  "The hundred pistoles would avail me little then.  Look
+you, Monsieur de Condillac, and you, madame, if I go, I'll need to
+take with me a better hostage than the whole garrison of this place.
+I'll need for shield some one who will see to it that he is not hurt
+himself, just as I shall see to it that he is hurt before I am."
+
+"What do you mean?  Speak out, Fortunio," the Marquise bade him.
+
+"I mean, madame, that I will go, not to do this thing, but to stand
+by and render help if help be needed.  Let Monsieur de Condillac go,
+and I will go with him, and I will undertake to see to it that he
+returns unhurt and that we leave the other stark."
+
+Both started, and the Seneschal leaned heavily upon the table.  He
+was not, with all his faults, a man of blood, and this talk of
+butchery turned him sick and faint.
+
+Vainly now did the Marquise seek to alter the captain's resolution;
+but in this she received a sudden check from Marius himself.  He
+cut in upon her arguments to ask the captain:
+
+"How can you promise so much?  Do you mean that you and I must fall
+upon him?  You forget that he will have men about him.  A duel is
+one thing, a rough-and-tumble another, and we shall fare none so
+well in this, I'm thinking."
+
+The captain closed one eye, and a leer of subtle cunning overspread
+his face.
+
+"I've thought of that," said he.  "Neither a duel nor a
+rough-and-tumble do I propose, but something between the two;
+something that shall seem a duel yet be a rough-and-tumble."
+
+"Explain yourself."
+
+"What further explanation does it ask?  We come upon Monsieur le
+Marquis where his men are not.  We penetrate, let us say, into his
+chamber.  I turn the key in the door.  We are alone with him and you
+provoke him.  He is angry, and must fight you there and then.  I am
+your friend; I must fill the office of second for both sides.  You
+engage, and I stand aside and let you fight it out.  You say he is
+indifferently skilled with the sword, and, in addition, that he has
+a fever.  Thus you should contrive to put your steel through him,
+and a duel it will have been.  But if by luck or skill he should
+have you in danger, I shall be at hand to flick in my sword at the
+right moment and make an opening through which you may send yours
+home."
+
+"Believe me it were better - " began the Dowager.  But Marius, who
+of a sudden was much taken with the notion, again broke in.
+
+"Are you to be depended upon to make no mistake, Fortunio?"
+
+"Per Bacco!" swore the ruffler.  "A mistake must cost me a hundred
+pistoles.  I think you may depend upon me there.  If I err at all,
+it will be on the side of eagerness to see you make short work of
+him.  You have my answer now, monsieur.  If we talk all night, you
+shall not move me further.  But if my proposal suits you, I am your
+man."
+
+"And I yours, Fortunio," answered Marius, and there was a ring
+almost of exultation in his voice.
+
+The Dowager looked from one to the other, as if she were weighing
+the men and satisfying herself that Marius ran no risk.  She put
+a question or two to her son, another to the captain; then, seeming
+satisfied with what had been agreed, she nodded her head and told
+them they had best be stirring with the dawn.
+
+"You will have light enough by half-past six.  Do not delay later
+in taking the road.  And see that you are back here by nightfall;
+I shall be anxious till you are returned."
+
+She poured wine again for the captain, and Marius coming up to the
+table filled himself a glass, which he tossed off.  The Marquise
+was speaking to Tressan.
+
+"Will you not drink to the success of the venture?" she asked him,
+in a coaxing tone, her eyes upon his own.  "I think we are like to
+see the end of our troubles now, monsieur, and Marius shall be
+lord both of Condillac and La Vauvraye."
+
+And the gross, foolish Seneschal, under the spell of her magnificent
+eyes, slowly raised his cup to his lips and drank to the success
+of that murderous business.  Marius stood still, a frown between
+his eyes haled thither by the mention of La Vauvraye.  He might be
+winning it, as his mother said, but he would have preferred to have
+won it differently.  Then the frown was smoothed away; a sardonic
+smile replaced it; another cup of wine he poured himself.  Then,
+without word to any there, he turned on his heel and went from the
+room, a trifle unsteady in his gait, yet with such lines of
+purposefulness in the way he bore himself that the three of them
+stared after him in dull surprise.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+THE UNEXPECTED
+
+
+In her apartments in the Northern Tower Valerie had supped, and -
+to spare Monsieur de Garnache the full indignity of that part of
+the offices he was charged with - she had herself removed the cloth
+and set the things in the guard-room, where they might lie till
+morning.  When that was done - and despite her protests, Garnache
+had insisted upon lending a hand the Parisian reminded her that it
+was already after nine, and urged her to make such preparations as
+incumbed her for their journey.
+
+"My preparations are soon made," she assured him with a smile.  "I
+need but what I may carry in a cloak."
+
+They fell to talking of their impending flight, and they laughed
+together at the discomfiture that would be the Dowager's and her
+son's when, in the morning, they came to discover the empty cage.
+From that they passed on to talk of Valerie herself, of her earlier
+life at La Vauvraye, and later the conversation shifted to Garnache,
+and she questioned him touching the warring he had seen in early
+youth, and afterwards asked him for particulars of Paris - that
+wonderful city which to her mind was the only earthly parallel of
+Paradise - and of the life at Court.
+
+Thus in intimate talk did they while away the time of waiting, and
+in the hour that sped they came, perhaps, to know more of each
+other than they had done hitherto.  Intimate, indeed, had they
+unconsciously become already.  Their singular position, locked
+together in that tower - a position utterly impossible under any
+but the conditions that attended it - had conduced to that
+good-fellowship, whilst the girl's trust and dependence upon the
+man, the man's observance of that trust, and his determination to
+show her that it had not been misplaced, had done the rest.
+
+But to-night they seemed to have drawn nearer in spirit to each
+other, and that, maybe, it was that prompted Valerie to sigh, and
+in her sweet, unthinking innocence to say again:
+
+"I am truly sorry, Monsieur de Garnache, that our sojourn here is
+coming to an end."
+
+He was no coxcomb, and he set no false value on the words.  He
+laughed for answer, as he rejoined:
+
+"Not so am I, mademoiselle.  Nor shall I know peace of mind again
+until this ill-omened chateau is a good three leagues or so behind
+us.  Sh!  What was that?"
+
+He came instantly to his feet, his face intent and serious.  He had
+been sitting at his ease in an armchair, over the back of which he
+had tossed the baldric from which his sword depended.  The clang of
+the heavy door below, striking the wall as it was pushed open, had
+reached his ears.
+
+"Can it be time already?" asked mademoiselle; yet a panic took her,
+and she blenched a little.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Impossible," said he; "it is not more than ten o'clock.  Unless
+that fool Arsenio has blundered -" He stopped.  "Sh!" he whispered.
+"Some one is coming here."
+
+And suddenly he realized the peril that might lie in being found
+thus in her company.  It alarmed him more than did the visit itself,
+so unusual at this hour.  He saw that he had not time to reach the
+guard-room; he would be caught in the act of coming forth, and that
+might be interpreted by the Dowager or her son - if it should happen
+to be one or the other of them - as a hurried act of flight such as
+guilt might prompt.  Perhaps he exaggerated the risk; but their
+fortunes at Condillac had reached a point where they must not be
+jeopardized by any chance however slight.
+
+"To your chamber, mademoiselle," he whispered fearfully, and he
+pointed to the door of the inner room.  "Lock yourself in.  Quick!
+Sh!"  And he signed frantically to her to go silently.
+
+Swift and quietly as a mouse she glided from the room and softly
+closed the door of her chamber and turned the key in a lock, which
+Garnache had had the foresight to keep well oiled.  He breathed
+more freely when it was done.
+
+A step sounded in the guard-room.  He sank without a rustle into
+the chair from which he had risen, rested his head against the back
+of it, closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and dissembled sleep.
+
+The steps came swiftly across the guard-room floor, soft, as of one
+lightly shod; and Garnache wondered was it the mother or the son,
+just as he wondered what this ill-come visitor might be seeking.
+
+The door of the antechamber was pushed gently open it had stood
+ajar - and under the lintel appeared the slender figure of Marius,
+still in his brown velvet suit as Garnache last had seen him.  He
+paused a moment to peer into the chamber.  Then he stepped forward,
+frowning to behold "Battista" so cosily ensconced.
+
+"Ola there!" he cried, and kicked the sentry's outstretched legs,
+the more speedily to wake him.  "Is this the watch you keep?"
+
+Garnache opened his eyes and stared a second dully at the disturber
+of his feigned slumbers.  Then, as if being more fully awakened he
+recognized his master, he heaved himself suddenly to his feet and
+bowed.
+
+"Is this the watch you keep?" quoth Marius again, and Garnache,
+scanning the youth's face with foolishly smiling eyes, noted the
+flush on his cheek, the odd glitter in his handsome eyes, and even
+caught a whiff of wine upon his breath.  Alarm grew in Garnache's
+mind, but his face maintained its foolish vacancy, its inane smile.
+He bowed again and, with a wave of the hands towards the inner
+chamber,
+
+"La damigella a la," said he.
+
+For all that Marius had no Italian he understood the drift of the
+words, assisted as they were by the man's expressive gesture.  He
+sneered cruelly.
+
+"It would be an ugly thing for you, my ugly friend, if she were
+not," he answered.  "Away with you.  I shall call you when I need
+you."  And he pointed to the door.
+
+Garnache experienced some dismay, some fear even.  He plied his
+wits, and he determined that he had best seem to apprehend from his
+gestures Marius's meaning; but apprehend it in part only, and go no
+further than the other side of that door.
+
+He bowed, therefore, for the third time, and with another of his
+foolish grins he shuffled out of the chamber, pulling the door after
+him, so that Marius should not see how near at hand he stayed.
+
+Marius, without further heeding him, stepped to mademoiselle's door
+and rapped on a panel with brisk knuckles.
+
+"Who is there?" she inquired from within.
+
+"It is I - Marius.  Open, I have something I must say to you."
+
+"Will it not keep till morning?"
+
+"I shall be gone by then," he answered impatiently, "and much
+depends upon my seeing you ere I go.  So open.  Come!"
+
+There followed a pause, and Garnache in the outer room set his teeth
+and prayed she might not anger Marius.  He must be handled skillfully,
+lest their flight should be frustrated at the last moment.  He
+prayed, too, that there might be no need for his intervention.  That
+would indeed be the end of all - a shipwreck within sight of harbour.
+He promised himself that he would not lightly intervene.  For the
+rest this news of Marius's intended departure filled him with a
+desire to know something of the journey on which he was bound:
+
+Slowly mademoiselle's door opened.  White and timid she appeared.
+
+"What do you want, Marius?"
+
+"Now and always and above all things the sight of you, Valerie,"
+said he, and the flushed cheek, the glittering eye, and wine-laden
+breath were as plain to her as they had been to Garnache, and they
+filled her with a deeper terror.  Nevertheless she came forth at
+his bidding.
+
+"I see that you were not yet abed," said he.  "It is as well.  We
+must have a talk."  He set a chair for her and begged her to be
+seated; then he perched himself on the table, his hands gripping
+the edges of it on either side of him, and he turned his eyes upon
+her.
+
+"Valerie," he said slowly, "the Marquis de Condillac, my brother,
+is at La Rochette."
+
+"He is coming home!" she cried, clasping her hands and feigning
+surprise in word and glance.
+
+Marius shook his head and smiled grimly.
+
+"No," said he.  "He is not coming home.  That is - not unless you
+wish it."
+
+"Not unless I wish it?   But naturally I wish it!"
+
+"Then, Valerie, if you would have what you wish, so must I.  If
+Florimond is ever to come to Condillac again, you must be my wife."
+
+He leaned towards her now, supported by his elbow, so that his face
+was close to hers, a deeper flush upon it, a brighter glitter in his
+black eyes, his vinous breath enveloping and suffocating her.  She
+shrank back, her hands locking themselves one in the other till the
+knuckles showed white.
+
+"What - what is it you mean?" she faltered.
+
+"No more than I have said; no less.  If you love him well enough to
+sacrifice yourself," and his lips curled sardonically at the word,
+"then marry me and save him from his doom."
+
+"What doom?" Her voice came mechanically, her lips seeming scarce
+to move.
+
+He swung down from the table and stood before her.
+
+"I will tell you," he said, in a voice very full of promise.  "I
+love you, Valerie, above all else on earth or, I think, in heaven;
+and I'll not yield you to him.  Say 'No' to me now, and at daybreak
+I start for La Rochette to win you from him at point of sword."
+
+Despite her fears she could not repress a little smile of scorn.
+
+"Is that all?" said she.  "Why, if you are so rash, it is yourself,
+assuredly, will be slain."
+
+He smiled tranquilly at that reflection upon his courage and his
+skill.
+
+"So might it befall if I went alone," said he.  She understood.
+Her eyes dilated with horror, with loathing of him.  The angry words
+that sprang to her lips were not to be denied.
+
+"You cur, you cowardly assassin!" she blazed at him.  "I might have
+guessed that in some such cutthroat manner would your vaunt of
+winning me at the sword-point be accomplished."
+
+She watched the colour fade from his cheeks, and the ugly, livid
+hue that spread in its room to his very lips.  Yet it did not daunt
+her.  She was on her feet, confronting him ere he had time to speak
+again.  Her eyes flashed, and her arm pointed quivering to the door.
+
+"Go!" she bade him, her voice harsh for once.  "Out of my sight!
+Go!  Do your worst, so that you leave me.  I'll hold no traffic
+with you."
+
+"Will you not?" said he, through setting teeth, and suddenly he
+caught the wrist of that outstretched arm.  But she saw nothing of
+immediate danger.  The only danger that she knew was the danger that
+threatened Florimond, and little did that matter since at midnight
+she was to leave Condillac to reach La Rochette in time to warn her
+betrothed.  The knowledge gave her confidence and an added courage.
+
+"You have offered me your bargain," she told him.  "You have named
+your price and you have heard my refusal.  Now go."
+
+"Not yet awhile," said he, in a voice so odiously sweet that
+Garnache caught his breath.
+
+He drew her towards him.  Despite her wild struggles he held her
+fast against his breast.  Do what she would, he rained his hot
+kisses on her face and hair, till at last, freeing a hand, she smote
+him with all her might across the face.
+
+He let her go then.  He fell back with an oath, a patch of
+fingermarks showing red on his white countenance.
+
+"That blow has killed Florimond de Condillac," he told her viciously.
+"He dies at noon to-morrow.  Ponder it, my pretty."
+
+"I care not what you do so that you leave me," she answered
+defiantly, restraining by a brave effort the tears of angry distress
+that welled up from her stricken heart.  And no less stricken, no
+less angry was Garnache where he listened.  It was by an effort that
+he had restrained himself from bursting in upon them when Marius had
+seized her.  The reflection that were he to do so all would
+irretrievably be ruined alone had stayed him.
+
+Marius eyed the girl a moment, his face distorted by the rage that
+was in him.
+
+"By God!" he swore, "if I cannot have your love, I'll give you cause
+enough to hate me."
+
+"Already have you done that most thoroughly," said she.  And Garnache
+cursed this pertness of hers which was serving to dare him on.
+
+The next moment there broke from her a startled cry.  Marius had
+seized her again and was crushing her frail body in his arms.
+
+"I shall kiss your lips before I go, ma mie," said he, his voice
+thick now with a passion that was not all of anger.  And then, while
+he still struggled to have his way with her, a pair of arms took him
+about the waist like hoops of steel.
+
+In his surprise he let her free, and in that moment he was swung
+back and round and cast a good six paces down the room.
+
+He came to a standstill by the table, at which he clutched to save
+himself from falling, and turned bewildered, furious eyes upon
+"Battista," by whom he now dimly realized that he had been assailed.
+
+Garnache's senses had all left him in that moment when Valerie had
+cried out.  He cast discretion to the winds; reason went out of him,
+and only blind anger remained to drive him into immediate action.
+And as suddenly as that flood of rage had leaped, as suddenly did it
+ebb now that he found himself face to face with the outraged
+Condillac and began to understand the magnitude of the folly he had
+committed.
+
+Everything was lost now, utterly and irretrievably - lost as a dozen
+other fine emprises had been by his sudden and ungoverned frenzy.
+God!  What a fool he was!  What a cursed, drivelling fool!  What,
+after all, was a kiss or two, compared with all the evil that might
+now result from his interference?  Haply Marius would have taken
+them and departed, and at midnight they would have been free to go
+from Condillac.
+
+The future would not have been lacking in opportunities to seek out
+and kill Marius for that insult.
+
+Why could he not have left the matter to the future?  But now, with
+Florimond to be murdered on the morrow at La Rochette, himself likely
+to be murdered within the hour at Condillac, Valerie was at their
+mercy utterly.
+
+Wildly and vainly did he strive even then to cover up the foolish
+thing that he had done.  He bowed apologetically to Marius; he
+waved his hands and filled the air with Italian phrases, frenziedly
+uttered, as if by the very vigour of them he sought to drive
+explanation into his master's brain.  Marius watched and listened,
+but his rage nowise abated; it grew, instead, as if that farrago of
+a language he did not understand were but an added insult.  An oath
+was all he uttered.  Then he swung round and caught Garnache's sword
+from the chair beside him, where it still rested, and Garnache in
+that moment cursed the oversight.  Whipping the long, keen blade
+from its sheath, Marius bore down upon the rash meddler.
+
+"Par Dieu!" he swore between his teeth.  "We'll see the colour of
+your dirty blood, you that lay hands upon a gentleman."
+
+But before he could send home the weapon, before Garnache could move
+to defend himself, Valerie had slipped between them.  Marius looked
+into her white, determined face, and was smitten with surprise.
+What was this hind to her that she should interfere at the risk of
+taking the sword herself?
+
+Then a slow smile spread upon his face.  He was smarting still under
+her disdain and resistance, as well as under a certain sense of the
+discomfiture this fellow had put upon him.  He saw a way to hurt her,
+to abase her pride, and cut her to the very soul with shame.
+
+"You are singularly concerned in this man's life," said he, an
+odious undercurrent of meaning in his voice.
+
+"I would not have you murder him," she answered, "for doing no more
+than madame your mother bade him."
+
+"I make no doubt he has proved a very excellent guard," he sneered.
+
+Even now all might have been well.  With that insult Marius might
+consider that he had taken payment for the discomfiture he had
+suffered.  He might have bethought him that, perhaps, as she said,
+"Battista" had done no more than observe the orders he had received
+ - a trifle excessively, maybe, yet faithfully nevertheless.
+Thinking thus, he might even have been content to go his ways and
+take his fill of vengeance by slaying Florimond upon the morrow.
+But Garnache's rash temper, rising anew, tore that last flimsy
+chance to shreds.
+
+The insult that mademoiselle might overlook might even not have fully
+understood - set him afire with indignation for her sake.  He forgot
+his role, forgot even that he had no French.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he cried, and she gasped in her affright at this
+ruinous indiscretion, "I beg that you will stand aside."  His voice
+was low and threatening, but his words were woefully distinct.
+
+"Par la mort Dieu!" swore Marius, taken utterly aback.  "What may
+your name be - you who hitherto have had no French?"
+
+Almost thrusting mademoiselle aside, Garnache stood out to face
+him, the flush of hot anger showing through the dye on his cheeks.
+
+"My name," said he, "is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache, and my
+business now to make an end of one at least of this obscene brood
+of Condillac."
+
+And, without more ado, he caught up a chair and held it before him
+in readiness to receive the other's onslaught.
+
+But Marius hung back an instant - at first in sheer surprise, later
+in fear.  He had some knowledge of the fellow's methods.  Even the
+sword he wielded gave him little confidence opposed to Garnache
+with a chair.  He must have help.  His eyes sought the door,
+measuring the distance.  Ere he could reach it Garnache would cut
+him off.  There was nothing for it but to attempt to drive the
+Parisian back.  And so with a sudden rush he advanced to the attack.
+Garnache fell back and raised his chair, and in that instant
+mademoiselle once more intervened between them.
+
+"Stand aside, mademoiselle," cried Garnache, who now, grown cool,
+as was his way when once he was engaged, saw clearly through the
+purpose formed by Marius.  "Stand aside, or we shall have him giving
+the alarm."
+
+He leapt clear of her to stop Marius's sudden rush for the door.
+On the very threshold the young man was forced to turn and defend
+himself, lest his brains be dashed out by that ponderous weapon
+Garnache was handling with a rare facility.  But the mischief was
+done, in that he had reached the threshold.  Backing, he defended
+himself and gained the anteroom.  Garnache followed, but the
+clumsy chair was defensive rather than offensive, and Marius's
+sword meanwhile darted above it and below it, forcing him to keep
+a certain distance.
+
+And now Marius raised his voice and shouted with all the power of
+his lungs:
+
+"To me!  To me!  Fortunio!  Abdon!  To me, you dogs!  I am beset."
+
+From the courtyard below rose an echo of his words, repeated in a
+shout by the sentinel, who had overheard them, and they caught the
+swift fall of the fellow's feet as he ran for help.  Furious,
+picturing to himself how the alarm would spread like a conflagration
+through the chateau, cursing his headstrong folly yet determined
+that Marius at least should not escape him, Garnache put forth his
+energies to hinder him from gaining the door that opened on to the
+stairs.  From the doorway of the antechamber mademoiselle, with a
+white face and terrified eyes, watched the unequal combat and heard
+the shouts for help.  Anon despair might whelm her at the thought
+of how they had lost their opportunity of escaping; but for the
+present she had no thought save for the life of that brave man who
+was defending himself with an unwieldy chair.
+
+Garnache leapt suddenly aside to take his opponent in the flank and
+thus turn him from his backward progress towards the outer door.
+The manoeuvre succeeded, and gradually, always defending himself,
+Garnache circled farther round him until he was between Marius and
+the threshold.
+
+And now there came a sound of running feet on the uneven stones of
+the courtyard.  Light gleamed on the staircase, and breathless voices
+were wafted up to the two men.  Garnache bethought him that his last
+hour was assuredly at hand.  Well, if he must take his death, he
+might as well take it here upon Marius's sword as upon another's.
+So he would risk it for the sake of leaving upon Marius some token
+by which he might remember him.  He swung his chair aloft, uncovering
+himself for a second.  The young man's sword darted in like a shaft
+of light.  Nimbly Garnache stepped aside to avoid it, and moved
+nearer his opponent.  Down crashed the chair, and down went Marius,
+stunned and bleeding, under its terrific blow.  The sword clattered
+from his hand and rolled, with a pendulum-like movement, to the feet
+of Garnache.
+
+The Parisian flung aside his chair and stooped to seize that very
+welcome blade.  He rose, grasping the hilt and gathering confidence
+from the touch of that excellently balanced weapon, and he swung
+round even as Fortunio and two of his braves appeared in the doorway.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+HOW MONSIEUR DE GARNACHE LEFT CONDILLAC
+
+
+Never was there a man with a better stomach for a fight than Martin
+de Garnache, nor did he stop to consider that here his appetite in
+that direction was likely to be indulged to a surfeit.  The sight
+of those three men opposing him, swords drawn and Fortunio armed in
+addition with a dagger, drove from his mind every other thought,
+every other consideration but that of the impending battle.
+
+He fell on guard to receive their onslaught, his eyes alert, his
+lips tight set, his knees like springs of steel, slightly flexed to
+support his well-poised body.
+
+But they paused a moment in the extremity of their surprise, and
+Fortunio called to him in Italian to know the meaning of this
+attitude of his as well as that of Marius, who lay huddled where he
+had fallen.
+
+Garnache, reckless now, disdaining further subterfuge nor seeking
+to have recourse to subtleties that could avail him nothing, retorted
+in French with the announcement of his true name.  At that,
+perceiving that here was some deep treachery at work, they hesitated
+no longer.
+
+Led by Fortunio they attacked him, and the din they made in the next
+few minutes with their heavy breathing, their frequent oaths, their
+stamping and springing this way and that, and, ringing above all,
+the clash and clatter of sword on sword, filled the chamber and
+could be heard in the courtyard below.
+
+Minutes sped, yet they gained no advantage on this single man; not
+one, but a dozen swords did he appear to wield, so rapid were his
+passes, so ubiquitous his point.  Had he but stood his ground there
+might have been a speedy end to him, but he retreated slowly towards
+the door of the antechamber.  Valerie still stood there, watching
+with fearful eyes and bated breath that tremendous struggle which
+at any moment she expected to see terminate in the death of her
+only friend.
+
+In her way she was helping Garnache, though she little realized it.
+The six tapers in the candle-branch she held aloft afforded the
+only light for that stormy scene, and that light was in the eyes
+of Garnache's assailants, showing him their faces yet leaving his
+own in shadow.
+
+He fell back steadily towards that door.  He could not see it; but
+there was not the need.  He knew that it was in a direct line with
+the one that opened upon the stairs, and by the latter he steered
+his backward course.  His aim was to gain the antechamber, although
+they guessed it not, thinking that he did but retreat through
+inability to stand his ground.  His reasons were that here in this
+guardroom the best he could do would be to put his back to the wall,
+where he might pick off one or two before they made an end of him.
+The place was too bare to suit his urgent, fearful need.  Within
+the inner room there was furniture to spare, with which he might
+contrive to hamper his opponents and give them such a lusty fight
+as would live in the memory of those who might survive it for as
+long as they should chance to live thereafter.
+
+He had no thought of perishing himself, although, to any less
+concerned, his death, sooner or later, must seem inevitable - the
+only possible conclusion to this affray, taken as he was.  His mind
+was concerned only with this fight; his business to kill, and not
+himself to be slain.  He knew that presently others would come to
+support these three.  Already, perhaps, they were on their way, and
+he husbanded his strength against their coming.  He was proudly
+conscious of his own superior skill, for he had studied the art of
+fence in Italy - its home - during his earlier years, and there was
+no trick of sword-play with which he was not acquainted, no ruse of
+service in a rough-and-tumble in which he was unversed.  He was
+proudly conscious, too, of his supple strength, his endurance, and
+his great length of reach, and upon all these he counted to help
+him make a decent fight.
+
+Valerie, watching him, guessed his purpose to be the gaining of the
+inner chamber, the crossing of the threshold on which she was
+standing.  She drew back a pace or two, almost mechanically, to give
+him room.  The movement went near to costing him his life.  The light
+no longer falling so pitilessly upon Fortunio's eyes, the captain
+saw more clearly than hitherto, and shot a swift, deadly stroke
+straight at the region of Garnache's heart.  The Parisian leapt back
+when it was within an inch of his breast; one of the bravoes followed
+up, springing a pace in advance of his companions and lengthening
+his arm in a powerful lunge.  Garnache caught the blade almost on
+his hilt, and by the slightest turn of the wrist made a simultaneous
+presentment of his point at the other's outstretched throat.  It
+took the fellow just above the Adam's apple, and with a horrid,
+gurgling cry he sank, stretched as he still was in the attitude of
+that murderous lunge that had proved fatal only to himself.
+
+Garnache had come on guard again upon the instant.  Yet in the
+briefest of seconds during which his sword had been about its work
+of death, Fortunio's rapier came at him a second time.  He beat the
+blade aside with his bare left hand and stopped with his point the
+rush of the other bravo.  Then he leapt back again, and his leap
+brought him to the threshold of the anteroom.  He retreated quickly
+a pace, and then another.  He was a sword's length within the
+chamber, and now he stood, firm as a rock and engaged Fortunio's
+blade which had followed him through the doorway.  But he was more
+at his ease.  The doorway was narrow.  Two men abreast could not
+beset him, since one must cumber the movements of the other.  If
+they came at him one at a time, he felt that he could continue that
+fight till morning, should there still by then be any left to face
+him.
+
+A wild exultation took him, an insane desire to laugh.  Surely was
+sword-play the merriest game that was ever devised for man's
+entertainment.  He straightened his arm, and his steel went out
+like a streak of lightning.  But for the dagger on which he caught
+its edge, the blade had assuredly pierced the captain's heart.  And
+now, fighting still, Garnache called to Valerie.  He had need of
+her assistance to make his preparations ere others came.
+
+"Set down your tapers, mademoiselle," he bade her, "on the
+mantel shelf at my back.  Place the other candle branch there too."
+
+Swiftly, yet with half-swimming senses, everything dim to her as to
+one in a nightmare, she ran to do his bidding; and now the light
+placed so at his back, gave him over his opponents the same slight
+advantage that he had enjoyed before.  In brisk tones he issued his
+fresh orders.
+
+"Can you move the table, mademoiselle?" he asked her.  "Try to drag
+it here, to the wall on my left, as close to the door as you can
+bring it."
+
+"I will try, monsieur," she panted through dry lips; and again she
+moved to do his bidding.  Quickened by the need there was, her
+limbs, which awhile ago had seemed on the point of refusing their
+office, appeared to gather more than ordinary strength.  She was
+unconsciously sobbing in her passionate anxiety to render him what
+help was possible.  Frenziedly she caught at the heavy oaken table,
+and began to drag it across the room as Garnache had begged her.
+And now, Fortunio seeing what was toward, and guessing Garnache's
+intentions, sought by a rush to force his way into the Chamber.  But
+Garnache was ready for him.  There was a harsh grind of steel on
+steel, culminating in a resounding lest, and Fortunio was back
+in the guard-room, whither he had leapt to save his skin.  A pause
+fell at that, and Garnache lowered his point to rest his arm until
+they should again come at him.  From beyond the doorway the captain
+called upon him to yield.  He took the summons as an insult, and
+flew into a momentary passion.
+
+"Yield?" he roared.  "Yield to you, you cut-throat scum?  You shall
+have my sword if you will come for it, but you shall have it in your
+throat."
+
+Angered in his turn, Fortunio inclined his head to his companion's
+ear, issuing an order.  In obedience to it, it was the bravo now who
+advanced and engaged Garnache.  Suddenly he dropped on to his knees,
+and over his head Garnache found his blade suddenly opposed by
+Fortunio's.  It was a clever trick, and it all but did Garnache's
+business then.  Yet together with the surprise of it there came to
+him the understanding of what was intended.  Under his guard the
+kneeling man's sword was to be thrust up into his vitals.  As a cry
+of alarm broke from mademoiselle, he leapt aside and towards the
+wall, where he was covered from Fortunio's weapon, and turning
+suddenly he passed his sword from side to side through the body of
+the kneeling mercenary.
+
+The whole thing he had performed mechanically, more by instinct than
+by reason; and when it was done, and the tables were thus effectively
+turned upon his assailants, he scarcely realized how he had
+accomplished it.
+
+The man's body cumbered now the doorway, and behind him Fortunio
+stood, never daring to advance lest a thrust of that sword which he
+could not see - Garnache still standing close against the wall -
+should serve him likewise.
+
+Garnache leaned there, in that friendly shelter, to breathe, and he
+smiled grimly under cover of his mustache.  So long as he had to
+deal with a single assailant he saw no need to move from so excellent
+a position.  Close beside him, leaning heavily against the table she
+had dragged thus far, stood Valerie, her face livid as death, her
+heart sick within her at the horror inspired her by that thing lying
+on the threshold.  She could not take her eyes from the crimson stain
+that spread slowly on the floor, coming from under that limply
+huddled mass of arms and legs.
+
+"Do not look, mademoiselle," Garnache implored her softly.  "Be
+brave, child; try to be brave."
+
+She sought to brace her flagging courage, and by an effort she
+averted her eyes from that horrid heap and fixed them upon Garnache's
+calm, intrepid face.  The sight of his quietly watchful eyes, his
+grimly smiling lips, seemed to infuse courage into her anew.
+
+"I have the table, monsieur," she told him.  "I can bring it no
+nearer to the wall."
+
+He understood that this was not because her courage or her strength
+might be exhausted, but because he now occupied the spot where he
+had bidden her place it.  He motioned her away, and when she had
+moved he darted suddenly and swiftly aside and caught the table, his
+sword still fast in his two first fingers, which he had locked over
+the quillons.  He had pushed its massive weight halfway across the
+door before Fortunio grasped the situation.  Instantly the captain
+sought to take advantage of it, thinking to catch Garnache unawares.
+But no sooner did he show his nose inside the doorpost than Garnache's
+sword flashed before his eyes, driving him back with a bloody furrow
+in his cheek.
+
+"Have a care, Monsieur le Capitaine," Garnache mocked him.  "Had you
+come an inch farther it might have been the death of you."
+
+A clatter of steps sounded upon the stairs, and the Parisian bent
+once more to his task, and thrust the table across the open doorway.
+He had a moment's respite now, for Fortunio stung - though lightly
+was not likely to come again until he had others to support him.
+And while the others came, while the hum of their voices rose higher,
+and finally their steps clattered over the bare boards of the
+guard-room floor, Garnache had caught up and flung a chair under the
+table to protect him from an attack from below, while he had piled
+another on top to increase and further strengthen the barricade.
+
+Valerie watched him agonizedly, leaning now against the wall, her
+hands pressed across her bosom, as if to keep down its tempestuous
+heaving.  Yet her anguish was tempered by a great wonder and a great
+admiration of this man who could keep such calm eyes and such
+smiling lips in the face of the dreadful odds by which he was beset,
+in the face of the certain death that must ultimately reach him
+before he was many minutes older.  And in her imagination she
+conjured up a picture of him lying there torn by their angry swords
+and drenched in blood, his life gone out of him, his brave spirit,
+quenched for ever - and all for her unworthy sake.  Because she
+little, worthless thing that she was - would not marry as they
+listed, this fine, chivalrous soul was to be driven from its
+stalwart body.
+
+An agony of grief took her now, and she fell once more to those
+awful sobs that awhile ago had shaken her.  She had refused to
+marry Marius that Florimond's life should be spared, knowing that
+before Marius could reach him she herself would have warned her
+betrothed.  Yet even had that circumstance not existed, she was sure
+that still she would have refused to do the will of Marius.  But
+equally sure was she that she would not so refuse him were he now to
+offer as the price of her compliance the life of Garnache, which she
+accounted irrevocably doomed.
+
+Suddenly his steady, soothing voice penetrated her anguished musings.
+
+"Calm yourself, mademoiselle; all is far, from lost as yet."
+
+She thought that he but spoke so to comfort her; she did not follow
+the working of his warlike mind, concentrated entirely upon the
+business of the moment, with little thought - or care, for that
+matter - for what might betide anon.  Yet she made an effort to
+repress her sobs.  She would be brave, if only to show herself
+worthy of the companionship and friendship of so brave a man.
+
+Across his barricade he peered into the outer room to ascertain with
+what fresh opponents he might have to reckon, and he was surprised
+to see but four men standing by Fortunio, whilst behind them among
+the thicker shadows, he dimly made out a woman's figure and, beside
+her, another man who was short and squat.
+
+He bethought him that the hour, and the circumstance that most of
+the mercenaries would be in their beds, accounted for the
+reinforcement not being greater.
+
+The woman moved forward, and he saw as he had suspected, that it
+was the Dowager herself.  The squat figure beside her, moving with
+her into the shaft of light that fell from the doorway Garnache
+defended, revealed to him the features of Monsieur de Tressan.  If
+any doubt he had still entertained concerning the Seneschal's
+loyalty, that doubt was now dispelled.
+
+And now the Dowager uttered a sudden cry of fear.  She had caught
+sight of the fallen Marius, and she hurried to his side.  Tressan
+sped after her and between them they raised the boy and helped him
+to a chair, where he now sat, passing a heavy hand across his no
+doubt aching brow.  Clearly he was recovering, from which Garnache
+opined with regret that his blow had been too light.  The Dowager
+turned to Fortunio, who had approached her, and her eyes seemed to
+take fire at something that he told her.
+
+"Garnache?" the Parisian heard her say, and he saw Fortunio jerk
+his thumb in the direction of the barricade.
+
+She appeared to forget her son; she stepped suddenly from his side,
+and peered through the doorway at the stalwart figure of Garnache,
+dimly to be seen through the pile of furniture that protected him
+to the height of his breast.  No word said she to the Parisian.
+She stood regarding him a moment with lips compressed and a white,
+startled, angry face.  Then:
+
+"It was by Marius's contrivance that he was placed sentry over the
+girl," he heard her tell Fortunio, and he thought she sneered.
+
+She looked at the two bodies on the floor, one almost at her feet,
+the other just inside the doorway, now almost hidden in the shadows
+of the table.  Then she issued her commands to the men, and fiercely
+she bade them pull down that barricade and take the dog alive.
+
+But before they could move to do her bidding, Garnache's voice rang
+imperatively through the chamber.
+
+"A word with you ere they begin, Monsieur de Tressan," he shouted,
+and such was the note of command he assumed that the men stood
+arrested, looking to the Dowager for fresh orders.  Tressan changed
+colour, for all that there was surely naught to fear, and he fingered
+his beard perplexedly, looking to the Marquise for direction.  She
+flashed him a glance, lifted one shoulder disdainfully, and to the
+men:
+
+"Fetch him out," said she, and she pointed to Garnache.  But again
+Garnache stayed them.
+
+"Monsieur de Tressan," he called impressively, "to your dying day
+ - and that will be none so distant - shall you regret it if you do
+not hear me."
+
+The Seneschal was stirred by those words and the half-threat,
+half-warning; they seemed to cover.  He paused a moment, and this
+time his eyes avoided the Marquise's.  At last, taking a step
+forward,
+
+"Knave," said he, "I do not know you."
+
+"You know me well enough.  You have heard my name.  I am Martin
+Marie Rigobert de Garnache, Her Majesty's emissary into Dauphiny to
+procure the enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the
+Chateau de Condillac, where she is detained by force and for the
+serving of unscrupulous ends.  Now you know me and my quality."
+
+The Dowager stamped her foot.
+
+"Fetch him out!" she commanded harshly.
+
+"Hear me first, Monsieur le Seneschal, or it will be the worse for
+you."  And the Seneschal, moved by that confident promise of evil,
+threw himself before the men-at-arms.
+
+"A moment, I beseech you, Marquise," he cried, and the men, seeing
+his earnestness and knowing his quality, stood undecided, buffeted
+as they were between his will and the Marquise's.  "What have you
+to say to me?" Tressan demanded, seeking to render arrogant his tone.
+
+"This: That my servant knows where I am, and that should I fail
+within a very few days to come forth safe and sound from Condillac
+to rejoin him, he is to ride to Paris with certain letters I have
+given him.  Those letters incriminate you to the full in this
+infamous matter here at Condillac.  I have set forth in them how
+you refused me help, how you ignored the Queen's commands of which
+I was the bearer; and should it be proved, in addition, that
+through your treachery and insubordination my life has been lost,
+I promise you that nothing in all this world will save you from a
+hanging."
+
+"Never listen, monsieur," cried the Dowager, seeing Tressan start
+back like a man in sudden fear.  "It is no more than the ruse of a
+desperate man."
+
+"Heed me or not, at your choice," Garnache retorted, addressing
+himself ever to Tressan.  "You have had your warning.  I little
+thought to see you here to-night.  But seeing you confirms my worst
+suspicions, and if I am to die, I can die easy in my conscience at
+the thought that in sacrificing you to Her Majesty's wrath I have
+certainly not sacrificed an innocent man."
+
+"Madame - " the Seneschal began, turning to the Dowager.  But she
+broke in impatiently upon his intended words, upon the prayer that
+bubbled to his lips that she should pause a while ere she made an
+end of this Parisian.
+
+"Monsieur," said she, "you may bargain with him when he is taken.
+We will have him alive.  Go in," she bade her men, her voice so
+resolute now that none dared tarry longer.  "Fetch the knave out
+ - alive."
+
+Garnache smiled at mademoiselle as the words were uttered.
+
+"They want me alive," said he.  "That is a hopeful state of things.
+Bear up, child; I may need your help ere we are through."
+
+"You shall find me ready, monsieur," she assured him for all her
+tremors.  He looked at the pale face, composed now by an effort of
+her will, and at the beautiful hazel eyes which strove to meet his
+with calm and to reflect his smile, and he marvelled at her courage
+as much as did she at his.
+
+Then the assault began, and he could have laughed at the way in
+which a couple of those cut-throats - neither wishing to have the
+honour of meeting him singly - hindered each other by seeking to
+attack him at once.
+
+At last the Dowager commanded one of them to go in.  The fellow
+came, and he was driven back by the sword that darted at him from
+above the barricade.
+
+There matters might have come to a deadlock, but that Fortunio came
+forward with one of his men to repeat the tactics which had cost
+him a life already.  His fellow went down on his knees, and drove
+his sword under the table and through the frame of the chair, seeking
+to prick Garnache in the legs.  Simultaneously the captain laid hold
+of an arm of the chair above and sought to engage Garnache across
+it.  The ruse succeeded to the extent of compelling the Parisian to
+retreat.  The table seemed likely to be his undoing instead of
+helping him.  He dropped like lightning to one knee, seeking to force
+the fellow out from underneath.  But the obstacles which should have
+hindered his assailants hindered Garnache even more at this juncture.
+In that instant Fortunio whipped the chair from the table-top, and
+flung it forward.  One of its legs caught Garnache on the sword arm,
+deadening it for a second.  The sword fell from his hand, and Valerie
+shrieked aloud, thinking the battle at an end.  But the next moment
+he was on his feet, his rapier firmly gripped once more, for all
+that his arm still felt a trifle numbed.  As seconds passed the
+numbness wore away, but before that had taken place the table had
+been thrust forward, and the man beneath it had made it impossible
+for Garnache to hinder this.  Suddenly he called to Valerie.
+
+"A cloak, mademoiselle!  Get me a cloak!" he begged.  And she,
+stemming her fears once more, ran to do his bidding.
+
+She caught up a cloak that lay on a chair by the door of her
+bed-chamber, and brought it to him.  He twisted it twice round his
+left arm, letting its folds hang loose, and advanced again to try
+conclusions with the gentleman underneath.  He cast the garment so
+that it enmeshed the sword when next it was advanced.  Stepping
+briskly aside, he was up to the table, and his busy blade drove
+back the man who assailed him across it.  He threw his weight
+against it, and thrust it back till it was jammed hard once more
+against the doorposts, leaving the chair at his very feet.  The
+man beneath had recovered his sword by this, and again he sought
+to use it.  That was the end of him.  Again Garnache enmeshed it,
+kicked away the chair, or, rather, thrust it aside with his foot,
+stooped suddenly, and driving his blade under the table felt it
+sink into the body of his tormentor.
+
+There was a groan and a spluttering cough, and then before Garnache
+could recover he heard mademoiselle crying out to him to beware.
+The table was thrust suddenly forward almost on top of him; its edge
+caught his left shoulder, and sent him back a full yard, sprawling
+upon the ground.
+
+To rise again, gasping for air - for the fall had shaken him - was
+the work of an instant.  But in that instant Fortunio had thrust the
+table clear of the doorway, and his men were pouring into the room.
+
+They came at Garnache in a body, with wild shouts and fierce mockery,
+and he hurriedly fell on guard and gave way before them until his
+shoulders were against the wainscot and he had at least the assurance
+that none could take him in the rear.  Three blades engaged his own.
+Fortunio had come no farther than the doorway, where he stood his
+torn cheek drenched in blood, watching the scene the Marquise beside
+him, and Tressan standing just behind them, very pale and scared.
+
+Yet Garnache's first thought even in that moment of dire peril was
+for Valerie.  He would spare her the sight that must before many
+moments be spread to view within that shambles.
+
+"To your chamber, mademoiselle," he cried to her.  "You hinder me,"
+he added by way of compelling her obedience.  She did his bidding,
+but only in part.  No farther went she than the doorway of her room,
+where she remained standing, watching the fray as earlier she had
+stood and watched it from the door of the antechamber.
+
+Suddenly she was moved by inspiration.  He had gained an advantage
+before, by retreating through a doorway into an inner room.  Might
+he not do the same again, and be in better case if he were to
+retreat now to her own chamber?  Impulsively she called to him.
+
+"In here, Monsieur de Garnache.  In here."
+
+The Marquise looked across at her, and smiled in mockery.  Garnache
+was too well occupied, she thought, to attempt any such rashness.
+If he but dared remove his shoulders from the wall there would be a
+speedier end to him than as things were.
+
+Not so, however, thought Garnache.  The cloak twisted about his left
+arm gave him some advantage, and he used it to the full.  He flicked
+the slack of it in the face of one, and followed it up by stabbing
+the fellow in the stomach before he could recover guard, whilst with
+another wave of that cloak he enmeshed the sword that shot readily
+into the opening he had left.
+
+Madame cursed, and Fortunio echoed her imprecations.  The Seneschal
+gasped, his fears lost in amazement at so much valour and dexterity.
+
+Garnache swung away from the wall now, and set his back to
+mademoiselle, determined to act upon her advice.  But even in that
+moment he asked himself for the first time since the commencement
+of that carnage - to what purpose?  His arms were growing heavy with
+fatigue, his mouth was parched, and great beads of perspiration
+stood upon his brow.  Soon he would be spent, and they would not
+fail to take a very full advantage of it.
+
+Hitherto his mind had been taken up with the battle only, and if he
+had thought of retreating, it was but to the end that he might gain
+a position of some vantage.  Now, conscious of his growing fatigue,
+his thoughts turned them at last to the consideration of flight.
+Was there no way out of it?  Must he kill every man in Condillac
+before he could hope to escape?
+
+Whimsically, and almost mechanically, he set himself, in his mind,
+to count the men.  There were twenty mercenaries all told, excluding
+Fortunio and himself.  On Arsenio he might rely not to attack him,
+perhaps even to come to his assistance at the finish.  That left
+nineteen.  Four he had already either killed outright or effectively
+disabled; so that fifteen remained him.  The task of dealing with
+those other fifteen was utterly beyond him.  Presently, no doubt,
+the two now opposing him would be reinforced by others.  So that if
+any possible way out existed, he had best set about finding it at
+once.
+
+He wondered could he cut down these two, make an end of Fortunio,
+and, running for it, attempt to escape through the postern before
+the rest of the garrison had time to come up with him or guess his
+purpose.  But the notion was too wild, its accomplishment too
+impossible.
+
+He was fighting now with his back to mademoiselle and his face to
+the tall window, through the leaded panes of which he caught the
+distorted shape of a crescent moon.  Suddenly the idea came to him.
+Through that window must lie his way.  It was a good fifty feet
+above the moat, he knew, and if he essayed to leap it, it must be
+an even chance that he would be killed in leaping.  But the chance
+of death was a certain one if he tarried where he was until others
+came to support his present opponents.  And so he briskly determined
+upon the lesser risk.
+
+He remembered that the window was nailed down, as it had remained
+since mademoiselle's pretended attempt at flight.  But surely that
+should prove no formidable obstacle.
+
+And now that his resolve was taken his tactics abruptly changed.
+Hitherto he had been sparing of his movements, husbanding his
+strength against the long battle that seemed promised him.  Suddenly
+he assumed the offensive where hitherto he had but acted in
+self-defence, and a most deadly offensive was it.  He plied his
+cloak, untwisting it from his arm and flinging it over the head and
+body of one of his assailants, so that he was enmeshed and blinded
+by it.  Leaping to the fellow's flank, Garnache, with a terrific
+kick, knocked his legs from under him so that he fell heavily.
+Then, stooping suddenly, the Parisian ran his blade under the other
+brave's guard and through the fellow's thigh.  The man cried out,
+staggered, and then went down utterly disabled.
+
+One swift downward thrust Garnache made at the mass that wriggled
+under his cloak.  The activity of its wriggles increased in the next
+few seconds, then ceased altogether.
+
+Tressan felt wet from head to foot with a sweat provoked by horror
+of what he saw.  The Dowager's lips were pouring forth a horrid
+litany of guard-room oaths, and meanwhile Garnache had swung round
+to meet Fortunio, the last of all who had stood with him.
+
+The captain came on boldly, armed with sword and dagger, and in that
+moment, feeling himself spent, Garnache bitterly repented having
+relinquished his cloak.  Yet he made a stubborn fight, and whilst
+they fenced and stamped about that room, Marius came to watch them,
+staggering to his mother's side and leaning heavily upon Tressan's
+shoulder.  The Marquise turned to him, her face livid to the lips.
+
+"That man must be the very fiend," Garnache heard her tell her son.
+"Run for help, Tressan, or, God knows, he may escape us yet.  Go for
+men, or we shall have Fortunio killed as well.  Bid them bring
+muskets."
+
+Tressan, moving like one bereft of wits, went her errand, while the
+two men fought on, stamping and panting, circling and lunging, their
+breath coming in gasps, their swords grinding and clashing till
+sparks leapt from them.
+
+The dust rose up to envelop and almost choke them, and more than
+once they slipped in the blood with which the floor was spattered,
+whilst presently Garnache barely recovered and saved himself from
+stumbling over the body of one of his victims against which his
+swiftly moving feet had hurtled.
+
+And the Dowager, who watched the conflict and who knew something of
+sword-play, realized that, tired though Garnache might be, unless
+help came soon or some strange chance gave the captain the advantage,
+Fortunio would be laid low with the others.
+
+His circling had brought the Parisian round, so that his back was
+now to the window, his face to the door of the bedchamber, where
+mademoiselle still watched in ever-growing horror.  His right
+shoulder was in line with the door of the antechamber, which madame
+occupied, and he never saw her quit Marius's side and creep slyly
+into the room to speed swiftly round behind him.
+
+The only one from whom he thought that he might have cause to fear
+treachery was the man whom he had dropped with a thigh wound, and
+he was careful to keep beyond the reach of any sudden sword-thrust
+from that fellow.
+
+But if he did not see the woman's movements, mademoiselle saw them,
+and the sight set her eyes dilating with a new fear.  She guessed
+the Dowager's treacherous purpose.  And no sooner had she guessed
+it than, with a choking sob, she told herself that what madame could
+do that could she also.
+
+Suddenly Garnache saw an opening; Fortunio's eyes, caught by the
+Dowager's movements, strayed for a moment past his opponent, and the
+thing would have been fatal to the captain but that in that moment,
+as Garnache was on the point of lunging, he felt himself caught from
+behind, his arms pinioned to his sides by a pair of slender ones
+that twined themselves about him, and over his shoulder, the breath
+of it fanning his hot cheek, came a vicious voice -
+
+"Stab now, Fortunio!"
+
+The captain asked nothing better.  He raised his weary sword-arm
+and brought his point to the level of Garnache's breast, but in
+that instant its weight became leaden.  Imitating the Marquise,
+Valerie had been in time.  She seized Fortunio's half-lifted arm and
+flung all her weight upon it.
+
+The captain cursed her horridly in a frenzy of fear, for he saw that
+did Garnache shake off the Marquise there would be an end of himself.
+He sought to wrench himself free of her detaining grasp, and the
+exertion brought him down, weary as he was, and with her weight
+hanging to him.  He sank to his knees, and the girl, still clinging
+valiantly, sank with him, calling to Garnache that she held the
+captain fast.
+
+Putting forth all his remaining strength, the Parisian twisted from
+the Dowager's encircling grasp and hurled her from him with a
+violence he nowise intended.
+
+"Yours, madame, are the first woman's arms that ever Martin de
+Garnache has known," said he.  "And never could embrace of beauty
+have been less welcome."
+
+Panting, he caught up one of the overturned chairs.  Holding it by
+the back he made for the window.  He had dropped his sword, and he
+called to mademoiselle to hold the captain yet an instant longer.
+He swung his chair aloft and dashed it against the window.  There
+was a thundering crash of shivered glass and a cool draught of that
+November night came to sweeten the air that had been fouled by the
+stamping of the fighters.
+
+Again he swung up his chair and dashed it at the window, and yet
+again, until no window remained, but a great, gaping opening with a
+fringe of ragged glass and twisted leadwork.
+
+In that moment Fortunio struggled to his feet, free of the girl, who
+sank, almost in a swoon.  He sprang towards Garnache.  The Parisian
+turned and flung his now shattered chair toward the advancing captain.
+It dropped at his feet, and his flying shins struck against an edge
+of it, bringing him, hurt and sprawling, to the ground.  Before he
+could recover, a figure was flying through the open gap that lately
+had been a window.
+
+Mademoiselle sat up and screamed.
+
+"You will be killed, Monsieur de Garnache!  Dear God, you will be
+killed!" and the anguish in her voice was awful.
+
+It was the last thing that reached the ears of Monsieur de Garnache
+as he tumbled headlong through the darkness of the chill November
+night.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+IN THE MOAT
+
+Fortunio and the Marquise reached the window side by side, and they
+were in time to hear a dull splash in the waters fifty feet below
+them.  There was a cloud over the little sickle of moon, and to their
+eyes, fresh from the blaze of candle-light, the darkness was
+impenetrable.
+
+"He is in the moat," cried the Marquise excitedly, and Valerie, who
+sat on the floor whither she had slipped when Fortunio shook her off,
+rocked herself in an agony of fear.
+
+To the horrors about her - the huddled bodies lying so still upon
+the floor, the bloody footprints everywhere, the shattered furniture,
+and the groans of the man with the wounded thigh - to all this she
+was insensible.  Garnache was dead, she told herself; he was surely
+dead; and it seemed as if the very thought of it were killing, too,
+a part of her own self.
+
+Unconsciously she sobbed her fears aloud.  "He is dead," she moaned;
+"he is dead."
+
+The Marquise overheard that piteous cry, and turned to survey the
+girl, her brows lifting, her lips parting in an astonishment that
+for a second effaced the horrors of that night.  Suspicion spread
+like an oil stain in her evil mind.  She stepped forward and caught
+the girl by one of her limp arms.  Marius, paler than his stunning
+had left him, leaned more heavily against the door-post, and looked
+on with bloodshot eyes.  If ever maiden avowed the secret of her
+heart, it seemed to him that Valerie avowed it then.
+
+The Marquise shook her angrily.
+
+"What was he to you, girl?  What was he to you?" she demanded shrilly.
+
+And the girl, no more than half conscious of what she was saying,
+made answer:
+
+"The bravest gentleman, the noblest friend I have ever known."
+
+Pah!  The Dowager dropped her arm and turned to issue a command to
+Fortunio.  But already the fellow had departed.  His concern was
+not with women, but with the man who had escaped him.  He must make
+certain that the fall had killed Garnache.
+
+Breathless and worn as he was, all spattered now with blood from the
+scratch in his cheek, which lent him a terrific aspect, he dashed
+from that shambles and across the guard-room.  He snatched up a
+lighted lantern that had been left in the doorway and leapt down the
+stairs and into the courtyard.  Here he came upon Monsieur de Tressan
+with a half-dozen fellows at his heels, all more or less half clad,
+but all very fully armed with swords and knives, and one or two with
+muskets.
+
+Roughly, with little thought for the dignity of his high office, he
+thrust the Lord Seneschal aside and turned the men.  Some he ordered
+off to the stables to get horses, for if Garnache had survived his
+leap and swum the moat, they must give chase.  Whatever betide, the
+Parisian must not get away.  He feared the consequences of that as
+much for himself as for Condillac.  Some five or six of the men he
+bade follow him, and never pausing to answer any of Tressan's
+fearful questions, he sped across the courtyard, through the kitchens
+ - which was the nearest way - into the outer quadrangle.  Never
+pausing to draw breath, spent though he was, he pursued his flight
+under the great archway of the keep and across the drawbridge, the
+raising of which had been that night postponed to await the Lord
+Seneschal's departure.
+
+Here on the bridge he paused and turned in a frenzy to scream to
+his followers that they should fetch more torches.  Meanwhile he
+snatched the only one at hand from the man-at-arms that carried it.
+
+His men sprang into the guard-room of the keep, realizing from his
+almost hysterical manner the urgent need for haste.  And while he
+waited for them, standing there on the bridge, his torch held high,
+he scanned by its lurid red light the water as far as eye could
+reach on either side of him.
+
+There was a faint movement on the dark, oily surface for all that no
+wind stirred.  Not more than four or five minutes could have elapsed
+since Garnache's leap, and it would seem as if the last ripple from
+the disturbance of his plunge had not yet rolled itself out.  But
+otherwise there was nothing here, nor did Fortunio expect aught.  The
+window of the Northern Tower abutted on to the other side of the
+chateau, and it was there he must look for traces of the fugitive or
+for his body.
+
+"Hasten!" he shouted over his shoulder.  "Follow me!"  And without
+waiting for them he ran across the bridge and darted round the
+building, his torch scattering a shower of sparks behind him on the
+night, and sending little rills of blood-red light down the sword
+which he still carried.
+
+He gained the spot where Garnache must have fallen, and he stood
+below the radiance that clove the night from the shattered window
+fifty feet above, casting the light of his torch this way and that
+over the black bosom of the moat.  Not a ripple moved now upon that
+even, steely surface.  Voices sounded behind him, and with them a
+great glare of ruddy light came to herald the arrival of his men.
+He turned to them and pointed with his sword away from the chateau.
+
+"Spread yourselves!" he shouted.  "Make search yonder.  He cannot
+have gone far."
+
+And they, but dimly realizing whom they sought, yet realizing that
+they sought a man, dashed off and spread themselves as he had bidden
+them, to search the stretch of meadowland, where ill must betide any
+fugitive, since no cover offered.
+
+Fortunio remained where he was at the edge of the moat.  He stooped,
+and waving his torch along the ground he moved to the far angle of
+the chateau, examining the soft, oozy clay.  It was impossible that
+a man could have clambered out over that without leaving some
+impression.  He reached the corner and found the clay intact; at
+least, nowhere could he discover a mark of hands or a footprint set
+as would be that of a man emerging from the water.
+
+He retraced his steps and went back until he had reached the eastern
+angle of the chateau, yet always with the same result.  He
+straightened himself at last, and his manner was more calm; his
+frenzied haste was gone, and deliberately he now raised his torch and
+let its light shine again over the waters.  He pondered them a moment,
+his dark eyes musing almost regretfully.
+
+"Drowned!" he said aloud, and sheathed his sword.
+
+From the window overhead a voice hailed him.  He looked up and saw
+the Dowager, and, behind her, the figure of her son.  Away in the
+meadows the lights of his men's torches darted hither and thither
+like playful jack-o'-lanterns.
+
+"Have you got him, Fortunio?"
+
+"Yes, madame," he answered with assurance.  "You may have his body
+when you will.  He is underneath here."  And he pointed to the water.
+
+They appeared to take his word for it, for they questioned him no
+further.  The Marquise turned to mademoiselle, who was still sitting
+on the floor.
+
+"He is drowned, Valerie," she said slowly, watching the girl's face.
+
+Valerie looked up.  Her eyes were very wide, and her lips moved for
+a second.  Then she fell forward without a word.  This last horror,
+treading on the heels of all those that already had assailed her,
+proved too great a strain for her brave spirit.  She had swooned.
+
+Tressan entered at that moment, full of questions as to what might
+be toward, for he had understood nothing in the courtyard.  The
+Marquise called to him to help her with the girl, Marius being still
+too faint, and between them they bore her to her chamber, laid her
+on the bed, and, withdrawing, closed the door upon her.  Then she
+signed to Marius and the Seneschal.
+
+"Come," she said; "let us go.  The sight and smell of the place are
+turning me sick, although my stomach is strong enough to endure most
+horrors."
+
+She took up one of the candle-branches to light them, and they went
+below and made their way to the hall, where they found Marius's page,
+Gaston, looking very pale and scared at the din that had filled the
+chateau during the past half-hour or so.  With him was Marius's hound,
+which the poor boy had kept by him for company and protection in that
+dreadful time.
+
+The Marquise spoke to him kindly, and she stooped to pat the dog's
+glossy head.  Then she bade Gaston set wine for them, and when it
+was fetched the three of them drank in brooding, gloomy silence.
+
+The draught invigorated Marius, it cheered Tressan's drooping
+spirits, and it quenched the Dowager's thirst.  The Seneschal turned
+to her again with his unanswered questions touching the end of that
+butchery above-stairs.  She told him what Fortunio had said that
+Garnache was drowned as a consequence of his mad leap from the window.
+
+Into Tressan's mind there sprang the memory of the thing Garnache had
+promised should befall him in such a case.  It drove the colour from
+his cheeks and brought great lines of fearful care into sharp relief
+about his mouth and eyes.
+
+"Madame, we are ruined!" he groaned.
+
+"Tressan," she answered him contemptuously, "you are chicken-hearted.
+Listen to me.  Did he not say that he had left his man behind him
+when he came to Condillac?  Where think you that he left his man?"
+
+"Maybe in Grenoble," answered the Seneschal, staring.
+
+"Find out," she told him impressively, her eyes on his, and calm
+as though they had never looked upon such sights as that very night
+had offered them.  "If not in Grenoble, certainly, at least,
+somewhere in this Dauphiny of which you are the King's Lord
+Seneschal.  Turn the whole province inside out, man, but find the
+fellow.  Yours is the power to do it.  Do it, then, and you will
+have no consequences to fear.  You have seen the man?"
+
+"Ay, I have seen him.  I remember him; and his name, I bethink me,
+is Rabecque."
+
+He took courage; his face looked less dejected.
+
+"You overlook nothing, madame," he murmured.  "You are truly
+wonderful.  I will start the search this very night.  My men are
+almost all at Montelimar awaiting my commands.  I'll dispatch a
+messenger with orders that they are to spread themselves throughout
+Dauphiny upon this quest."
+
+The door opened, and Fortunio entered.  He was still unwashed and
+terrible to look upon, all blood-bespattered.  The sight of him drove
+a shudder through Tressan.  The Marquise grew solicitous.
+
+"How is your wound, Fortunio?" was her first question.
+
+He made a gesture that dismissed the matter.
+
+"It is nothing.  I am over full-blooded, and if I am scratched, I
+bleed, without perceiving it, enough to drain another man."
+
+"Here, drink, mon capitaine," she urged him, very friendly, filling
+him a cup with her own hands.  "And you, Marius?" she asked.  "Are
+you recovering strength?"
+
+"I am well," answered Marius sullenly.  His defeat that evening had
+left him glum and morose.  He felt that he had cut a sorry figure
+in the affair, and his vanity was wounded.  "I deplore I had so
+little share in the fight," he muttered.
+
+"The lustiest fight ever I or any man beheld," swore Fortunio.
+"Dieu!  But he was a fighter, that Monsieur de Garnache, and he
+deserved a better end than drowning."
+
+"You are quite sure that he is drowned?"
+
+Fortunio replied by giving his reasons for that conclusion, and
+they convinced both the Marquise and her son indeed they had never
+deemed it possible that the Parisian could have survived that awful
+leap.  The Dowager looked at Marius, and from him to the captain.
+
+"Do you think, you two, that you will be fit for tomorrow's business?"
+
+"For myself," laughed Fortunio, "I am ready for it now."
+
+"And I shall be when I have rested," answered Marius grimly.
+
+"Then get you both to rest, you will be needing it," she bade them.
+
+"And I, too, madame," said the Seneschal, bending over the hand
+she held out to him.  "Good-night to you all."  He would have added
+a word to wish them luck in the morrow's venture; but for the life
+of him he dared not.  He turned, made another of his bows, and
+rolled out of the room.
+
+Five minutes later the drawbridge was being raised after his
+departure, and Fortunio was issuing orders to the men he had recalled
+from their futile search to go clear the guard-room and antechamber
+of the Northern Tower, and to bear the dead to the chapel, which
+must serve as a mortuary for the time.  That done he went off to bed,
+and soon after the lights were extinguished in Condillac; and save
+for Arsenio, who was, on guard, sorely perturbed by all that had
+befallen and marvelling at the rashness of his friend "Battista" -
+for he had no full particulars of the business - the place was
+wrapped in sleep.
+
+Had they been less sure that Garnache was drowned, maybe they had
+slumbered less tranquilly that night at Condillac.  Fortunio had
+been shrewd in his conclusions, yet a trifle hasty; for whilst, as
+a matter of fact, he was correct in assuming that the Parisian had
+not crawled out of the moat - neither at the point he had searched,
+nor elsewhere - yet was he utterly wrong to assume him at the bottom
+of it.
+
+Garnache had gone through that window prepared to leap into another
+ - and, he hoped, a better world.  He had spun round twice in the
+air and shot feet foremost through the chill waters of the moat, and
+down until his toes came in contact with a less yielding substance,
+yet yielding nevertheless.  Marvelling that he should have retained
+until now his senses, he realized betimes that he was touching mud
+ - that he was really ankle deep in it.  A vigorous, frantic kick
+with both legs at once released him, and he felt himself slowly
+re-ascending to the surface.
+
+It has been often said that a drowning man in his struggles sees
+his whole life mirrored before him.  In the instants of Garnache's
+ascent through the half stagnant waters of that moat he had reviewed
+the entire situation and determined upon the course he should pursue.
+When he reached the surface, he must see to it that he broke it
+gently, for at the window above were sure to be watchers, looking to
+see how he had fared.  Madame, he remembered, had sent Tressan for
+muskets.  If he had returned with them and they should perceive him
+from above, a bullet would be sent to dispose of him, and it were a
+pity to be shot now after having come through so much.
+
+His head broke the surface and emerged into the chill darkness of
+the night.  He took a deep breath of cold but very welcome air, and
+moving his arms gently under water, he swam quietly, not to the edge
+of the moat but to the chateau wall, close under which he thought
+he would be secure from observation.  He found by good fortune a
+crevice between two stones; he did not see it, his fingers found it
+for him as they groped along that granite surface.  He clung there
+a moment and pondered the situation.  He heard voices above, and
+looking up he saw the glare of light through the opening he had
+battered.
+
+And now he was surprised to feel new vigour running through him.  He
+had hurled himself from that window with scarce the power to leap,
+bathed in perspiration and deeming his strength utterly spent.  The
+ice-cold waters of the moat had served, it would seem, to brace him,
+to wash away his fatigue, and to renew his energies.  His mind was
+singularly clear and his senses rendered superacute, and he set
+himself to consider what he had best do.
+
+Swim to the edge of the moat and, clambering out, take to his legs
+was naturally the first impulse.  But, reflecting upon the open
+nature of the ground, he realized that that must mean his ruin.
+Presently they would come to see how he had fared, and failing to
+find him in the water they would search the country round about.  He
+set himself in their place.  He tried to think as they would think,
+the better that he might realize how they would act, and then an
+idea came to him that might be worth heeding.  In any case his
+situation was still very desperate; on that score he allowed himself
+no illusions.  That they would take his drowning for granted, and
+never come to satisfy themselves, he was not optimist enough to
+assume.
+
+He abandoned his grip of the wall and began to swim gently toward
+the eastern angle.  If they came out, they must lower the bridge;
+he would place himself so that in falling it should cover him and
+screen him from their sight.  He rounded the angle of the building,
+and now the friendly cloud that had hung across the moon moved by,
+and a faint, silver radiance was upon the water under his eyes.  But
+yonder, ahead of him, something black lay athwart the moat.  At once
+he knew it for the bridge.  It was down.  And he had the explanation
+in that he remembered that the Lord Seneschal had not yet left
+Condillac.  It mattered little to him one way or the other.  The
+bridge was there, and he made the best of it.
+
+A few swift, silent strokes brought him to it.  He hesitated a moment
+before venturing into the darkness underneath; then, bethinking him
+that it was that or discovery, he passed under.  He made for the
+wall, and as he groped along he found a chain depending and reaching
+down into the water.  He caught at it with both hands and hung by it
+to await events.
+
+And now, for the first time that night, his pulses really quickened.
+There in the dark he waited, and the moments that sped seemed very
+long to him, and they were very anxious.  He had no good sword
+wherewith to defend himself were he attacked, no good, solid ground
+on which to take his stand.  If he were discovered, he was helpless,
+at their mercy, to shoot, or take, or beat to death as best they
+listed.  And so he waited, his pulses throbbing, his breath coming
+short and fast.  The cold water that had invigorated him some minutes
+ago was numbing him now, and seemed to be freezing his courage as it
+froze the blood in his veins, the very marrow in his bones.
+
+Presently his ears caught a rush of feet, a sound of voices, and
+Fortunio's raised above the others.  Heavy steps rang on the bridge
+over his head, and the thud of their fall was like thunder to the
+man beneath.  A crimson splash of light fell on the moat on either
+side of him.  The fellow on the bridge had halted.  Then the steps
+went on.  The light flared this way and that, and Garnache almost
+trembled, expecting at every moment that its rays would penetrate
+the spot where he was hanging and reveal him cowering there like a
+frightened water-rat.  But the man moved on, and his light flared no
+longer.
+
+Then others followed him.  Garnache heard the sounds of their search.
+So overwrought was he that there was a moment when he thought of
+swimming to the edge and making across the country to the north while
+they were hunting the meadows to the east; but he repressed the
+impulse and stayed on.  An eternity did it seem before those men
+returned and marched once more over his head.  A further eternity
+was it until the clatter of hoofs on the courtyard stones and their
+thunder on the planks above him brought him the news that Tressan
+was riding home.  He heard the hoofs quicken, and their loud rattle
+on the road that led down to the Isere, a half-mile away; and then,
+when the hoof-beats grew more distant, there came again the echo of
+voices up above.
+
+Was it not over yet?  Dear God! would it never end?  He felt that a
+few moments more of this immersion and he should be done for utterly;
+his numbness must rob him of the power to cross the moat.
+
+Suddenly the first welcome sound he had heard that night came to his
+ears.  Chains creaked, hinges groaned, and the great black pall above
+him began gradually to rise.  Faster it went, till, at last, it fell
+back into position, flat with the wall of the chateau, and such
+little light as there was from the moon was beating down upon his
+frozen face.
+
+He let the chain go, and, with strokes swift and silent as he could
+contrive, he crossed the water.  He clambered up the bank, almost
+bereft of strength.  A moment he crouched there listening.  Had he
+moved too soon?  Had he been incautious?
+
+Nothing stirred behind him to confirm his fears.  He crept softly
+across the hard ground of the road where he had landed.  Then, when
+the yielding, silent turf was under his feet, he gave not another
+thought for his numbness, but started to run as a man runs in a
+nightmare, so little did the speed of his movements match the pace
+of his desire to set a distance between himself and Condillac.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THROUGH THE NIGHT
+
+It wanted something over an hour to midnight when Monsieur de
+Garnache started out in his sodden clothes to run from Condillac.
+He bore away to the north, and continued running until he had
+covered a mile or so, when perforce he must slacken his pace lest
+presently he should have to give way to utter exhaustion.  He
+trudged on bravely thereafter, at a good, swinging pace, realizing
+that in moving briskly lay his salvation from such ill effects as
+might otherwise attend his too long immersion.  His run had set a
+pleasant glow upon his skin and seemed to have thawed the frozen
+condition of his joints.  Yet he could not disguise from himself
+that he was sorely worn by that night's happenings, and that, if
+he would reach his goal, he must carefully husband such strength
+as yet remained him.
+
+That goal of his was Voiron, some four leagues distant to the north,
+where, at the inn of the Beau Paon, his man, Rabecque, should be
+lodged, ready for his coming at any time.  Once already, when
+repairing to Condillac, he had travelled by that road, and it was
+so direct that there seemed scant fear of his mistaking it.  On he
+plodded through the night, his way lighted for him by the crescent
+moon, the air so still that, despite his wet garments, being warmed
+as he was by his brisk movements, he never felt the cold of it.
+
+He had overheard enough of what had been said by Marius to Valerie
+to understand the business that was afoot for the morrow, and he
+doubted him that he had not sufficiently injured the Dowager's son
+to make him refrain from or adjourn his murderous ride across the
+border into Savoy.
+
+Garnache's purpose now was to reach Voiron, there to snatch a brief
+rest, and then, equipped anew to set out with his man for La Rochette
+and anticipate the fell plans of Marius and Fortunio.
+
+He might have experienced elation at his almost miraculous escape
+and at the circumstance that he was still at large to carry this
+duel with the Condillacs to a fitting finish, were it not for the
+reflection that but for his besetting sin of hastiness he might now
+be travelling in dry garments toward La Rochette, with mademoiselle
+beside him.  Once again that rash temper of his had marred an
+enterprise that was on the point of succeeding.  And yet, even as
+he regretted his rashness, rage stirred him again at the thought of
+Marius crushing that slender shape against him and seeking to force
+his odious kisses upon her pure, immaculate lips.  And then the
+thought of her, left behind at Condillac at the mercy of Marius and
+that she-devil the Marquise, and the fears that of a sudden leapt
+up in his mind, brought him to a standstill, as though he were
+contemplating the incomparable folly of a return.  He beat his hands
+together for a moment in a frenzy of anguish; he threw back his head
+and raised his eyes to the sky above with a burst of imprecations
+on his lips.  And then reflection brought him peace.  No, no; they
+dare offer her no hurt.  To do so must irrevocably lose them La
+Vauvraye; and it was their covetousness had made them villains.
+Upon that covetousness did their villainy rest, and he need fear
+from them no wanton ruthlessness that should endanger their chance
+of profit.
+
+He trudged on, reassured.  He had been a fool so to give way to
+fear; as great a fool as he had been when he had laid hands on
+Marius to quell his excessive amorousness.  Dieu!  Was he bewitched?
+What ailed him?  Again he paused there in the night to think the
+situation out.
+
+A dozen thoughts, all centering about Valerie, came crowding in upon
+his brain, till in the end a great burst of laughter - the laughter
+of a madman almost, eerie and terrific as it rang upon the silent
+night broke from his parted lips.  That brief moment of introspection
+had revealed him to himself, and the revelation had fetched that
+peal of mocking laughter from him.
+
+He realized now, at last, that not because the Queen had ordered
+him to procure Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye's enlargement had he
+submitted to assume a filthy travesty, to set his neck in jeopardy,
+to play the lackey and the spy.  It was because something in
+Valerie's eyes, something in her pure, lily face had moved him to
+it; and simultaneously had come the thought of the relation in which
+she stood to that man at La Rochette whose life he now sought to
+save for her, and it had stabbed him with a bitterness no misfortune,
+no failure yet had brought him.
+
+He trudged on, knowing himself for what he was a fool who, after
+close upon forty years of a strenuous life in which no petticoat had
+played a part, was come under the spell of a pair of innocent eyes
+belonging to a child almost young enough to have been his daughter.
+
+He despised himself a little for his weakness; he despised himself
+for his apostasy from the faith that had governed his life - the
+faith to keep himself immune from the folly to which womanhood had
+driven so many a stout man.
+
+And yet, mock himself, despise himself as he would, a great
+tenderness, a great desire grew strong in his soul that night as
+he trudged on toward distant Voiron. Mile after mile her image
+kept him company, and once, when he had left Voreppe behind him,
+the greater portion of his journey done, some devil whispered in
+his ear that he was weary; that he would be over-weary on the
+morrow for any ride to La Rochette. He had done all that mortal
+man could do; let him rest to-morrow whilst Marius and Fortunio
+accomplished by Florimond what the fever had begun.
+
+A cold perspiration broke on him as he wrestled with that grim
+temptation.  Valerie was his; she belonged to him by the right of
+dangers shared; never had mother in her labours been nearer death
+for the offspring's sake than had he for Valerie during the days
+that were sped and the hours that were but gone.  She belonged to
+him by the title of those dangers he had been through.  What had
+Florimond done to establish his claim to her?  He had remained
+absent during long years, a-warring in a foreign land.  With how
+many banal loves might not the fellow in that time have strewn his
+soldier's path!  Garnache knew well how close does Cupid stalk in
+the wake of Mars, knew well the way of these gay soldiers and the
+lightness of their loves.
+
+Was, then, this fellow to come now and claim her, when perils were
+past, when there was naught left to do but lead her to the altar?
+Could he be worthy of such a pearl of womanhood, this laggard who,
+because a fever touched him, sat him down in an inn within a few
+hours' ride of her to rest him, as though the world held no such
+woman as Valerie?
+
+And she, herself, by what ties was she bound to him?  By the ties
+of an old promise, given at an age when she knew not what love meant.
+He had talked of it with her, and he knew how dispassionately she
+awaited Florimond's return.  Florimond might be betrothed to her
+ - her father and his had encompassed that between them - but no
+lover of hers was he.
+
+Thus far did his thoughts journey, and temptation gripped him ever
+more and more strongly.  And then his manhood and his honour awoke
+with a shudder, as awakens a man from an ugly dream.  What manner
+of fool was he? he asked himself again.  Upon what presumptions
+did he base his silly musings?  Did he suppose that even were there
+no Florimond, it would be left for a harsh, war-worn old greybeard
+such as he to awaken tenderness in the bosom of that child?  The
+tenderness of friendship perhaps - she had confessed to that; but
+the tenderness of her sweet love must be won by a younger, comelier
+man.
+
+If love had indeed touched him at last, let him be worthy of it and
+of her who inspired it.  Let him strain every sinew in her service,
+asking no guerdon; let him save the life of the man to whom she was
+affianced; let him save her from the clutches of the Marquise de
+Condillac and her beautiful, unscrupulous son.
+
+He put his folly from him and-went on, seeking to hold his mind to
+the planning of his to-morrow's journey and its business.  He had
+no means to know that at that very hour Valerie was on her knees by
+her little white bed, in the Northern Tower of Condillac, praying
+for the repose of the soul of Monsieur de Garnache - the bravest
+gentleman, the noblest friend she had ever known.  For she accounted
+him dead, and she thought with horror of his body lying in the slime
+under the cold waters of the moat beneath the window of her
+antechamber.  A change seemed to have come upon her.  Her soul was
+numb, her courage seemed dead, and little care had she in that hour
+of what might betide her now.
+
+Florimond was coming, she remembered: coming to wed her.  Ah, well!
+It mattered little, since Monsieur de Garnache was dead - as though
+it could have mattered had he been living!
+
+Three hours of his long striding brought Garnache at last to Voiron,
+and the echo of his footsteps rang through the silent streets and
+scared a stray cat or two that were preying out of doors.  There was
+no watch in the little township and no lights, but by the moon's
+faint glimmer Garnache sought the inn of the Beau Paon, and found
+it at the end of a little wandering.  A gaudy peacock, with tail
+spread wide, was the sign above the door on which he thumped and
+kicked as if he would have beaten it down.
+
+It opened after some delay, and a man, half clad, candle in hand, a
+night-cap on his hoary locks, showed an angry face at the opening.
+
+At sight of the gaunt, bedraggled figure that craved admittance,
+the landlord would have shut the door again, fearing that he had to
+do with some wild bandit from the hills.  But Garnache thrust his
+foot in the way.
+
+"There is a man named Rabecque, from Paris, lodging here.  I must
+have instant speech with him," said he; and his words, together
+with the crisp, commanding tones in which they were uttered, had
+their effect upon the host.
+
+Rabecque had been playing the great lord during the week he had
+spent at Voiron, and had known how to command a certain deference
+and regard.  That this tatterdemalion, with the haughty voice,
+should demand to see him at that hour of the night, with such scant
+unconcern of how far he might incommode the great Monsieur Rabecque,
+earned for him too a certain measure of regard, though still alloyed
+with some suspicion.
+
+The landlord bade him enter.  He did not know whether Monsieur
+Rabecque would forgive him for being disturbed; he could not say
+whether Monsieur Rabecque would consent to see this visitor at such
+an hour; very probably he would not.  Still, monsieur might enter.
+
+Garnache cut him short before he had half done, announced his name
+and bade him convey it to Rabecque.  The alacrity with which the
+lackey stirred from his bed upon hearing who it was that had arrived
+impressed the host not a little, but not half so much as it impressed
+him presently to observe the deference with which this great Monsieur
+Rabecque of Paris confronted the scarecrow below stairs when he was
+brought into its presence.
+
+"You are safe and sound, monsieur?" he cried, in deferential joy.
+
+"Aye, by a miracle, mon fils," Garnache answered him, with a short
+laugh.  "Help me to bed; then bring me a cup of spiced wine.  I have
+swum a moat and done other wonders in these clothes."
+
+The host and Rabecque bustled now to minister to his wants between
+them, and when, jaded and worn, Garnache lay at last between
+good-smelling sheets with the feeling in him that he was like to
+sleep until the day of judgment, he issued his final orders.
+
+"Awake me at daybreak, Rabecque," said he drowsily.  "We must be
+stirring then.  Have horse ready and clothes for me.  I shall need
+you to wash me clean and shave me and make me what I was before
+your tricks and dyes turned me into what I have been this week and
+more.  Take away the light.  At daybreak!  Don't let me sleep
+beyond that as you value your place with me.  We shall have brisk
+work to-morrow.  At - daybreak - Rabecque!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+FLORIMOND DE CONDILLAC
+
+
+It was noon of the next day when two horsemen gained the heights
+above La Rochette and paused to breathe their nags and take a survey
+of the little township in the plain at their feet.  One of these
+was Monsieur de Garnache, the other was his man Rabecque.  But it
+was no longer the travestied Garnache that Condillac had known as
+"Battista" during the past days, it was that gentleman as he had been
+when first he presented himself at the chateau.  Rabecque had shaved
+him, and by means of certain unguents had cleansed his skin and hair
+of the dyes with which he had earlier overlaid them.
+
+That metamorphosis, of itself, was enough to set Garnache in a good
+humour; he felt himself again, and the feeling gave him confidence.
+His mustachios bristled as fiercely as of old, his skin was clear
+and healthy, and his dark brown hair showed ashen at the temples.
+He was becomingly arrayed in a suit of dark brown camlet, with rows
+of close-set gold buttons running up his hanging sleeves; a leather
+jerkin hid much of his finery, and his great boots encased his legs.
+He wore a brown hat, with a tallish crown and a red feather, and
+Rabecque carried his cloak for him, for the persistent Saint Martin's
+summer rendered that day of November rather as one of early autumn.
+
+A flood of sunshine descended from a cloudless sky to drench the
+country at their feet, and all about them the trees preserved a
+green that was but little touched by autumnal browning.
+
+Awhile he paused there on the heights; then he gave his horse a
+touch of the spur, and they started down the winding road that led
+into La Rochette.  A half-hour later they were riding under the
+porte cochere of the inn of the Black Boar.  Of the ostler who
+hastened forward to take their reins Monsieur de Garnache inquired
+if the Marquis de Condillac were lodged there.  He was answered in
+the affirmative, and he got down at once from his horse.  Indeed,
+but for the formality of the thing, he might have spared himself
+the question, for lounging about the courtyard were a score of
+stalwart weather-tanned fellows, whose air and accoutrements
+proclaimed them soldiers.  It required little shrewdness to guess
+in them the personal followers of the Marquis, the remainder of
+the little troop that had followed the young seigneur to the wars
+when, some three years ago, he had set out from Condillac.
+
+Garnache gave orders for the horses to be cared for, and bade
+Rabecque get himself fed in the common room.  Heralded by the host,
+the Parisian then mounted the stairs to Monsieur de Condillac's
+apartments.
+
+The landlord led the way to the inn's best room, turned the handle,
+and, throwing wide the door, stood aside for Monsieur de Garnache
+to enter.
+
+From within the chamber came the sounds of a scuffle, a man's soft
+laugh, and a girl's softer intercession.
+
+"Let me go, monsieur.  Of your pity, let me go.  Some one is coming."
+
+"And what care I who comes?" answered a voice that seemed oppressed
+by laughter.
+
+Garnache strode into the chamber - spacious and handsomely furnished
+as became the best room of the Auberge du Sanglier Noir - to find a
+meal spread on the table, steaming with an odour promising of good
+things, but neglected by the guest for the charms of the
+serving-wench, whose waist he had imprisoned.  As Garnache's tall
+figure loomed before him he let the girl go and turned a
+half-laughing, half-startled face upon the intruder.
+
+"Who the devil may you be?" he inquired, and a brown eye, rakish
+and roving in its glance, played briskly over the Parisian, whilst
+Garnache himself returned the compliment, and calmly surveyed this
+florid gentleman of middle height with the fair hair and regular
+features.
+
+The girl scurried by and darted from the room, dodging the smiting
+hand which the host raised as she flew past him.  The Parisian felt
+his gorge rising.  Was this the sort of fever that had kept Monsieur
+le Marquis at La Rochette, whilst mademoiselle was suffering in
+durance at Condillac?  His last night's jealous speculations touching
+a man he did not know had leastways led him into no exaggeration.
+He found just such a man as he had pictured - a lightly-loving,
+pleasure-taking roysterer, with never a thought beyond the amusement
+which the hour afforded him.
+
+With curling lip Garnache bowed stiffly, and in a cold, formal voice
+he announced himself.
+
+"My name is Martin Marie Rigobert de Garnache.  I am an emissary
+dispatched from Paris by her Majesty the Queen-mother to procure the
+enlargement of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye from the durance in which
+she is held by madame your stepmother."
+
+The pleasant gentleman's eyebrows went up; a smile that was almost
+insolent broke on his face.
+
+"That being so, monsieur, why the devil are you here?"
+
+"I am here, monsieur," answered him Garnache, throwing back his
+head, his nostrils quivering, "because you are not at Condillac."
+
+The tone was truculent to the point of defiance, for despite the
+firm resolve he had taken last night never again to let his temper
+overmaster him, already Garnache's self-control was slipping away.
+
+The Marquis noted the tone, and observed the man.  In their way he
+liked both; in their way he disliked both.  But he clearly saw that
+this peppery gentleman must be treated less cavalierly, or trouble
+would come of it.  So he waved him gracefully to the table, where
+a brace of flagons stood amid the steaming viands.
+
+"You will dine with me, monsieur," said he, the utmost politeness
+marking his utterance now.  "I take it that since you have come
+here in quest of me you have something to tell me.  Shall we talk
+as we eat?  I detest a lonely meal."
+
+The florid gentleman's tone and manner were mollifying in the
+extreme.  Garnache had risen early and ridden far; the smell of
+the viands had quickened an appetite already very keen; moreover,
+since he and this gentleman were to be allies, it was as well they
+should not begin by quarrelling.
+
+He bowed less stiffly, expressed his willingness and his thanks,
+laid hat and whip and cloak aside, unbuckled and set down his sword,
+and, that done, took at table the place which his host himself
+prepared him.
+
+Garnache took more careful stock of the Marquis now.  He found much
+to like in his countenance.  It was frank and jovial; obviously
+that of a sensualist, but, leastways, an honest sensualist.  He was
+dressed in black, as became a man who mourned his father, yet with
+a striking richness of material, whilst his broad collar of fine
+point and the lace cuffs of his doublet were worth a fortune.
+
+What time they ate Monsieur de Garnache told of his journey from
+Paris and of his dealings with Tressan and his subsequent adventures
+at Condillac.  He dwelt passingly upon the manner in which they had
+treated him, and found it difficult to choose words to express the
+reason for his returning in disguise to play the knight-errant to
+Valerie.  He passed on to speak of last night's happenings and of
+his escape.  Throughout, the Marquis heard him with a grave
+countenance and a sober, attentive glance, yet, when he had finished
+a smile crept round the sensual lips.
+
+"The letter that I had at Milan prepared me for some such trouble
+as this," said he, and Garnache was amazed at the lightness of his
+tone, just as he had been amazed to see the fellow keep his
+countenance at the narrative of mademoiselle's position.  "I guessed
+that my beautiful stepmother intended me some such scurviness from
+the circumstance of her having kept me in ignorance of my father's
+death.  But frankly, sir, your tale by far outstrips my wildest
+imaginings.  You have behaved very - very bravely in this affair.
+You seem, in fact, to have taken a greater interest in Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye's enlargement than the Queen could have a right to
+expect of you."  And he smiled, a world of suggestion in his eyes.
+Garnache sat back in his chair and stared at the man.
+
+"This levity, monsieur, on such a subject, leaves me thunderstruck,"
+he said at last.
+
+"Diable!" laughed the other.  "You are too prone, after your trials;
+to view its tragic rather than its comic side.  Forgive me if I am
+smitten only with the humour of the thing."
+
+"The humour of the thing!" gurgled Garnache, his eyes starting from
+his head.  Then out leapt that temper of his like an eager hound
+that has been suddenly unleashed.  He brought down his clenched
+hand upon the table, caught in passing a flagon, and sent it
+crashing to the floor.  If there was a table near at hand when his
+temper went, he never failed to treat it so.
+
+"Par la mort Dieu! monsieur, you see but the humour of it, do you?
+And what of that poor child who is lying there, suffering this
+incarceration because of her fidelity to a promise given you?"
+
+The statement was hardly fully accurate.  But it served its purpose.
+The other's face became instantly, grave.
+
+"Calm yourself, I beg, monsieur," he cried, raising a soothing hand.
+"I have offended you somewhere; that is plain.  There is something
+here that I do not altogether understand.  You say that Valerie
+has suffered on account of a promise given me?  To what are you
+referring?"
+
+"They hold her a prisoner, monsieur, because they wish to wed her
+to Marius," answered Garnache, striving hard to cool his anger.
+
+"Parfaitement!  That much I understood."
+
+"Well, then, monsieur, is the rest not plain?  Because she is
+betrothed to you - "  He paused.  He saw, at last, that he was
+stating something not altogether accurate.  But the other took his
+meaning there and then, lay back in his chair, and burst out
+laughing.
+
+The blood hummed through Garnache's head as he tightened his lips
+and watched this gentleman indulge his inexplicable mirth.  Surely
+Monsieur de Condillac was possessed of the keenest sense of humour
+in all France.  He laughed with a will, and Garnache sent up a
+devout prayer that the laugh might choke him.  The noise of it
+filled the hostelry.
+
+"Sir," said Garnache, with an ever-increasing tartness, "there is
+a by-word has it 'Much laughter, little wit.'  In confidence won,
+is that your case, monsieur?"
+
+The other looked at him soberly a moment, then went off again.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur!" he gasped, "you'll be the death of me.  For
+the love of Heaven look less fierce.  Is it my fault that I must
+laugh?  The folly of it all is so colossal.  Three years from home,
+yet there is a woman keeps faithful and holds to a promise given
+for her.  Come, monsieur, you who have seen the world, you must
+agree that there is in this something that is passing singular,
+extravagantly amusing.  My poor little Valerie!" he spluttered
+through his half-checked mirth, "does she wait for me still? does
+she count me still betrothed to her?  And because of that, says
+'No' to brother Marius!  Death of my life!  I shall die of it."
+
+"I have a notion that you may, monsieur," rasped Garnache's voice,
+and with it rasped Garnache's chair upon the boards.  He had
+risen, and he was confronting his merry host very fiercely, white
+to the lips, his eyes aflame.  There was no mistaking his attitude,
+no mistaking his words.
+
+"Eh?" gasped the other, recovering himself at last to envisage what
+appeared to develop into a serious situation.
+
+"Monsieur," said Garnache, his voice very cold, "do I understand
+that you no longer intend to carry out your engagement and wed
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye?"
+
+A dull flush spread upon the Marquis's face.  He rose too, and
+across the table he confronted his guest, his mien haughty, his
+eyes imperious.
+
+"I thought, monsieur," said he, with a great dignity, "I thought
+when I invited you to sit at my table that your business was to
+serve me, however little I might be conscious of having merited
+the honour.  It seems instead that you are come hither to affront
+me.  You are my guest, monsieur.  Let me beg that you will depart
+before I resent a question on a matter which concerns myself alone."
+
+The man was right, and Garnache was wrong.  He had no title to take
+up the affairs of Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.  But he was past
+reason now, and he was not the man to brook haughtiness, however
+courteously it might be cloaked.  He eyed the Marquis's flushed
+ace across the board, and his lip curled.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, "I take your meaning very fully.  Half a word
+with me is as good as a whole sentence with another.  You have
+dubbed me in polite phrases an impertinent.  That I am not; and I
+resent the imputation."
+
+"Oh, that!" said the Marquis, with a half-laugh and a shrug.  "If
+you resent it - "  His smile and his gesture made the rest plain.
+
+"Exactly, monsieur," was Garnache's answer.  "But I do not fight
+sick men."
+
+Florimond's brows grew wrinkled, his eyes puzzled.
+
+"Sick men!" he echoed.  "Awhile ago, monsieur, you appeared to
+cast a doubt upon my sanity.  Is it a case of the drunkard who
+thinks all the world drunk but himself?"
+
+Garnache gazed at him.  That doubt he had entertained grew now into
+something like assurance.
+
+"I know not whether it is the fever makes your tongue run so - "
+he began, when the other broke in, a sudden light of understanding
+in his eyes.
+
+"You are at fault," he cried.  "I have no fever."
+
+"But then your letter to Condillac?" demanded Garnache, lost now
+in utter amazement.
+
+"What of it?  I'll swear I never said I had a fever."
+
+"I'll swear you did."
+
+"You give me the lie, then?"
+
+But Garnache waved his hands as if he implored the other, to have
+done with giving and taking offence.  There was some misunderstanding
+somewhere, he realized, and sheer astonishment had cooled his anger.
+His only aim now was to have this obscure thing made clear.
+
+"No, no," he cried.  "I am seeking enlightenment."
+
+Florimond smiled.
+
+"I may have said that we were detained by a fever; but I never said
+the patient was myself."
+
+"Who then?  Who else?" cried Garnache.
+
+"Why, now I understand, monsieur.  But it is my wife who has the
+fever."
+
+"Your - !" Garnache dared not trust himself to utter the word.
+
+"My wife, monsieur," the Marquis repeated.  "The journey proved too
+much for her, travelling at the rate she did."
+
+A silence fell.  Garnache's long chin sank on to his breast, and he
+stood there, his eyes upon the tablecloth, his thoughts with the
+poor innocent child who waited at Condillac, so full of trust and
+faith and loyalty to this betrothed of hers who had come home with
+a wife out of Italy.
+
+And then, while he stood so and Florimond was regarding him
+curiously, the door opened, and the host appeared.
+
+"Monsieur le Marquis," said he, "there are two gentlemen below asking
+to see you.  One of them is Monsieur Marius de Condillac."
+
+"Marius?" cried the Marquis, and he started round with a frown.
+
+"Marius?" breathed Garnache, and then, realizing that the assassins
+had followed so close upon his heels, he put all thoughts from his
+mind other than that of the immediate business.  He had, himself,
+a score to settle with them.  The time was now.  He swung round on
+his heel, and before he knew what he had said the words were out:
+
+"Bring them up, Monsieur l'Hote."
+
+Florimond looked at him in surprise.
+
+"Oh, by all means, if monsieur wishes it," said he, with a fine
+irony.
+
+Garnache looked at him, then back at the hesitating host.
+
+"You have heard," said he coolly.  "Bring them up."
+
+"Bien, monsieur," replied the host, withdrawing and closing the door
+after him.
+
+"Your interference in my affairs grows really droll, monsieur,"
+said the Marquis tartly.
+
+"When you shall have learned to what purpose I am interfering,
+you'll find it, possibly, not quite so droll," was the answer, no
+less tart.  "We have but a moment, monsieur.  Listen while I tell
+you the nature of their errand."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+THE GHOST IN THE CUPBOARD
+
+
+Garnache had but a few minutes in which to unfold his story, and he
+needed, in addition, a second or two in which to ponder the
+situation as he now found it.
+
+His first reflection was that Florimond, since he was now married,
+might perhaps, instead of proving Valerie's saviour from Marius,
+join forces with his brother in coercing her into this alliance with
+him.  But from what Valerie herself had told him he was inclined to
+think more favourably of Florimond and to suppress such doubts as
+these.  Still he could incur no risks; is business was to serve
+Valerie and Valerie only; to procure at all costs her permanent
+liberation from the power of the Condillacs.  To make sure of this
+he must play upon Florimond's anger, letting him know that Marius
+had journeyed to La Rochette for the purpose of murdering his
+half-brother.  That he but sought to murder him to the end that he
+might be removed from his path to Valerie, was a circumstance that
+need not too prominently be presented.  Still, presented it must
+be, for Florimond would require to know by what motive his brother
+was impelled ere he could credit him capable of such villainy.
+
+Succinctly, but tellingly, Garnache brought out the story of the
+plot that had been laid for Florimond's assassination, and it joyed
+him to see the anger rising in the Marquis's face and flashing from
+his eyes.
+
+"What reason have they for so damnable a deed?" he cried, between
+incredulity and indignation.
+
+"Their overweening ambition.  Marius covets Mademoiselle de La
+Vauvraye's estates."
+
+"And to gain his ends he would not stop at murdering me?  Is it,
+indeed, the truth you tell me?"
+
+"I pledge my honour for the truth of it," answered Garnache,
+watching him closely.  Florimond looked at him a moment.  The steady
+glance of those blue eyes and the steady tone of that crisp voice
+scattered his last doubt.
+
+"The villains!" cried the Marquis.  "The fools!" he added.  "For me,
+Marius had been welcome to Valerie.  He might have found in me an
+ally to aid him in the urging of his suit.  But now - "  He raised
+his clenched hand and shook it in the air, as if in promise of the
+battle he would deliver.
+
+"Good," said Garnache, reassured.  "I hear their steps upon the
+stairs.  They must not find me with you."
+
+A moment later the door opened, and Marius, very bravely arrayed,
+entered the room, followed closely by Fortunio.  Neither showed much
+ill effects of last night's happenings, save for a long dark-brown
+scar that ran athwart the captain's cheek, where Garnache's sword
+had ploughed it.
+
+They found Florimond seated quietly at table, and as they entered
+he rose and came forward with a friendly smile to greet his brother.
+His sense of humour was being excited; he was something of an actor,
+and the role he had adopted in the comedy to be played gave him a
+certain grim satisfaction.  He would test for himself the truth of
+what Monsieur de Garnache had told him concerning his brother's
+intentions.  Marius received his advances very coolly.  He took his
+brother's hand, submitted to his brother's kiss; but neither kiss
+nor hand-pressure did he return.  Florimond affected not to notice
+this.
+
+"You are well, my dear Marius, I hope," said he, and thrusting him
+out at arms' length, he held him by the shoulders and regarded him
+critically.  "Ma foi, but you are changed into a comely well-grown
+man.  And your mother - she is well, too, I trust."
+
+"I thank you, Florimond, she is well," said Marius stiffly.
+
+The Marquis took his hands from his brother's shoulders; his florid,
+good-natured face smiling ever, as if this were the happiest moment
+of his life.
+
+"It is good to see France again, my dear Marius," he told his
+brother.  "I was a fool to have remained away so long.  I am pining
+to be at Condillac once more."
+
+Marius eyeing him, looked in vain for signs of the fever.  He had
+expected to find a debilitated, emaciated man; instead, he saw a
+very lusty, healthy, hearty fellow, full of good humour, and
+seemingly full of strength.  He began to like his purpose less,
+despite such encouragement as he gathered from the support of
+Fortunio.  Still, it must be gone through with.
+
+"You wrote us that you had the fever," he said, half inquiringly.
+
+"Pooh!  That is naught."  And Florimond snapped a strong finger
+against a stronger thumb.  "But whom have you with you?" he asked,
+and his eyes took the measure of Fortunio, standing a pace or two
+behind his master.
+
+Marius presented his bravo.
+
+"This is Captain Fortunio, the commander of our garrison of
+Condillac."
+
+The Marquis nodded good-humouredly towards the captain.
+
+"Captain Fortunio?  He is well named for a soldier of fortune.  My
+brother, no doubt, will have family matters to tell me of.  If you
+will step below, Monsieur le Capitaine, and drink a health or so
+while you wait, I shall be honoured."
+
+The captain, nonplussed, looked at Marius, and Florimond surprised
+the look.  But Marius's manner became still chillier.
+
+"Fortunio here," said he, and he half turned and let his hand fall
+on the captain's shoulder, "is my very good friend.  I have no
+secrets from him."
+
+The instant lift of Florimond's eyebrows was full of insolent,
+supercilious disdain.  Yet Marius did not fasten his quarrel upon
+that.  He had come to La Rochette resolved that any pretext would
+serve his turn.  But the sight of his brother so inflamed his
+jealousy that he had now determined that the quarrel should be
+picked on the actual ground in which it had its roots.
+
+"Oh, as you will," said the Marquis coolly.  "Perhaps your friend
+will be seated, and you, too, my dear Marius."  And he played the
+host to them with a brisk charm.  Setting chairs, he forced them to
+sit, and pressed wine upon them.
+
+Marius cast his hat and cloak on the chair where Garnache's had been
+left.  The Parisian's hat and cloak, he naturally assumed to belong
+to his brother.  The smashed flagon and the mess of wine upon the
+floor he scarce observed, setting it down to some clumsiness, either
+his brother's or a servant's.  They both drank, Marius in silence,
+the captain with a toast.
+
+"Your good return, Monsieur le Marquis," said he, and Florimond
+thanked him by an inclination of the head.  Then, turning to Marius:
+
+"And so," he said, "you have a garrison at Condillac.  What the
+devil has been taking place there?  I have had some odd news of you.
+It would almost seem as if you were setting up as rebels in our
+quiet little corner of Dauphiny."
+
+Marius shrugged his shoulders; his face suggested that he was
+ill-humoured.
+
+"Madame the Queen-Regent has seen fit to interfere in our concerns.
+We Condillacs do not lightly brook interference."
+
+Florimond showed his teeth in a pleasant smile.
+
+"That is true, that is very true, Pardieu!  But what warranted this
+action of Her Majesty's?"
+
+Marius felt that the time for deeds was come.  This fatuous
+conversation was but a futile waste of time.  He set down his glass,
+and sitting back in his chair he fixed his sullen black eyes full
+upon his half-brother's smiling brown ones.
+
+"I think we have exchanged compliments enough," said he, and Fortunio
+wagged his head approvingly.  There were too many men in the
+courtyard for his liking, and the more time they waited, the more
+likely were they to suffer interruption.  Their aim must be to get
+the thing done quickly, and then quickly to depart before an alarm
+could be raised.  "Our trouble at Condillac concerns Mademoiselle de
+La Vauvraye."
+
+Florimond started forward, with a ready assumption of lover-like
+solicitude.
+
+"No harm has come to her?" he cried.  "Tell me that no harm has come
+to her."
+
+"Reassure yourself," answered Marius, with a sneer, a greyness that
+was of jealous rage overspreading his face.  "No harm has come to
+her whatever.  The trouble was that I sought to wed her, and she,
+because she is betrothed to you, would have none of me.  So we
+brought her to Condillac, hoping always to persuade her.  You will
+remember that she was under my mother's tutelage.  The girl, however,
+could not be constrained.  She suborned one of our men to bear a
+letter to Paris for her, and in answer to it the Queen sent a
+hot-headed, rash blunderer down to Dauphiny to procure her
+liberation.  He lies now at the bottom of the moat of Condillac."
+
+Florimond's face had assumed a look of horror and indignation.
+
+"Do you dare tell me this?" he cried.
+
+"Dare?" answered Marius, with an ugly laugh.  "Men enough have died
+over this affair already.  That fellow Garnache left some bodies on
+our hands last night before he set out for another world himself.
+You little dream how far my daring goes in this matter.  I'll add
+as many more as need be to the death roll that we have already,
+before you set foot in Condillac."
+
+"Ah!" said Florimond, as one upon whose mind a light breaks suddenly.
+"So, that is the business on which you come to me.  I doubted your
+brotherliness, I must confess, my dear Marius.  But tell me, brother
+mine, what of our father's wishes in this matter?  Have you no
+respect for those?"
+
+"What respect had you?" flashed back Marius, his voice now raised
+in anger.  "Was it like a lover to remain away for three years - to
+let all that time go by without ever a word from you to your
+betrothed?  What have you done to make good your claim to her?"
+
+"Nothing, I confess; yet - "
+
+"Well, you shall do something now," exclaimed Marius, rising.  "I
+am here to afford you the opportunity.  If you would still win
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, you shall win her from me - at point
+of sword.  Fortunio, see to the door."
+
+"Wait, Marius!" cried Florimond, and he looked genuinely aghast.
+"Do not forget that we are brothers, men of the same blood; that
+my father was your father."
+
+"I choose to remember rather that we are rivals," answered Marius,
+and he drew his rapier.  Fortunio turned the key in the lock.
+Florimond gave his brother a long searching look, then with a sigh
+he picked up his sword where it lay ready to his hand and
+thoughtfully unsheathed it.  Holding the hilt in one hand and the
+blade in the other he stood, bending the weapon like a whip, whilst
+again he searchingly regarded his brother.
+
+"Hear me a moment," said he.  "If you will force this unnatural
+quarrel upon me, at least let the thing be decently done.  Not here,
+not in these cramped quarters, but out in the open let our meeting
+take place.  If the captain, there, will act for you, I'll find a
+friend to do me the like service."
+
+"We settle this matter here and now," Marius answered him, in a tone
+of calm finality.
+
+"But if I were to kill you - " Florimond began.
+
+"Reassure yourself," said Marius with an ugly smile.
+
+"Very well, then; either alternative will suit the case I wish to
+put.  If you were to kill me - it may be ranked as murder.  The
+irregularity of it could not be overlooked."
+
+"The captain, here, will act for both of us."
+
+"I am entirely at your service, gentlemen," replied Fortunio
+pleasantly, bowing to each in turn.
+
+Florimond considered him.  "I do not like his looks," he objected.
+"He may be the friend of your bosom, Marius; you may have no secrets
+from him; but for my part, frankly, I should prefer the presence of
+some friend of my own to keep his blade engaged."
+
+The Marquis's manner was affable in the extreme.  Now that it was
+settled that they must fight, he appeared to have cast aside all
+scruples based upon their consanguinity, and he discussed the affair
+with the greatest bonhomie, as though he were disposing of a matter
+of how they should sit down to table.
+
+It gave them pause.  The change was too abrupt.  They did not like
+it.  It was as the calm that screens some surprise.  Yet it was
+impossible he should have been forewarned; impossible he could have
+had word of how they proposed to deal with him.
+
+Marius shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"There is reason in what you say," he acknowledged; "but I am in
+haste.  I cannot wait while you go in search of a friend."
+
+"Why then," he answered, with a careless laugh, "I must raise one
+from the dead."
+
+Both stared at him.  Was he mad?  Had the fever touched his brain?
+Was that healthy colour but the brand of a malady that rendered
+him delirious?
+
+"Dieu!  How you stare!" he continued, laughing in their faces.
+"You shall see something to compensate you for your journey,
+messieurs.  I have learnt some odd tricks in Italy; they are a
+curious people beyond the Alps.  What did you say was the name of
+the man the Queen had sent from Paris?  - he who lies at the
+bottom of the moat of Condillac?"
+
+"Let there be an end to this jesting," growled Marius.  "On guard,
+Monsieur le Marquis!"
+
+"Patience! patience!" Florimond implored him.  "You shall have your
+way with me, I promise you.  But of your charity, messieurs, tell
+me first the name of that man."
+
+"It was Garnache," said Fortunio, "and if the information will serve
+you, it was I who slew him."
+
+"You?" cried Florimond.  "Tell me of it, I beg you."
+
+"Do you fool us?" questioned Marius in a rage that overmastered his
+astonishment, his growing suspicion that here all was not quite as
+it seemed.
+
+"Fool you?  But no.  I do but wish to show you something that I
+learned in Italy.  Tell me how you slew him, Monsieur le Capitaine."
+
+"I think we are wasting time," said the captain, angry too.  He felt
+that this smiling gentleman was deriding the pair of them; it crossed
+his mind that for some purpose of his own the Marquis was seeking to
+gain time.  He drew his sword.
+
+Florimond saw the act, watched it, and his eyes twinkled.  Suddenly
+Marius's sword shot out at him.  He leapt back beyond the table, and
+threw himself on guard, his lips still wreathed in their mysterious
+smile.
+
+"The time has come, messieurs," said he.  "I should have preferred
+to know more of how you slew that Monsieur de Garnache; but since you
+deny me the information, I shall do my best without it.  I'll try to
+conjure up his ghost, to keep you entertained, Monsieur le Capitaine."
+And then, raising his voice, his sword, engaging now his brother's:
+
+"Ola, Monsieur de Garnache!" he cried.  "To me!"
+
+And then it seemed to those assassins that the Marquis had been
+neither mad nor boastful when he had spoken of strange things he
+had learned beyond the Alps, or else it was they themselves were
+turned light-headed, for the doors of a cupboard at the far end of
+the room flew open suddenly, and from between them stepped the
+stalwart figure of Martin de Garnache, a grim smile lifting the
+corners of his mustachios, a naked sword in his hand flashing back
+the sunlight that flooded through the window.
+
+They paused, aghast, and they turned ashen; and then in the mind of
+each arose the same explanation of this phenomenon.  This Garnache
+wore the appearance of the man who had announced himself by that
+name when he came to Condillac a fortnight ago.  Then, the sallow,
+black-haired knave who had last night proclaimed himself as Garnache
+in disguise was some impostor.  That was the conclusion they promptly
+arrived at, and however greatly they might be dismayed by the
+appearance of this ally of Florimond's, yet the conclusion heartened
+them anew.  But scarce had they arrived at it when Monsieur de
+Garnache's crisp voice came swiftly to dispel it.
+
+"Monsieur le Capitaine," it said, and Fortunio shivered at the sound,
+for it was the voice he had heard but a few hours ago, "I welcome
+the opportunity of resuming our last night's interrupted sword-play."
+And he advanced deliberately.
+
+Marius's sword had fallen away from his brother's, and the two
+combatants stood pausing.  Fortunio without more ado made for the
+door.  But Garnache crossed the intervening space in a bound.
+
+"Turn!" he cried.  "Turn, or I'll put my sword through your back.
+The door shall serve you presently, but it is odds that it will
+need a couple of men to bear you through it.  Look to your dirty
+skin!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE OFFICES OF MOTHER CHURCH
+
+
+A couple of hours after the engagement in the Marquis de Condillac's
+apartments at the Sanglier Noir at La Rochette, Monsieur de Garnache,
+attended only by Rabecque, rode briskly into France once more and
+made for the little town of Cheylas, which is on the road that leads
+down to the valley of the Isere and to Condillac.  But not as far as
+the township did he journey.  On a hill, the slopes all cultivated
+into an opulent vineyard, some two miles east of Cheylas, stood the
+low, square grey building of the Convent of Saint Francis.  Thither
+did Monsieur de Garnache bend his horse's steps.  Up the long white
+road that crept zigzag through the Franciscans' vineyards rode the
+Parisian and his servant under the welcome sunshine of that November
+afternoon.
+
+Garnache's face was gloomy and his eyes sad, for his thoughts were
+all of Valerie, and he was prey to a hundred anxieties regarding
+her.
+
+They gained the heights at last, and Rabecque got down to beat with
+his whip upon the convent gates.
+
+A lay-brother came to open, and in reply to Garnache's request that
+he might have a word with the Father Abbot, invited him to enter.
+
+Through the cloisters about the great quadrangle, where a couple of
+monks, their habits girt high as their knees, were busy at gardeners'
+work, Garnache followed his conductor, and up the steps to the
+Abbot's chamber.
+
+The master of the Convent' of Saint Francis of Cheylas a tall, lean
+man with an ascetic face, prominent cheekbones, and a nose not
+unlike Garnache's own - the nose of a man of action rather than of
+prayer - bowed gravely to this stalwart stranger, and in courteous
+accents begged to be informed in what he might serve him.
+
+Hat in hand, Garnache took a step forward in that bare, scantily
+furnished little room, permeated by the faint, waxlike odour that
+is peculiar to the abode of conventuals.  Without hesitation he
+stated the reason of his visit.
+
+"Father," said he, "a son of the house of Condillac met his end
+this morning at La Rochette."
+
+The monk's eyes seemed to quicken, as though his interest in the
+outer world had suddenly revived.
+
+"It is the Hand of God," he cried.  "Their evil ways have provoked
+at last the anger of Heaven.  How did this unfortunate meet his
+death?"
+
+Garnache shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"De mortuis nil nisi bonum," said he.  His air was grave, his blue
+eyes solemn, and the Abbot had little cause to suspect the
+closeness with which that pair of eyes was watching him.  He coloured
+faintly at the implied rebuke, but he inclined his head as if
+submissive to the correction, and waited for the other to proceed.
+
+"There is the need, Father, to give his body burial," said Garnache
+gently.
+
+But at that the monk raised his head, and a deeper flush the flush
+of anger - spread now upon his sallow cheeks.  Garnache observed it,
+and was glad.
+
+"Why do you come to me?" he asked.
+
+"Why?" echoed Garnache, and there was hesitancy now in his voice.
+"Is not the burial of the dead enjoined by Mother Church?  Is it
+not a part of your sacred office?"
+
+"You ask me this as you would challenge my reply," said the monk,
+shaking his head.  "It is as you say, but it is not within our
+office to bury the impious dead, nor those who in life were
+excommunicate and died without repentance."
+
+"How can you assume he died without repentance?"
+
+"I do not; but I assume he died without absolution, for there is no
+priest who, knowing his name, would dare to shrive him, and if one
+should do it in ignorance of his name and excommunication, why then
+it is not done at all.  Bid others bury this son of the house of
+Condillac; it matters no more by what hands or in what ground he be
+buried than if he were the horse he rode or the hound that followed
+him."
+
+"The Church is very harsh, Father," said Garnache sternly.
+
+"The Church is very just," the priest answered him, more sternly
+still, a holy wrath kindling his sombre eyes.
+
+"He was in life a powerful noble," said Garnache thoughtfully.  "It
+is but fitting that, being dead, honour and reverence should be
+shown his body."
+
+"Then let those who have themselves been honoured by the Condillacs
+honour this dead Condillac now.  The Church is not of that number,
+monsieur.  Since the late Marquis's death the house of Condillac
+has been in rebellion against us; our priests have been maltreated,
+our authority flouted; they paid no tithes, approached no sacraments.
+Weary of their ungodliness the Church placed its ban upon them under
+this ban it seems they die.  My heart grieves for them; but - "
+
+He spread his hands, long and almost transparent in their leanness,
+and on his face a cloud of sorrow rested.
+
+"Nevertheless, Father," said Garnache, "twenty brothers of Saint
+Francis shall bear the body home to Condillac, and you yourself
+shall head this grim procession."
+
+"I?"  The monk shrank back before him, and his figure seemed to grow
+taller.  "Who are you, sir, that say to me what I shall do, the
+Church's law despite?"
+
+Garnache took the Abbot by the sleeve of his rough habit and drew
+him gently towards the window.  There was a persuasive smile on his
+lips and in his keen eyes which the monk, almost unconsciously,
+obeyed.
+
+"I will tell you," said Garnache, "and at the same time I shall
+seek to turn you from your harsh purpose."
+
+At the hour at which Monsieur de Garnache was seeking to persuade
+the Abbot of Saint Francis of Cheylas to adopt a point of view more
+kindly towards a dead man, Madame de Condillac was at dinner, and
+with her was Valerie de La Vauvraye.  Neither woman ate appreciably.
+The one was oppressed by sorrow, the other by anxiety, and the
+circumstance that they were both afflicted served perhaps to render
+the Dowager gentler in her manner towards the girl.
+
+She watched the pale face and troubled eyes of Valerie; she observed
+the almost lifeless manner in which she came and went as she was
+bidden, as though a part of her had ceased to exist, and that part
+the part that matters most.  It did cross her mind that in this
+condition mademoiselle might the more readily be bent to their will,
+but she dwelt not overlong upon that reflection.  Rather was her
+mood charitable, no doubt because she felt herself the need of
+charity, the want of sympathy.
+
+She was tormented by fears altogether disproportionate to their
+cause.  A hundred times she told herself that no ill could befall
+Marius.  Florimond was a sick man, and were he otherwise, there was
+still Fortunio to stand by and see to it that the right sword
+pierced the right heart, else would his pistoles be lost to him.
+
+Nevertheless she was fretted by anxiety, and she waited impatiently
+for news, fuming at the delay, yet knowing full well that news could
+not yet reach her.
+
+Once she reproved Valerie for her lack of appetite, and there was
+in her voice a kindness Valerie had not heard for months - not since
+the old Marquis died, nor did she hear it now, or, hearing it, she
+did not heed it.
+
+"You are not eating, child," the Dowager said, and her eyes were
+gentle.
+
+Valerie looked up like one suddenly awakened; and in that moment
+her eyes filled with tears.  It was as if the Dowager's voice had
+opened the floodgates of her sorrow and let out the tears that
+hitherto had been repressed.  The Marquise rose and waved the page
+and an attendant lackey from the room.  She crossed to Valerie's
+side and put her arm about the girl's shoulder.
+
+"What ails you, child?" she asked.  For a moment the girl suffered
+the caress; almost she seemed to nestle closer to the Dowager's
+shoulder.  Then, as if understanding had come to her suddenly, she
+drew back and quietly disengaged herself from the other's arms.  Her
+tears ceased; the quiver passed from her lip.
+
+"You are very good, madame," she said, with a coldness that rendered
+the courteous words almost insulting, "but nothing ails me save a
+wish to be alone."
+
+"You have been alone too much of late," the Dowager answered,
+persisting in her wish to show kindness to Valerie; for all that,
+had she looked into her own heart, she might have been puzzled to
+find a reason for her mood - unless the reason lay in her own
+affliction of anxiety for Marius.
+
+"Perhaps I have," said the girl, in the same cold, almost strained
+voice.  "It was not by my own contriving."
+
+"Ah, but it was, child; indeed it was.  Had you been reasonable you
+had found us kinder.  We had never treated you as we have done,
+never made a prisoner of you."
+
+Valerie looked up into the beautiful ivory-white face, with its
+black eyes and singularly scarlet lips, and a wan smile raised the
+corners of her gentle mouth.
+
+"You had no right - none ever gave it you - to set constraint and
+restraint upon me."
+
+"I had - indeed, indeed I had," the Marquise answered her, in a
+tone of sad protest.  "Your father gave me such a right when he gave
+me charge of you."
+
+"Was it a part of your charge to seek to turn me from my loyalty to
+Florimond, and endeavour to compel me by means gentle or ungentle
+into marriage with Marius?"
+
+"We thought Florimond dead; or, if not dead, then certainly unworthy
+of you to leave you without news of him for years together.  And if
+he was not dead then, it is odds he will be dead by now."  The words
+slipped out almost unconsciously, and the Marquise bit her lip and
+straightened herself, fearing an explosion.  But none came.  The
+girl looked across the table at the fire that smouldered on the
+hearth in need of being replenished.
+
+"What do you mean, madame?" she asked; but her tone was listless,
+apathetic, as of one who though uttering a question is incurious as
+to what the answer may be.
+
+"We had news some days ago that he was journeying homewards, but
+that he was detained by fever at La Rochette.  We have since heard
+that his fever has grown so serious that there is little hope of
+his recovery."
+
+"And it was to solace his last moments that Monsieur Marius left
+Condillac this morning?"
+
+The Dowager looked sharply at the girl; but Valerie's face continued
+averted, her gaze resting on the fire.  Her tone suggested nothing
+beyond a natural curiosity.
+
+"Yes," said the Dowager.
+
+"And lest his own efforts to help his brother out of this world
+should prove insufficient he took Captain Fortunio with him?" said
+Valerie, in the same indifferent voice.
+
+"What do you mean?" the Marquise almost hissed into the girl's ear.
+
+Valerie turned to her, a faint colour stirring in her white face.
+
+"Just what I have said, madame.  Would you know what I have prayed?
+All night was I upon my knees from the moment that I recovered
+consciousness, and my prayers were that Heaven might see fit to
+let Florimond destroy your son.  Not that I desire Florimond's
+return, for I care not if I never set eyes on him again.  There is
+a curse upon this house, madame," the girl continued, rising from
+her chair and speaking now with a greater animation, whilst the
+Marquise recoiled a step, her face strangely altered and suddenly
+gone grey, "and I have prayed that that curse might be worked out
+upon that assassin, Marius.  A fine husband, madame, you would
+thrust upon the daughter of Gaston de La Vauvraye."
+
+And turning, without waiting for an answer, she moved slowly down
+the room, and took her way to her own desolate apartments, so full
+of memories of him she mourned - of him, it seemed to her, she must
+always mourn; of him who lay dead in the black waters of the moat
+beneath her window.
+
+Stricken with a sudden, inexplicable terror, the Dowager, who for
+all her spirit was not without a certain superstition, felt her
+knees loosen, and she sank limply into a chair.  She was amazed at
+the extent of Valerie's knowledge, and puzzled by it; she was
+amazed, too, at the seeming apathy of Valerie for the danger in
+which Florimond stood, and at her avowal that she did not care if
+she never again beheld him.  But such amazement as came to her was
+whelmed fathoms-deep in her sudden fears for Marius.  If he should
+die!  She grew cold at the thought, and she sat there, her hands
+folded in her lap, her face grey.  That mention of the curse the
+Church had put upon them had frozen her quick blood and turned her
+stout spirit to mere water.
+
+At last she rose and went out into the open to inquire if no
+messenger had yet arrived, for all that she knew there was not
+yet time for any messenger to have reached the chateau.  She mounted
+the winding staircase of stone that led to the ramparts, and there
+alone, in the November sunshine, she paced to and fro for hours,
+waiting for news, straining her eyes to gaze up the valley of the
+Isere, watching for the horseman that must come that way.  Then,
+as time sped on and the sun approached its setting and still no one
+came, she bethought her that if harm had befallen Marius, none would
+ride that night to Condillac.  This very delay seemed pregnant with
+news of disaster.  And then she shook off her fears and tried to
+comfort herself.  There was not yet time.  Besides, what had she to
+fear for Marius?  He was strong and quick, and Fortunio was by his
+side.  A man was surely dead by now at La Rochette; but that man
+could not be Marius.
+
+At last, in the distance, she espied a moving object, and down on
+the silent air of eventide came the far-off rattle of a horse's hoofs.
+Some one was riding, galloping that way.  He was returned at last.
+She leaned on the battlements, her breath coming in quick, short
+gasps, and watched the horseman growing larger with every stride of
+his horse.
+
+A mist was rising from the river, and it dimmed the figure; and she
+cursed the mist for heightening her anxiety, for straining further
+her impatience.  Then a new fear was begotten in her mind.  Why came
+one horseman only where two should have ridden?  Who was it that
+returned, and what had befallen his companion?  God send, at least,
+it might be Marius who rode thus, at such a breakneck pace.
+
+At last she could make him out.  He was close to the chateau now,
+and she noticed that his right arm was bandaged and hanging in a
+sling.  And then a scream broke from her, and she bit her lip hard
+to keep another in check, for she had seen the horseman's face, and
+it was Fortunio's.  Fortunio - and wounded!  Then, assuredly, Marius
+was dead!
+
+She swayed where she stood.  She set her hand on her bosom, above
+her heart, as if she would have repressed the beating of the one,
+the heaving of the other; her soul sickened, and her mind seemed to
+turn numb, as she waited there for the news that should confirm her
+fears.
+
+The hoofs of his horse thundered over the planks of the drawbridge,
+and came clatteringly to halt as he harshly drew rein in the
+courtyard below.  There was a sound of running feet and men sprang
+to his assistance.  Madame would have gone below to meet him; but
+her limbs seemed to refuse their office.  She leaned against one of
+the merlons of the embattled parapet, her eyes on the spot where he
+should emerge from the stairs, and thus she waited, her eyes
+haggard, her face drawn.
+
+He came at last, lurching in his walk, being overstiff from his
+long ride.  She took a step forward to meet him.  Her lips parted.
+
+"Well?" she asked him, and her voice sounded harsh and strained.
+"How has the venture sped?"
+
+"The only way it could," he answered.  "As you would wish it."
+
+At that she thought that she must faint.  Het lungs seemed to writhe
+for air, and she opened her lips and took long draughts of the
+rising mist, never speaking for a moment or two until she had
+sufficiently recovered from this tremendous revulsion from her
+fears.
+
+"Then, where is Marius?" she asked at last.
+
+"He has remained behind to accompany the body home.  They are
+bringing it here."
+
+"They?" she echoed.  "Who are they?"
+
+"The monks of Saint Francis of Cheylas," he answered.
+
+A something in his tone, a something in his shifty eyes, a cloud
+upon his fair and usually so ingenuous looking countenance aroused
+her suspicions and gave her resurrected courage pause.
+
+She caught him viciously by the arms, and forced his glance to meet
+her own in the fading daylight.
+
+"It is the truth you are telling me, Fortunio?" she snapped, and
+her voice was half-angry, half-fearful.
+
+He faced her now, his eyes bold.  He raised a hand to lend emphasis
+to his words.
+
+"I swear, madame, by my salvation, that Monsieur Marius is sound
+and well."
+
+She was satisfied.  She released his arm.
+
+"Does he come to-night?" she asked.
+
+"They will be here to-morrow, madame.  I rode on to tell you so."
+
+"An odd fancy, this of his.  But" - and a sudden smile overspread
+her face - "we may find a more useful purpose for one of these monks."
+
+An hour ago she would willingly have set mademoiselle at liberty in
+exchange for the assurance that Marius had been successful in the
+business that had taken him over the border into Savoy.  She would
+have done it gladly, content that Marius should be heir to Condillac.
+But now that Condillac was assured her son, she must have more for
+him; her insatiable greed for his advancement and prosperity was
+again upon her.  Now, more than ever - now that Florimond was dead
+ - must she have La Vauvraye for Marius, and she thought that
+mademoiselle would no longer be difficult to bend.  The child had
+fallen in love with that mad Garnache, and when a woman is crossed
+in love, while her grief lasts it matters little to her where she
+weds.  Did she not know it out of the fund of her own bitter
+experience?  Was it not that - the compulsion her own father had
+employed to make her find a mate in a man so much older than herself
+as Condillac - that had warped her own nature, and done much to
+make her what she was?
+
+A lover she had had, and whilst he lived she had resisted them, and
+stood out against this odious marriage that for convenience' sake
+they forced upon her.  He was killed in Paris in a duel, and when
+the news of it came to her, she had folded her hands and let them
+wed her to whom they listed.
+
+Of just such a dejection of spirit had she observed the signs in
+Valerie; let them profit by it while it lasted.  They had been long
+enough without Church ceremonies at Condillac.  There should be two
+to-morrow to make up for the empty time - a wedding and a burial.
+
+She was going down the stairs, Fortunio a step behind her, when her
+mind reverted to the happening at La Rochette.
+
+"Was it well done?" she asked.
+
+"It made some stir," said he.  "The Marquis had men with him, and
+had the affair taken place in France ill might have come of it."
+
+"You shall give me a full account of it," said she, rightly thinking
+that there was still something to be explained.  Then she laughed
+softly.  "Yes, it was a lucky chance for us, his staying at La
+Rochette.  Florimond was born under an unlucky star, I think, and
+you under a lucky one, Fortunio."
+
+"I think so, too, as regards myself," he answered grimly, and he
+thought of the sword that had ploughed his cheek last night and
+pierced his sword-arm that morning, and he thanked such gods as
+in his godlessness he owned for the luck that had kept that sword
+from finding out his heart.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE JUDGMENT OF GARNACHE
+
+
+On the morrow, which was a Friday and the tenth of November - a date
+to be hereafter graven on the memory of all concerned in the affairs
+of Condillac - the Dowager rose betimes, and, for decency's sake,
+having in mind the business of the day, she gowned herself in black.
+
+Betimes, too, the Lord Seneschal rode out of Grenoble, attended by a
+couple of grooms, and headed for Condillac, in doing which - little
+though he suspected it - he was serving nobody's interests more
+thoroughly than Monsieur de Garnache's.
+
+Madame received him courteously.  She was in a blithe - and happy
+mood that morning - the reaction from her yesterday's distress of
+mind.  The world was full of promise, and all things had prospered
+with her and Marius.  Her boy was lord of Condillac; Florimond, whom
+she had hated and who had stood in the way of her boy's advancement,
+was dead and on his way to burial; Garnache, the man from Paris who
+might have made trouble for them had he ridden home again with the
+tale of their resistance, was silenced for all time, and the carp
+in the moat would be feasting by now upon what was left of him;
+Valerie de La Vauvraye was in a dejected frame of mind that augured
+well for the success of the Dowager's plans concerning her, and by
+noon at latest there would be priests at Condillac, and, if Marius
+still wished to marry the obstinate baggage, there would be no
+difficulty as to that.
+
+It was a glorious morning, mild and sunny as an April day, as though
+Nature took a hand in the Dowager's triumph and wished to make the
+best of its wintry garb in honour of it.
+
+The presence of this gross suitor of hers afforded her another
+source of satisfaction.  There would no longer be the necessity she
+once had dreaded of listening to his suit for longer than it should
+be her pleasure to be amused by him.  But when Tressan spoke, he
+struck the first note of discord in the perfect harmony which the
+Dowager imagined existed.
+
+"Madame," said he, "I am desolated that I am not a bearer of better
+tidings.  But for all that we have made the most diligent search,
+the man Rabecque has not yet been apprehended.  Still, we have not
+abandoned hope," he added, by way of showing that there was a silver
+lining to his cloud of danger.
+
+For just a moment madame's brows were knitted.  She had forgotten
+Rabecque until now; but an instant's reflection assured her that in
+forgetting him she had done him no more than such honour as he
+deserved.  She laughed, as she led the way down the garden steps
+ - the mildness of the day and the brightness of her mood had moved
+her there to receive the Seneschal.
+
+"From the sombreness of your tone one might fear your news to be of
+the nature of some catastrophe.  What shall it signify that Rabecque
+eludes your men?  He is but a lackey after all."
+
+"True," said the Seneschal, very soberly; "but do not forget, I beg,
+that he is the bearer of letters from one who is not a lackey."
+
+The laughter went out of her face at that.  Here was something that
+had been lost sight of in the all-absorbing joy of other things.
+In calling the forgotten Rabecque to mind she had but imagined that
+it was no more than a matter of the tale he might tell - a tale not
+difficult to refute, she thought.  Her word should always weigh
+against a lackey's.  But that letter was a vastly different matter.
+
+"He must be found, Tressan," she said sharply.
+
+Tressan smiled uneasily, and chewed at his beard.
+
+"No effort shall be spared," he promised her.  "Of that you may be
+very sure.  The affairs of the province are at a standstill," he
+added, that vanity of his for appearing a man of infinite business
+rising even in an hour of such anxiety, for to himself, no less
+than to her, was there danger should Rabecque ever reach his
+destination with the papers Garnache had said he carried.
+
+"The affairs of the province are at a standstill," he repeated,
+"while all my energies are bent upon this quest.  Should we fail to
+have news of his capture in Dauphiny, we need not, nevertheless,
+despond.  I have sent men after him along the three roads that lead
+to Paris.  They are to spare neither money nor horses in picking up
+his trail and effecting his capture.  After all, I think we shall
+have him."
+
+"He is our only danger now," the Marquise answered, "for Florimond
+is dead - of the fever," she added, with a sneering smile which
+gave Tressan sensations as of cold water on his spine.  "It were
+an irony of fate if that miserable lackey were to reach Paris now
+and spoil the triumph for which we have worked so hard."
+
+"It were, indeed," Tressan agreed with her, "and we must see that
+he does not."
+
+"But if he does," she returned, "then we must stand together."  And
+with that she set her mind at ease once more, her mood that morning
+being very optimistic.
+
+"Always, I hope, Clotilde," he answered, and his little eyes leered
+up out of the dimples of fat in which they were embedded.  "I have
+stood by you like a true friend in this affair; is it not so?"
+
+"Indeed; do I deny it?" she answered half scornfully.
+
+"As I shall stand by you always when the need arises.  You are a
+little in my debt concerning Monsieur de Garnache."
+
+"I - I realize it," said she, and she felt again as if the sunshine
+were gone from the day, the blitheness from her heart.  She was
+moved to bid him cease leering at her and to take himself and his
+wooing to the devil.  But she bethought her that the need for him
+might not yet utterly be passed.  Not only in the affair of Garnache
+ - in which he stood implicated as deeply as herself - might she
+require his loyalty, but also in the matter of what had befallen
+yesterday at La Rochette; for despite Fortunio's assurances that
+things had gone smoothly, his tale hung none too convincingly
+together; and whilst she did not entertain any serious fear of
+subsequent trouble, yet it might be well not utterly to banish the
+consideration of such a possibility, and to keep the Seneschal her
+ally against it.  So she told him now, with as much graciousness as
+she could command, that she fully realized her debt, and when,
+encouraged, he spoke of his reward, she smiled upon him as might a
+girl smile upon too impetuous a wooer whose impetuosity she
+deprecates yet cannot wholly withstand.
+
+"I am a widow of six months," she reminded him, as she had reminded
+him once before.  Her widowhood was proving a most convenient refuge.
+"It is not for me to listen to a suitor, however my foolish heart
+may incline.  Come to me in another six months' time."
+
+"And you will wed me then?" he bleated.
+
+By an effort her eyes smiled down upon him, although her face was
+a trifle drawn.
+
+"Have I not said that I will listen to no suitor?  and what is that
+but a suitor's question?"
+
+He caught her hand; he would have fallen on his knees there and
+then, at her feet, on the grass still wet with the night's mist,
+but that he in time bethought him of how sadly his fine apparel
+would be the sufferer.
+
+"Yet I shall not sleep, I shall know no rest, no peace until you
+have given me an answer.  Just an answer is all I ask.  I will set
+a curb upon my impatience afterwards, and go through my period of
+ah - probation without murmuring.  Say that you, will marry me in
+six months' time - at Easter, say."
+
+She saw that an answer she must give, and so she gave him the answer
+that he craved.  And he - poor fool! - never caught the ring of her
+voice, as false as the ring of a base coin; never guessed that in
+promising she told herself it would be safe to break that promise
+six months hence, when the need of him and his loyalty would be
+passed.
+
+A man approached them briskly from the chateau.  He brought news
+that a numerous company of monks was descending the valley of the
+Isere towards Condillac.  A faint excitement stirred her, and
+accompanied by Tressan she retraced her steps and made for the
+battlements, whence she might overlook their arrival.
+
+As they went Tressan asked for an explanation of this cortege, and
+she answered him with Fortunio's story of how things had sped
+yesterday at La Rochette.
+
+Up the steps leading to the battlements she went ahead of him, with
+a youthful, eager haste that took no thought for the corpulence and
+short-windedness of the following Seneschal.  From the heights she
+looked eastwards, shading her eyes from the light of the morning
+sun, and surveyed the procession which with slow dignity paced down
+the valley towards Condillac.
+
+At its head walked the tall, lean figure of the Abbot of Saint
+Francis of Cheylas, bearing on high a silvered crucifix that flashed
+and scintillated in the sunlight.  His cowl was thrown back,
+revealing his pale, ascetic countenance and shaven head.  Behind him
+came a coffin covered by a black pall, and borne on the shoulders of
+six black-robed, black cowled monks, and behind these again walked,
+two by two, some fourteen cowled brothers of the order of Saint
+Francis, their heads bowed, their arms folded, and their hands tucked
+away in their capacious sleeves.
+
+It was a numerous cortege, and as she watched its approach the
+Marquise was moved to wonder by what arguments had the proud Abbot
+been induced to do so much honour to a dead Condillac and bear his
+body home to this excommunicated roof.
+
+Behind the monks a closed carriage lumbered down the uneven mountain
+way, and behind this rode four mounted grooms in the livery of
+Condillac.  Of Marius she saw nowhere any sign, and she inferred
+him to be travelling in that vehicle, the attendant servants being
+those of the dead Marquis.
+
+In silence, with the Seneschal at her elbow, she watched the
+procession advance until it was at the foot of the drawbridge.  Then,
+while the solemn rhythm of their feet sounded across the planks that
+spanned the moat, she turned, and, signing to the Seneschal to
+follow her, she went below to meet them.  But when she reached the
+courtyard she was surprised to find they had not paused, as surely
+would have been seemly.  Unbidden, the Abbot had gone forward through
+the great doorway and down the gallery that led to the hall of
+Condillac.  Already, when she arrived below, the coffin and its
+bearers had disappeared, and the last of the monks was passing from
+sight in its wake.  Leaning against the doorway through which they
+were vanishing stood Fortunio, idly watching that procession and
+thoughtfully stroking his mustachios.  About the yard lounged a
+dozen or so men-at-arms, practically all the garrison that was left
+them since the fight with Garnache two nights ago.
+
+After the last monk had disappeared, she still remained there,
+expectantly; and when she saw that neither the carriage nor the
+grooms made their appearance, she stepped up to Fortunio to inquire
+into the reason of it.
+
+"Surely Monsieur de Condillac rides in that coach," said she.
+
+"Surely," Fortunio answered, himself looking puzzled.  "I will go
+seek the reason, madame.  Meanwhile will you receive the Abbot?
+The monks will have deposited their burden."
+
+She composed her features into a fitting solemnity, and passed
+briskly through to the hall, Tressan ever at her heels.  Here she
+found the coffin deposited on the table, its great black pall of
+velvet, silver-edged, sweeping down to the floor.  No fire had been
+lighted that morning nor had the sun yet reached the windows, so
+that the place wore a chill and gloomy air that was perhaps well
+attuned to the purpose that it was being made to serve.
+
+With a rare dignity, her head held high, she swept down the length
+of that noble chamber towards the Abbot, who stood erect as a
+pikestaff: at the tablehead, awaiting her.  And well was it for
+him that he was a man of austere habit of mind, else might her
+majestic, incomparable beauty have softened his heart and melted
+the harshness of his purpose.
+
+He raised his hand when she was within a sword's length of him, and
+with startling words, delivered in ringing tones, he broke the
+ponderous silence.
+
+"Wretched woman," he denounced her, "your sins have found you out.
+Justice is to be done, and your neck shall be bent despite your
+stubborn pride.  Derider of priests, despoiler of purity, mocker
+of Holy Church, your impious reign is at an end."
+
+Tressan fell back aghast, his face blenching to the lips; for if
+justice was at hand for her, as the Abbot said, then was justice at
+hand for him as well.  Where had their plans miscarried?  What flaw
+was there that hitherto she had not perceived?  Thus he questioned
+himself in his sudden panic.
+
+But the Marquise was no sharer in his tremors.  Her eyes opened a
+trifle wider; a faint colour crept into her cheeks; but her only
+emotions were of amazement and indignation.  Was he mad, this
+shaveling monk?  That was the question that leapt into her mind,
+the very question with which she coldly answered his outburst.
+
+"For madness only," she thought fit to add, "could excuse such rash
+temerity as yours."
+
+"Not madness, madame," he answered, with chill haughtiness - "not
+madness, but righteous indignation.  You have defied the power of
+Holy Church as you have defied the power of our sovereign lady,
+and justice is upon you.  We are here to present the reckoning, and
+see its payment made in full."
+
+She fancied he alluded to the body in the coffin - the body of her
+stepson - and she could have laughed at his foolish conclusions
+that she must account Florimond's death an act of justice upon her
+for her impiety.  But her rising anger left her no room for laughter.
+
+"I thought, sir priest, you were come to bury the dead.  But it
+rather seems you are come to talk."
+
+He looked at her long and sternly.  Then he shook his head, and the
+faintest shadow of a smile haunted his ascetic face.
+
+"Not to talk, madame; oh, not to talk," he answered slowly.  "But
+to act, I have come, madame, to liberate from this shambles the
+gentle lamb you hold here prisoned."
+
+At that some of the colour left her cheeks; her eyes grew startled:
+at last she began to realize that all was not as she had thought -
+as she had been given to understand.  - Still, she sought to hector
+it, from very instinct.
+
+"Vertudieu!" she thundered at him.  "What mean you?"
+
+Behind her Tressan's great plump knees were knocking one against
+the other.  Fool that he had been to come to Condillac that day,
+and to be trapped thus in her company, a partner in her guilt.
+This proud Abbot who stood there uttering denunciations had some
+power behind him, else had he never dared to raise his voice in
+Condillac within call of desperate men who would give little
+thought to the sacredness, of his office.
+
+"What mean you?" she repeated - adding with a sinister smile, "in
+your zeal, Sir Abbot, you are forgetting that my men are within call."
+
+"So, madame, are mine," was his astounding answer, and he waved a
+hand towards the array of monks, all standing with bowed heads and
+folded arms.
+
+At that her laughter rang shrill through the chamber.  "These poor
+shavelings?" she questioned.
+
+"Just these poor shavelings, madame," he answered, and he raised
+his hand again and made a sign.  And then an odd thing happened,
+and it struck a real terror into the heart of the Marquise and
+heightened that which was already afflicting her fat lover,
+Tressan.
+
+The monks drew themselves erect.  It was as if a sudden gust of
+wind had swept through their ranks and set them all in motion.
+Cowls fell back and habits were swept aside, and where twenty monks
+had stood, there were standing now a score of nimble, stalwart men
+in the livery of Condillac, all fully armed, all grinning in
+enjoyment of her and Tressan's dismay.
+
+One of them turned aside and locked the door of the chamber.  But
+his movement went unheeded by the Dowager, whose beautiful eyes,
+starting with horror, were now back upon the grim figure of the
+Abbot, marvelling almost to see no transformation wrought in him.
+
+"Treachery!" she breathed, in an awful voice, that was no louder
+than a whisper, and again her eyes travelled round the company,
+and suddenly they fastened upon Fortunio, standing six paces from
+her to the right, pulling thoughtfully at his mustachios, and
+manifesting no surprise at what had taken place.
+
+In a sudden, blind choler, she swept round, plucked the dagger from
+Tressan's belt and flung herself upon the treacherous captain.  He
+had betrayed her in some way; he had delivered up Condillac - into
+whose power she had yet had no time to think.  She caught him by
+the throat with a hand of such nervous strength as one would little
+have suspected from its white and delicate contour.  Her dagger was
+poised in the air, and the captain, taken thus suddenly, was palsied
+with amazement and could raise no hand to defend himself from the
+blow impending.
+
+But the Abbot stepped suddenly to her side and caught her wrist in
+his thin, transparent hand.
+
+"Forbear," he bade her.  "The man is but a tool."
+
+She fell back - dragged back almost by the Abbot - panting with
+rage and grief; and then she noticed that during the moment that
+her back had been turned the pall had been swept from the coffin.
+The sight of the bare deal box arrested her attention, and for the
+moment turned aside her anger.  What fresh surprise did they prepare
+her?
+
+No sooner had she asked herself the question than herself she
+answered it, and an icy hand seemed to close about her heart.  It
+was Marius who was dead.  They had lied to her.  Marius's was the
+body they had borne to Condillac - those men in the livery of her
+stepson.
+
+With a sudden sob in her throat she took a step towards the coffin.
+She must see for herself.  One way or the other she must at once
+dispel this torturing doubt.  But ere she had taken three paces,
+she stood arrested again, her hands jerked suddenly to the height
+of her breast, her lips parting to let out a scream of terror.  For
+the coffin-lid had slowly raised and clattered over.  And as if to
+pile terror for her, a figure rose from the box, and, sitting up,
+looked round with a grim smile; and the figure was the figure of
+a man whom she knew to be dead, a man who had died by her
+contriving - it was the figure of Garnache.  It was Garnache as
+he had been on the occasion of his first coming to Condillac, as
+he had been on the day they had sought his life in this very room.
+How well she knew that great hooked nose and the bright, steely
+blue eyes, the dark brown hair, ash-coloured at the temples where
+age had paled it, and the fierce, reddish mustachios, bristling
+above the firm mouth and long, square chin.
+
+She stared and stared, her beautiful face livid and distorted,
+till there was no beauty to be seen in it, what time the Abbot
+regarded her coldly and Tressan, behind her, turned almost sick
+with terror.  But not the terror of ghosts was it afflicted him.  He
+saw in Garnache a man who was still of the quick - a man who by
+some miracle had escaped the fate to which they supposed him to
+have succumbed; and his terror was the terror of the reckoning
+which that man would ask.
+
+After a moment's pause, as if relishing the sensation he had created,
+Garnache rose to his feet and leapt briskly to the ground.  There
+was nothing ghostly about the thud with which he alighted on his
+feet before her.  A part of her terror left her; yet not quite all.
+She saw that she had but a man to deal with, yet she began to
+realize that this man was very terrible.
+
+"Garnache again!" she gasped.
+
+He bowed serenely, his lips smiling.
+
+"Aye, madame," he told her pleasantly, "always Garnache.  Tenacious
+as a leech, madame; and like a leech come hither to do a little
+work of purification."
+
+Her eyes, now kindling again as she recovered from her recent fears,
+sought Fortunio's shifty glance.  Garnache followed it and read
+what was in her mind.
+
+"What Fortunio has done," said he, "he has done by your son's
+authority and sanction."
+
+"Marius?" she inquired, and she was almost fearful lest she should
+hear that by her son he meant her stepson, and that Marius was dead.
+
+"Yes, Marius," he answered her.  "I bent him to my will.  I
+threatened him that he and this fellow of his, this comrade in arms
+so worthy of his master, should be broken on the wheel together
+unless I were implicitly obeyed.  If they would save their lives,
+this was their chance.  They were wise, and they took it, and thus
+afforded me the means of penetrating into Condillac and rescuing
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye."
+
+"Then Marius - ?" She left her question unfinished, her hand
+clutching nervously at the bosom of her gown.
+
+"Is sound and well, as Fortunio truthfully will have told you.  But
+he is not yet out of my grasp, nor will be until the affairs of
+Condillac are settled.  For if I meet with further opposition here,
+broken on the wheel he shall be yet, I promise you."
+
+Still she made a last attempt at hectoring it.  The long habit of
+mastership dies hard.  She threw back her head; her courage revived
+now that she knew Marius to be alive and sound.
+
+"Fine words," she sneered.  "But who are you that you can threaten
+so and promise so?"
+
+"I am the Queen-Regent's humble mouthpiece, madame.  What I threaten,
+I threaten in her name.  Ruffle it no longer, I beseech you.  It
+will prove little worth your while.  You are deposed, madame, and
+you had best take your deposition with dignity and calm - in all
+friendliness do I advise it."
+
+"I am not yet come so low that I need your advice," she answered
+sourly.
+
+"You may before the sun sets," he answered, with his quiet smile.
+"The Marquis de Condillac and his wife are still at La Rochette,
+waiting until my business here is done that they may come home."
+
+"His wife?" she cried.
+
+"His wife, madame.  He has brought home a wife from Italy."
+
+"Then - then - Marius?"  She said no more than that.  Maybe she had
+no intention of muttering even so much of her thoughts aloud.  But
+Garnache caught the trend of her mind, and he marvelled to see how
+strong a habit of thought can be.  At once upon hearing of the
+Marquis's marriage her mind had flown back to its wonted pondering
+of the possibilities of Marius's wedding Valerie.
+
+But Garnache dispelled such speculations.
+
+"No, madame," said he.  "Marius looks elsewhere for a wife - unless
+mademoiselle of her own free will should elect to wed him - a thing
+unlikely."  Then, with a sudden change to sternness - "Mademoiselle
+de La Vauvraye is well, madame?" he asked.
+
+She nodded her head, but made no answer in words.  He turned to
+Fortunio.
+
+"Go fetch her," he bade the captain, and one of the men unlocked
+the door to let Fortunio out upon that errand.
+
+The Parisian took a turn in the apartment, and came close to Tressan.
+He nodded to the Seneschal with a friendliness that turned him sick
+with fright.
+
+"Well met, my dear Lord Seneschal.  I am rejoiced to find you here.
+Had it been otherwise I must have sent for you.  There is a little
+matter to be settled between us.  You may depend upon me to settle
+it to your present satisfaction, if to your future grief."  And,
+with a smile, he passed on, leaving the Seneschal too palsied to
+answer him, too stricken to disclaim his share in what had taken
+place at Condillac.
+
+"You have terms to make with me?" the Marquise questioned proudly.
+
+"Certainly," he answered, with his grim courtesy.  "Upon your
+acceptance of those terms shall depend Marius's life and your own
+future liberty."
+
+"What are they?"
+
+"That within the hour all your people - to the last scullion - shall
+have laid down their arms and vacated Condillac."
+
+It was beyond her power to refuse.
+
+"The Marquis will not drive me forth?" she half affirmed, half asked.
+
+"The Marquis, madame, has no power in this matter.  It is for the
+Queen to deal with your insubordination - for me as the Queen's
+emissary."
+
+"If I consent, monsieur, what then?"
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and smiled quietly.
+
+"There is no 'if,' madame.  Consent you must, willingly or
+unwillingly.  To make sure of that have I come back thus and with
+force.  But should you deliver battle, you will be worsted - and it
+will be very ill for you.  Bid your men depart, as I have told you,
+and you also shall have liberty to go hence."
+
+"Aye, but whither?" she cried, in a sudden frenzy of anger.
+
+"I realize, madame, from what I know of your circumstances that
+you will be well-nigh homeless.  You should have thought of how
+one day you might come to be dependent upon the Marquis de
+Condillac's generosity before you set yourself to conspire against
+him, before you sought to encompass his death.  You can hardly
+look for generosity at his hands now, and so you will be all but
+homeless, unless - "  He paused, and his eyes strayed to Tressan
+and were laden with a sardonic look.
+
+"You take a very daring tone with me," she told him.  "You speak to
+me as no man has ever dared to speak."
+
+"When the power was yours, madame, you dealt with me as none has
+ever dared to deal.  The advantage now is mine.  Behold how I use
+it in your own interests; observe how generously I shall deal with
+you who deal in murder.  Monsieur de Tressan," he called briskly.
+The Seneschal started forward as if some one had prodded him
+suddenly.
+
+"Mu - monsieur?" said he.
+
+"With you, too, will I return good for evil.  Come hither."
+
+The Seneschal approached, wondering what was about to take place.
+The Marquise watched his coming, a cold glitter in her eye, for -
+keener of mental vision than Tressan - she already knew the hideous
+purpose that was in Garnache's mind.
+
+The soldiers grinned; the Abbot looked on with an impassive face.
+
+"The Marquise de Condillac is likely to be homeless henceforth,"
+said the Parisian, addressing the Seneschal.  "Will you not be
+gallant enough to offer her a home, Monsieur de Tressan?"
+
+"Will I?" gasped Tressan, scarce daring to believe his own ears,
+his eyes staring with a look that was almost one of vacancy.
+"Madame well knows how readily."
+
+"Oho?" crowed Garnache, who had been observing madame's face.  "She
+knows?  Then do so, monsieur; and on that condition I will forget
+your indiscretions here.  I pledge you my word that you shall not
+be called to further account for the lives that have been lost
+through your treachery and want of loyalty, provided that of your
+own free will you lay down your Seneschalship of Dauphiny an office
+which I cannot consent to see you filling hereafter."
+
+Tressan stared from the Dowager to Garnache and back to the Dowager.
+She stood there as if Garnache's words had turned her into marble,
+bereft of speech through very rage.  And then the door opened, and
+Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye entered, followed closely by Fortunio.
+
+At sight of Garnache she stood still, set her hand on her heart,
+and uttered a low cry.  Was it indeed Garnache she saw - Garnache,
+her brave knight-errant?  He looked no longer as he had looked
+during those days when he had been her gaoler; but he looked as she
+liked to think of him since she had accounted him dead.  He advanced
+to meet her, a smile in his eyes that had something wistful in it.
+He held out both hands to her, and she took them, and there, under
+the eyes of all, before he could snatch them away, she had stooped
+and kissed them, whilst a murmur of "Thank God! Thank God!" escaped
+from her lips to heaven.
+
+"Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!" he remonstrated, when it was too late
+to stay her.  "You must not; it is not seemly in me to allow it."
+
+He saw in the act no more than an expression of the gratitude for
+what he had done to serve her, and for the risk in which his life
+had been so willingly placed in that service.  Under the suasion of
+his words she grew calm again; then, suddenly, a fear stirred her
+once more in that place where she had known naught but fears.
+
+"Why are you here, monsieur?  You have come into danger again?"
+
+"No, no," he laughed.  "These are my own men at least, for the time
+being.  I am come in power this time, to administer justice.  What
+shall be done with this lady, mademoiselle?" he asked; and knowing
+well the merciful sweetness of the girl's soul, he added, "Speak,
+now.  Her fate shall rest in your hands."
+
+Valerie looked at her enemy, and then her eyes strayed round the
+room and took stock of the men standing there in silence, of the
+Abbot who still remained at the table-head, a pale, scarce-interested
+spectator of this odd scene.
+
+The change had come so abruptly.  A few minutes ago she had been
+still a prisoner, suffering tortures at having heard that Marius
+was to return that day, and that, willy-nilly, she must wed him now.
+And now she was free it seemed: her champion was returned in power,
+and he stood bidding her decide the fate of her late oppressors.
+
+Madame's face was ashen.  She judged the girl by her own self; she
+had no knowledge of any such infinite sweetness as that of this
+child's nature, a sweetness that could do no hurt to any.  Death
+was what the Marquise expected, since she knew that death would she
+herself have pronounced had the positions been reversed.  But -
+
+"Let her go in peace, monsieur," she heard mademoiselle say, and she
+could not believe but that she was being mocked.  And as if mockery
+were at issue, Garnache laughed.
+
+"We will let her go, mademoiselle - yet not quite her own way.  You
+must not longer remain unrestrained, madame," he told the Marquise.
+"Natures such as yours need a man's guidance.  I think you will be
+sufficiently punished if you wed this rash Monsieur de Tressan, just
+as he will be sufficiently punished later when disillusionment
+follows his present youthful ardour.  Make each other happy, then,"
+and he waved his arms from one to the other.  "Our good Father,
+here, will tie the knot at once, and then, my Lord Seneschal, you
+may bear home your bride.  Her son shall follow you."
+
+But the Marquise blazed out now.  She stamped her foot, and her
+eyes seemed to have taken fire.
+
+"Never, sir!  Never in life!" she cried.  "I will not be so
+constrained.  I am the Marquise de Condillac, monsieur.  Do not
+forget it!"
+
+"I am hardly in danger of doing that.  It is because I remember it
+that I urge you to change your estate with all dispatch; and cease
+to be the Marquise de Condillac.  That same Marquise has a heavy
+score against her.  Let her evade payment by this metamorphosis.
+I have opened for you, madame, a door through which you may escape."
+
+"You are insolent," she told him.  "By God, sir!  I am no baggage to
+be disposed of by the will of any man."
+
+At that Garnache himself took fire.  Her anger proved as the steel
+smiting the flint of his own nature, and one of his fierce bursts
+of blazing passion whirled about her head.
+
+"And what of this child, here?" he thundered.  "What of her, madame?
+Was she a baggage to be disposed of by the will of any man or woman?
+Yet you sought to dispose of her against her heart, against her
+nature, against her plighted word.  Enough said!" he barked, and so
+terrific was his mien and voice that the stout-spirited Dowager was
+cowed, and recoiled as he advanced a step in her direction.  "Get
+you married.  Take you this man to husband, you who with such
+calmness sought to drive others into unwilling wedlock.  Do it,
+madame, and do it now, or by the Heaven above us, you shall come to
+Paris with me, and you'll not find them nice there.  It will avail
+you little to storm and shout at them that you are Marquise de
+Condillac.  As a murderess and a rebel shall you be tried, and as
+both or either it is odds you will be broken on the wheel - and your
+son with you.  So make your choice, madame."
+
+He ceased.  Valerie had caught him by the arm.  At once his fury
+fell from him.  He turned to her.
+
+"What is it, child?"
+
+"Do not compel her, if she will not wed him," said she.  "I know -
+and - she did not - how terrible a thing it is."
+
+"Nay, patience, child," he soothed her, smiling now, his smile as
+the sunshine that succeeds a thunderstorm.
+
+"It is none so bad with her.  She is but coy.  They had plighted
+their troth already, so it seems.  Besides, I do not compel her.
+She shall marry him of her own free will - or else go to Paris and
+stand her trial and the consequences."
+
+"They had plighted their troth, do you say?"
+
+"Well - had you not, Monsieur le Seneschal?"
+
+"We had, monsieur," said Tressan, with conscious pride; "and for
+myself I am ready for these immediate nuptials."
+
+"Then, in God's name, let Madame give us her answer now.  We have
+not the day to waste."
+
+She stood looking at him, her toe tapping the ground, her eyes
+sullenly angry.  And in the end, half-fainting in her great
+disdain, she consented to do his will.  Paris and the wheel formed
+too horrible an alternative; besides, even if that were spared her,
+there was but a hovel in Touraine for her, and Tressan, for all
+his fat ugliness, was wealthy.
+
+So the Abbot, who had lent himself to the mummery of coming there
+to read a burial service, made ready now, by order of the Queen's
+emissary, to solemnize a wedding.
+
+It was soon done.  Fortunio stood sponsor for Tressan, and Garnache
+himself insisted upon handing the Lord Seneschal his bride, a stroke
+of irony which hurt the proud lady of Condillac more than all her
+sufferings of the past half-hour.
+
+When it was over and the Dowager Marquise de Condillac had been
+converted into the Comtesse de Tressan, Garnache bade them depart
+in peace and at once.
+
+"As I have promised, you shall be spared all prosecution, Monsieur
+de Tressan," he assured the Seneschal at parting.  "But you must
+resign at once the King's Seneschalship of Dauphiny, else will you
+put me to the necessity of having you deprived of your office - and
+that might entail unpleasant consequences."
+
+They went, madame with bowed head, her stubborn pride broken at
+last as the Abbot of Saint Francis had so confidently promised her.
+After them went the Abbot and the lackeys of Florimond, and Fortunio
+went with these to carry out Garnache's orders that the men of the
+Dowager's garrison be sent packing at once, leaving with the
+Parisian, in the great hall, just Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+SAINT MARTIN'S EVE
+
+
+Uneasy in his mind, seeking some way to tell the thing and acquit
+himself of the painful task before him, Garnache took a turn in the
+apartment.
+
+Mademoiselle leaned against the table, which was still burdened by
+the empty coffin, and observed him.  His ponderings were vain; he
+could find no way to tell, his story.  She had said that she did not
+exactly love this Florimond, that her loyalty to him was no more
+than her loyalty to her father's wishes.  Nevertheless, he thought,
+what manner of hurt must not her pride receive when she learned that
+Florimond had brought him home a wife?  Garnache was full of pity
+for her and for the loneliness that must be hers hereafter, mistress
+of a vast estate in Dauphiny, alone and friendless.  And he was a
+little sorry for himself and the loneliness which, he felt, would
+be his hereafter; but that was by the way.
+
+At last it was she herself who broke the silence.
+
+"Monsieur," she asked him, and her voice was strained and husky,
+"were you in time to save Florimond?"
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle," he answered readily, glad that by that question
+she should have introduced the subject.  "I was in time."
+
+"And Marius?" she inquired.  "From what I heard you say, I take it
+that he has suffered no harm."
+
+"He has suffered none.  I have spared him that he might participate
+in the joy of his mother at her union with Monsieur de Tressan."
+
+"I am glad it was so, monsieur.  Tell me of it."  Her voice sounded
+formal and constrained.
+
+But either he did not hear or did not heed the question.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he said slowly.  "Florimond is coming - "
+
+"Florimond?" she broke in, and her voice went shrill, as if with a
+sudden fear, her cheeks turned white as chalk.  The thing that for
+months she had hoped and prayed for was come at last, and it struck
+her almost dead with terror.
+
+He remarked the change, and set it down to a natural excitement.
+He paused a moment.  Then:
+
+"He is still at La Rochette.  But he does no more than wait until he
+shall have learned that his stepmother has departed from Condillac."
+
+"But - why - why - ?  Was he then in no haste to come to me?" she
+inquired, her voice faltering.
+
+"He is - "  He stopped and tugged at his mustachios, his eyes
+regarding her sombrely.  He was close beside her now, where he had
+halted, and he set his hand gently upon her shoulder, looked down
+into that winsome little oval face she raised to his.
+
+"Mademoiselle," he inquired, "would it afflict you very sorely if
+you were not destined, after all, to wed the Lord of Condillac?"
+
+"Afflict me?" she echoed.  The very question set her gasping with
+hope.  "No - no, monsieur; it would not afflict me."
+
+"That is true?  That is really, really true?" he cried, and his tone
+seemed less despondent.
+
+"Don't you know how true it is?" she said, in such accents and with
+such a shy upward look that something seemed suddenly to take
+Garnache by the throat.  The blood flew to his cheeks.  He fancied
+an odd meaning in those words of hers - a meaning that set his
+pulses throbbing faster than joy or peril had ever set them yet.
+Then he checked himself, and deep down in his soul he seemed to
+hear a peal of mocking laughter - just such a burst of sardonic
+mirth as had broken from his lips two nights ago when on his way
+to Voiron.  Then he went back to the business he had in hand.
+
+"I am glad it is so with you," he said quietly.  "Because Florimond
+has brought him home a wife."
+
+The words were out, and he stood back as stands a man who, having
+cast an insult, prepares to ward the blow he expects in answer.  He
+had looked for a storm, a wild, frantic outburst; the lightning of
+flashing, angry eyes; the thunder of outraged pride.  Instead, here
+was a gentle calm, a wan smile overspreading her sweet, pale face,
+and then she hid that face in her hands, buried face and hands upon
+his shoulder and fell to weeping very quietly.
+
+This, he thought, was almost worse than the tempest he had looked
+for.  How was he to know that these tears were the overflow of a
+heart that was on the point of bursting from sheer joy?  He patted
+her shoulder; he soothed her.
+
+"Little child," he whispered in her ear.  "What does it matter?  You
+did not really love him.  He was all unworthy of you.  Do not grieve,
+child.  So, so, that is better."
+
+She was looking up at him, smiling through the tears that suffused
+er eyes.
+
+"I am weeping for joy, monsieur," said she.
+
+"For joy?" quoth he.  "Vertudieu!  There is no end to the things a
+woman weeps for!"
+
+Unconsciously, instinctively almost, she nestled closer to him, and
+again his pulses throbbed, again that flush came to overspread his
+lean countenance.  Very softly he whispered in her ear:
+
+"Will you go to Paris with me, mademoiselle?"
+
+He meant by that question no more than to ask whether, now that here
+in Dauphiny she would be friendless and alone, it were not better
+for her to place herself under the care of the Queen-Regent.  But
+what blame to her if she misunderstood the question, if she read in
+it the very words her heart was longing to hear from him?  The very
+gentleness of his tone implied his meaning to be the one she desired.
+She raised her hazel eyes again to his, she nestled closer to him,
+and then, with a shy fluttering of her lids, a delicious red
+suffusing her virgin cheek, she answered very softly:
+
+"I will go anywhere with you, monsieur - anywhere."
+
+With a cry he broke from her.  There was no fancying now; no
+possibility of misunderstanding.  He saw how she had misread his
+question, how she had delivered herself up to him in answer.  His
+almost roughness startled her, and she stared at him as he stamped
+down the apartment and back to where she stood, seeking in vain to
+master the turbulence of his feelings.  He stood still again.  He
+took her by the shoulders and held her at arms' length, before him,
+thus surveying her, and there was trouble in his keen eyes.
+
+"Mademoiselle, mademoiselle!" he cried.  "Valerie, my child, what
+are you saying to me?"
+
+"What would you have me say?" she asked, her eyes upon the floor.
+"Was I too forward?  It seemed to me there could not be question of
+such a thing between us now.  I belong to you.  What man has ever
+served a woman as you have served me?  What better friend, what
+nobler lover did ever woman have?  Why then need I take shame at
+confessing my devotion?"
+
+He swallowed hard, and there was a mist before his eyes - eyes that
+had looked unmoved on many a scene of carnage.
+
+"You know not what you do," he cried out, and his voice was as the
+voice of one in pain.  "I am old."
+
+"Old?" she echoed in deep surprise, and she looked up at him, as if
+she sought evidence of what he stated.
+
+"Aye, old," he assured her bitterly.  "Look at the grey in my hair,
+the wrinkles in my face.  I am no likely lover for you, child.
+You'll need a lusty, comely young gallant."
+
+She looked at him, and a faint smile flickered at the corners of her
+lips.  She observed his straight, handsome figure; his fine air of
+dignity and of strength.  Every inch a man was he; never lived there
+one who was more a man; and what more than such a man could any maid
+desire?
+
+"You are all that I would have you," she answered him, and in his
+mind he almost cursed her stubbornness, her want of reason.
+
+"I am peevish and cross-grained," he informed her, "and I have grown
+old in ignorance of woman's ways.  Love has never come to me until
+now.  What manner of lover, think you, can I make?"
+
+Her eyes were on the windows at his back.  The sunshine striking
+through them seemed to give her the reply she sought.
+
+"To-morrow will be Saint Martin's Day," she told him; "yet see with
+a warmth the sun is shining."
+
+"A poor, make-believe Saint Martin's Summer," said he.  "I am fitly
+answered by your allegory."
+
+"Oh, not make-believe, not make-believe," she exclaimed.  "There is
+no make-believe in the sun's brightness and its warmth.  We see it
+and we feel it, and we are none the less glad of it because the
+time of year should be November; rather do we take the greater joy
+in it.  And it is not yet November in your life, not yet by many
+months."
+
+"What you say is apt, perhaps," said he, "and may seem more apt than
+it is since my name is Martin, though I am no saint."  Then he shook
+off this mood that he accounted selfish; this mood that would take
+her - as the wolf takes the lamb - with no thought but for his own
+hunger.
+
+"No, no!" he cried out.  "It were unworthy in me!"
+
+"When I love you, Martin?" she asked him gently.
+
+A moment he stared at her, as if through those clear eyes he would
+penetrate to the very depths of her maiden soul.  Then he sank on
+to his knees before her as any stripling lover might have done, and
+kissed her hands in token of the fact that he was conquered.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg Etext St. Martin's Summer, by Rafael Sabatini
+
diff --git a/old/stmsm10.zip b/old/stmsm10.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9e50981
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/stmsm10.zip