de la Vire. In the growing darkness it was impossible to distinguish faces.
‘Hush!’ the stouter figure muttered in a tone of warning. ‘Speak lower. Who are you, and what do you here?’
‘I am here,’ I answered respectfully, ‘commissioned by a friend of the lady I have named, to convey her to a place of safety.’
‘Mon dieu!’ was the sharp answer. ‘Now? It is impossible.’
‘No,’ I murmured, ‘not now, but to-night. The moon rises at half-past two. My horses need rest and food. At three I will be below this window with the means of escape, if mademoiselle choose to use them.’
I felt that they were staring at me through the dusk, as though they would read my breast. ‘Your name, sir?’ the shorter figure murmured at last, after a pause which was full of suspense and excitement.
‘I do not think my name of much import at present, Mademoiselle,’ I answered, reluctant to proclaim myself a stranger. ‘When—’
‘Your name, your name, sir!’ she repeated imperiously, and I heard her little heel rap upon the stone floor of the balcony.
‘Gaston de Marsac,’ I answered unwillingly.
They both started, and cried out together. ‘Impossible!’ the last speaker exclaimed, amazement and anger in her tone, ‘This is a jest, sir. This—’
What more she would have said I was left to guess, for at that moment her attendant I had no doubt now which was mademoiselle and which Fanchette—suddenly laid her hand on her mistress’s mouth and pointed to the room behind them. A second’s suspense, and with a wanting gesture the two turned and disappeared through the window.
I lost no time in regaining the shelter of the trees; and concluding, though I was far from satisfied with the interview, that I could do nothing more now, but might rather, by loitering in the neighbourhood, awaken suspicion, I remounted and made for the highway and the village, where I found my men in noisy occupation of the inn, a poor place, with unglazed windows, and a fire in the middle of the earthen floor. My first care was to stable the Cid in a shed at the back, where I provided for its wants as far as I could with the aid of a half-naked boy, who seemed to be in hiding there.
This done, I returned to the front of the house, having pretty well made up my mind how I would set about the task before me. As I passed one of the windows, which was partially closed by a rude curtain made of old sacks, I stopped to look in. Fresnoy and his four rascals were seated on blocks of wood round the hearth, talking loudly and fiercely, and ruffling it as if the fire and the room were their own. A pedlar, seated on his goods in one corner, was eyeing them with evident fear and suspicion; in another corner two children had taken refuge under a donkey, which some fowls had chosen as a roosting-pole. The innkeeper, a sturdy fellow, with a great club in his fist, sat moodily at the foot of a ladder which led to the loft above, while a slatternly woman, who was going to and fro getting supper, seemed in equal terror of her guests and her good man.
Confirmed by what I saw, and assured that the villains were ripe for any mischief, and, if not checked, would speedily be beyond my control, I noisily flung the door open and entered. Fresnoy looked up with a sneer as I did so, and one of the men laughed. The others became silent; but no one moved or greeted me. Without a moment’s hesitation I stepped to the nearest fellow and, with a sturdy kick, sent his log from under him. ‘Rise, you rascal, when I enter!’ I cried, giving vent to the anger I had long felt. ‘And you, too!’ and with a second kick I sent his neighbour’s stool flying also, and administered a couple of cuts with my riding-cane across the man’s shoulders. ‘Have you no manners, sirrah? Across with you, and leave this side to your betters.’
The two rose, snarling and feeling for their weapons, and for a moment stood facing me, looking now at me and now askance at Fresnoy. But as he gave no sign, and their comrades only laughed, the men’s courage failed them at the pinch, and with a very poor grace they sneaked over to the other side of the fire and sat there, scowling.
I seated myself beside their leader. ‘This gentleman and I will eat here,’ I cried to the man at the foot of the ladder. ‘Bid your wife lay for us, and of the best you have; and do you give those knaves their provender where the smell of their greasy jackets will not come between us and our victuals.’
The man came forward, glad enough, as I saw, to discover any one in authority, and very civilly began to draw wine and place a board for us, while his wife filled our platters from the black pot which hung over the fire. Fresnoy’s face meanwhile wore the amused smile of one who comprehended my motives, but felt sufficiently sure of his position and influence with his followers to be indifferent to my proceedings. I presently showed him, however, that I had not yet done with him. Our table was laid in obedience to my orders at such a distance from the men that they could not overhear our talk, and by-and-by I leant over to him.
‘M. Fresnoy,’ I said, ‘you are in danger of forgetting one thing, I fancy, which it behoves you to remember.’
‘What?’ he muttered, scarcely deigning to look up at me.
‘That you have to do with Gaston de Marsac,’ I answered quietly. ‘I am making, as I told you this morning, a last attempt to recruit my fortunes, and I will let no man—no man, do you understand, M. Fresnoy?—thwart me and go harmless.’
‘Who wishes to thwart you?’ he asked impudently.
‘You,’ I answered unmoved, helping myself, as I spoke, from the roll of black bread which lay beside me. ‘You robbed me this afternoon; I passed it over. You encouraged those men to be insolent; I passed it over. But let me tell you this. If you fail me to-night, on the honour of a gentleman, M. Fresnoy, I will run you through as I would spit a lark.’
‘Will you? But two can play at that game,’ he cried, rising nimbly from his stool. ‘Still better six! Don’t you think, M. de Marsac, you had better have waited—?’
‘I think you had better hear one word more,’ I answered coolly, keeping my seat, ‘before you appeal to your fellows there.’
‘Well,’ he said, still standing, ‘what is it?’
‘Nay,’ I replied, after once more pointing to his stool in vain, ‘if you prefer to take my orders standing, well and good.’
‘Your orders?’ he shrieked, growing suddenly excited.
‘Yes, my orders!’ I retorted, rising as suddenly to my feet and hitching forward my sword. ‘My orders, sir,’ I repeated fiercely, ‘or, if you dispute my right to command as well as to pay this party, let us decide the question here and now—you and I, foot to foot, M. Fresnoy.’
The quarrel flashed up so suddenly, though I had been preparing it all along, that no one moved. The woman indeed, fell back to her children, but the rest looked on open-mouthed. Had they stirred, or had a moment’s hurly-burly heated his blood, I doubt not Fresnoy would have taken up my challenge, for he did not lack hardihood. But as it was, face to face with me in the silence, his courage failed him. He paused, glowering at me uncertainly, and did not speak.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘don’t you think that if I pay I ought to give orders, sir?’
‘Who wishes to oppose your orders?’ he muttered, drinking off a bumper, and sitting down with an air of impudent bravado, assumed to hide his discomfiture.
‘If
