“These are not the only difficulties you have had with each other.
Everybody in the country knows that you have had violent altercations.”
Count Claudieuse seemed to be in great distress.
“It is true: we have used hard words. M. de Boiscoran had two wretched
dogs that were continually escaping from his kennels, and came hunting
in my fields. You cannot imagine how much game they destroyed.”
“Exactly so. And one day you met M. de Boiscoran, and you warned him
that you would shoot his dogs.”
“I must confess I was furious. But I was wrong, a thousand times wrong:
I did threaten”--
“That is it. You were both of you armed. You threatened one another: he
actually aimed at you. Don’t deny it. A number of persons have seen it;
and I know it. He has told me so himself.”