"Nay, maître, if the people are with him, the League will not dare--"
"There you fool yourself, my springald. If there is one thing which the
nobles of the League neither know nor care about it is what the people
think. They sit wrangling over their French League and their Spanish
League, their kings and their princesses, and what this lord does and
that lord threatens, and they give no heed at all to us--us, the people.
But they will find out their mistake. Some day they will be taught that
the nobles are not all of France. There will come a reckoning when more
blood will flow in Paris than ever flowed on St. Bartholomew's day. They
think we are chained down, do they? Pardieu! there will come a day!"
I scarcely knew the man; his face was flushed, his eyes sparkling as if
they saw more than the common room and mean street. But as I stared the
glow faded, and he said in a lower tone:
"At least, it will happen unless Henry of Navarre comes to save us from
it. He is a good fellow, this Navarre."
"They say he can never enter Paris."
"They say lies. Let him but leave his heresies behind him and he can
enter Paris to-morrow."
"Mayenne does not think so."
"No; but Mayenne knows little of what goes on. He does not keep an inn
in the Rue Coupejarrets."
He stated the fact so gravely that I had to laugh.
"Laugh if you like; but I tell you, Félix Broux, my lord's
council-chamber is not the only place where they make kings. We do it,
too, we of the Rue Coupejarrets."
"Well," said I, "I leave you, then, to make kings. I must be off to my
duke. What's the scot, maître?"
He dropped the politician, and was all innkeeper in a second.
"A crown!" I cried in indignation. "Do you think I am made of crowns?
Remember, I am not yet Minister of Finance."
"No, but soon will be," he grinned. "Besides, what I ask is little
enough, God knows. Do you think food is cheap in a siege?"
"Then I pray Navarre may come soon and end it."
"Amen to that," said old Jacques, quite gravely. "If he comes a Catholic
it cannot be too soon."