"M. Lucas had struck me," I muttered; "I thought the fight was fair
enough. And they threatened my life."
Monsieur's contemptuous eyes shrivelled me as flame shrivels a leaf.
"You--a Broux of St. Quentin!"
Lucas, who had watched me close all the while, as they all three did,
said now:
"I believe he is a cheat, Monsieur. There is no plot. He has learned of
your plan through the eavesdropper he speaks of and thinks to make
credit out of a trumped-up tale of murder."
"No," answered Monsieur. "You may think that, Lucas, for he is a
stranger to you. But I know him. He was a fool sometimes, but he was
never dishonest. You used to be fond of me, Félix. What has happened to
make you consort with my enemies?"
"Ah, Monsieur, I love you. I have always loved you," I cried. "I am not
lying now, nor cheating you. There is a plot. I learned it and came
straight to you, though I was under oath not to betray them."
"Then, in Heaven's name, Félix," burst out Vigo, "which side are you
on?"
Monsieur began to laugh.
"That is what I should like to know. For, by St. Quentin, I can make
nothing of it."
"Monsieur," insisted Lucas, "whatever he was once, I believe him a
trickster now."
Monsieur bent his keen eyes on me.
"No; he is plainly in earnest. Therefore with patience I look to get
some sense out of this snarl of a story. Something is there we have not
yet fathomed."
"Will Monsieur let me speak?"
"I have done naught but urge you to do so for some time past," he
answered dryly.
"Monsieur, you know my father would not let me leave St. Quentin with
you, three months back. But at length he said I should come, and I
reached Paris last night and, since it was late, lodged at an inn. This
morning I came to your gate, but the guard would not let me enter. I was
so mad to see you, Monsieur, that when you drove out I sprang up on your
coach-step--"
"Ah," said Monsieur, a new light breaking in upon him, "that was you,
Félix? I did not know you; I was thinking of other matters. And Lucas
took you for a miscreant. Now I _am_ sorry."
If I had been a noble he could not have spoken franker apology. But at
once he was stern again. "And because my secretary took you in all good
faith for a possible assassin and struck you to save me, you turn
traitor and take part in a plot to set on him and kill him! I had
believed that of some hired lackey, not of a Broux."
"Monsieur, I was wrong--a thousand times wrong. I knew that as soon as I
had sworn. And when I found it was you they meant, I came to you, oath
or no oath."
"There spoke the Broux!" cried Monsieur with his brilliant smile. "Now
you are Félix. Who are my would-be murderers?"
We had come round in a circle to the place where we had stuck before,
and here we stuck again.
"Monsieur, I would tell you all before you could count ten--tell you
their names, their whereabouts, everything--were it not for one man who
stood my friend."
The duke's eyes flashed.
"You call him that--my assassin!"
"He is an assassin," I was forced to answer; "even Monsieur's
assassin--and a perjurer. But--but, Monsieur, he saved my life from the
other, at the risk of his own. How can I pay him back by betraying him?"
"According to your own account, he betrayed you."
"Aye, he lied to me," I said brokenly. "Yet Monsieur, if it were your
own case and one had saved your life, were he the scum of the gutter,
would you send him to his death?"
"To whom do you owe your first duty?"
"Monsieur, to you."
"Then speak."
But I could not do it. Though I knew Yeux-gris for a villain, yet he had
saved my life.
"Monsieur, I cannot."
The duke cried out:
"This to me!"
There was a silence. I stood with hanging head, the picture of a
shame-faced knave. Shame so filled me that I could not look up to meet
Monsieur's sentence. But when I had remembered the good hater in
Monsieur, I should have remembered, too, the good lover. Monsieur had
been fond of me at St. Quentin. As I waited for the lightning to strike,
he said with utmost gentleness:
"Félix, let me understand you. In what manner did this man save your
life?"
Now that was like my lord. Though a hot man, he loved fairness and ever
strove to do the just thing, and his patience was the finer that it was
not his nature. His leniency fired me with a sudden hope.
"Monsieur, there are four of them in the plot. But one cannot be as vile
as the others, since he saved my life. Monsieur, if I tell you, will you
let that one go?"
"I shall do as I see fit," he answered, all the duke. "Félix, will you
speak?"
"If Monsieur will promise to let him go--"
"Insolence, sirrah! I do not bargain with my servants."
His words were like whips. I flinched before his proud anger, and for
the second time stood with hanging head awaiting his sentence. And again
he did what I could not guess. He cried out:
"Félix, you are blind, besotted, mad. You know not what you do. I am in
constant danger. The city is filled with my enemies. The Leagues hate me
and are ever plotting mischief against me. Every day their mistrust and
hatred grow. I did a bold thing in coming to Paris, but I had a great
end to serve--to pave a way into the capital for the Catholic king and
bring the land to peace. For that, I live in hourly jeopardy, and risk
my life to-night on foot in the streets. If I am killed, more than my
life is lost. The Church may lose the king, and this dear France of ours
be harried to a desert in the civil wars!"
I had braced myself to bear Monsieur's anger, but this unlooked-for
appeal pierced me through and through. All the love and loyalty in
me--and I had much, though it may not have seemed so--rose in answer to
Monsieur's call. I fell on my knees before him, choked with sobs.
Monsieur's hand lay on my head as he said quietly:
"Now, Félix, speak."