"Sit down," bade the duke, "and tell me."
Lucas, standing at the foot of the table, observed:
"They turned you out of your bed, monsieur, to see me. It was
unnecessary severity. My tale will keep till morning."
"By Heaven, it shall not!" Mayenne shouted. "Beware how much further you
dare anger me, you Satan's cub!"
He was fingering the dagger again as if he longed to plunge it into
Lucas's gullet, and I rather marvelled that he did not, or summon his
guard to do it. For I could well understand how infuriating was Lucas.
He carried himself with an air of easy equality insufferable to the
first noble in the land. Mayenne's chosen role was the unmoved, the
inscrutable, but Lucas beat him at his own game and drove him out into
the open of passion and violence. It was a miracle to me that the man
lived--unless, indeed, he were a prince in disguise.
"Satan's cub!" Lucas repeated, laughing. "Our late king had called me
that, pardieu! But I knew not you acknowledged Satan in the family."
"I ordered Antoine to wake me if you returned in the night," Mayenne
went on gruffly. "When I heard you had been here I knew something was
wrong--unless the thing were done."
"It is not done. The whole plot is ruined."
"Nom de dieu! If it is by your bungling--"
"It was not by my bungling," Lucas answered with the first touch of heat
he had shown.
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