When he did he spoke low and
hurriedly, so that I could scarce catch the words. I knew it was no fear
of listeners that kept his voice down--they had shouted at each other
as if there was no one within a mile. I guessed that Lucas, for all his
bravado, took little pride in his tale, nor felt happy about its
reception. I could catch names now and then, Monsieur's, M. Etienne's,
Grammont's, but the hero of the tale was myself.
"You let him to the duke?" Mayenne cried presently.
At the harsh censure of his voice, Lucas's rang out with the old
defiance:
"With Vigo at his back I did. Sangdieu! you have yet to make the
acquaintance of St. Quentin's equery. A regiment of your lansquenets
couldn't keep him out."
"Does he never take wine?" Mayenne asked, lifting his hand with shut
fingers over the table and then opening them.
"That is easy to say, monsieur, sitting here in your own hotel stuffed
with your soldiers. But it was not so easy to do, alone in my enemy's
house, when at the least suspicion of me they had broken me on the
wheel."
"That is the rub!" Mayenne cried violently. "That is the trouble with
all of you. You think more of the safety of your own skins than of
accomplishing your work. Mordieu! where should I be to-day--where would
the Cause be--if my first care was my own peril?"
"Then that is where we differ, uncle," Lucas answered with a cold sneer.
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