ated himself between the
recumbent prisoner and the window. Then he coughed again, but sharply
and angrily this time.

"You hear me, Comte de la Seine?" he said haughtily.

It seemed to come naturally to the young esquire how to play his part--
to gain all the time he could; and he slowly raised one hand and let it
fall heavily back upon the coverlet.

Henry was satisfied, and his tones bespoke it, as he said:

"It is well, sir. I have stooped to pay you this visit--here this
night, to remind you that by the way in which you have repaid my
hospitality you have forfeited your life."

Denis raised his hand again, so that it came out of the shadow thrown by
the curtains into the light cast by the candles right across the bed;
and as the King sat there as if watching the effect of his words, the
hand was waved carelessly in the air before it was allowed to descend.

"Hah!" cried the King. "You are a Frenchman, sir, and you behave with
all the flippancy of your race. I understand your gesture. It means
recklessness. You, so to speak, tell me that you do not value your
life. You defy me. But you will alter your tone when you are called
upon to march in the middle of my guards to the headsman's block, and
suffer there for your crime."

There was a quick impatient gesture of the hand again.

"We shall see," continued the King, with his voice growing deeper,
suggestive of the hot anger that was burning in his breast. "And now
listen to me, M. le Comte de la Seine, as you call yourself. But you
have not deceived me. I know everything, even to the reason why you
have stooped to play the part of a common cutpurse."

Denis raised his hand again with an angry gesture, and Henry continued
more loudly:

"I repeat it, sir," he cried; "a common cutpurse; and please understand
that you are quite at my mercy. No one can save you but I. Now listen.
Men call me merciless and tyrannical. Let them. I am also just, and
can be merciful when I please. Are you ready to accept my mercy?"

Denis raised his hand again quickly.

"Hah! Good! Then it is in your power to act in a way that will command
this mercy, possibly my forgiveness, and the continuance of the feeling
of friendship that you, so brilliant and talented a man, have won."

Denis raised his hand again, as if in deprecation, feeling in spite of
his perilous position something like amusement at the success attending
the playing of his _role_.

"Oh yes," co