flagon, and sent it crashing to the floor. If
there was a table near at hand when his temper went, he never failed to
treat it so.

"Par la mort Dieu! monsieur, you see but the humour of it, do you? And
what of that poor child who is lying there, suffering this incarceration
because of her fidelity to a promise given you?"

The statement was hardly fully accurate. But it served its purpose. The
other's face became instantly, grave.

"Calm yourself, I beg, monsieur," he cried, raising a soothing hand. "I
have offended you somewhere; that is plain. There is something here that
I do not altogether understand. You say that Valerie has suffered on
account of a promise given me? To what are you referring?"

"They hold her a prisoner, monsieur, because they wish to wed her to
Marius," answered Garnache, striving hard to cool his anger.

"Parfaitement! That much I understood."

"Well, then, monsieur, is the rest not plain? Because she is betrothed
to you--" He paused. He saw, at last, that he was stating something not
altogether accurate. But the other took his meaning there and then, lay
back in his chair, and burst out laughing.

The blood hummed through Garnache's head as he tightened his lips and
watched this gentleman indulge his inexplicable mirth. Surely Monsieur
de Condillac was possessed of the keenest sense of humour in all France.
He laughed with a will, and Garnache sent up a devout prayer that the
laugh might choke him. The noise of it filled the hostelry.

"Sir," said Garnache, with an ever-increasing tartness, "there is a
by-word has it 'Much laughter, little wit.' In confidence won, is that
your case, monsieur?"

The other looked at him soberly a moment, then went off again.

"Monsieur, monsieur!" he gasped, "you'll be the death of me. For the
love of Heaven look less fierce. Is it my fault that I must laugh? The
folly of it all is so colossal. Three years from home, yet there is
a woman keeps faithful and holds to a promise given for her. Come,
monsieur, you who have seen the world, you must agree that there is in
this something that is passing singular, extravagantly amusing. My poor
little Valerie!" he spluttered through his half-checked mirth, "does she
wait for me still? does she count me still betrothed to her? And because
of that, says 'No' to brother Marius! Death of my life! I shall die of
it."

"I have a notion that you may, monsieur," rasped Garnache's voice, and
with it rasped Garnache's