t, stared at him with wild eyes, like one who looks
into the open roof of hell. Lucas fell to laughing.

"What! hang you and let our cousin Valere succeed? Mon dieu, no! M. de
Valere is a man!"

With a blow the guardsman struck the words and the laughter from his
lips. But I, who no more than Lucas knew how to hold my tongue, thought
I saw a better way to punish this brazen knave. I cried out:

"You are the dupe, Lucas! Aye, and coward to boot, fleeing here
from--nothing. I knew naught against you--you saw that. To slip out and
warn Martin before Vigo got a chance at him--that was all you had to do.
Yet you never thought of that but rushed away here, leaving Martin to
betray you. Had you stuck to your post you had been now on the road to
St. Denis, instead of the road to the Greve! Fool! fool! fool!"

He winced. He had not been ashamed to betray his benefactor, to bite the
hand that fed him, to desert a wounded comrade; but he was ashamed to
confront his own blunder. I had the satisfaction of pricking, not his
conscience, for he had none, but his pride.

"I had to warn Grammont off," he retorted. "Could I believe St. Quentin
such a lack-wit as to forgive these two because they were his kin? You
did better than you knew when you shut the door on me. You tracked me,
you marplot, you sneak! How came you into the coil?"

"By God's grace," M. le Comte answered. He laid a hand on my shoulder
and leaned there heavily. Lucas grinned.

"Ah, waxing pious, is he? The prodigal prepares to return."

M. Etienne's hand clinched on my shoulder. Vigo commanded a gag for
Lucas, saying, with the only touch of anger I ever knew him to show:

"He shall hang when the king comes in. And now to horse, lads, and out
of the quarter; we have wasted too much time palavering. King Henry is
not in Paris yet. We shall do well not to rouse Belin, though we can
make him trouble if he troubles us. Come, monsieur. Men, guard your
prisoner. I misjudge if he is not cropful of the devil still."

He did not look it. His figure was drooping; his face purple and
contorted, for one of the troopers had crammed his scarf into the man's
mouth, half strangling him. As he was led past us, with a sudden frantic
effort, fit to dislocate his jaw, he disgorged the gag to cry out
wildly:

"Oh, M. l'Ecuyer, have mercy! Have pity upon me! For Christ's sake,
pity!"

[Illustration: "IN A FLASH HE WAS OUT OF THEIR GRASP, FLYING DOWN THE
ALLEY."]

His bravado h