to do nothing to jeopard it. But I interfere in no
way with your liberty to proceed as you please."

"I should think not, forsooth!" M. Etienne blazed out furiously.

"I could," rejoined Vigo, with his maddening tranquillity. "I could
order the guard--and they would obey--to lock you up in your chamber. I
believe Monsieur would thank me for it. But I don't do it. I leave you
free to act as it likes you."

My lord was white with ire.

"Who is master here, you or I?"

"Neither of us, M. le Comte. But Monsieur, leaving, put the keys in my
hand, and I am head of the house till he returns. You are very angry, M.
Etienne, but my shoulders are broad enough to bear it. Your madness will
get no countenance from me."

"Hang you for an obstinate pig!" M. Etienne cried.

Vigo said no more. He had made plain his position; he had naught to add
or retract. Yeux-gris's face cleared. After all, there was no use being
angry with Vigo; one might as well make fists at the flow of the Seine.

"Very well." M. Etienne swallowed his wrath. "It is understood that I
get no aid from you. Then I have nobody in the world with me save Felix
here. But for all that I'll win my lady!"

XVIII

_To the Bastille._

But Vigo proved better than his word. If he would give us no
countenance, he gave freely good broad gold pieces. He himself suggested
M. Etienne's need of the sinews of war, not in the least embarrassed or
offended because he knew M. le Comte to be angry with him. He was no
feather ruffled, serene in the consciousness that he was absolutely in
the right. His position was impregnable; neither persuasion, ridicule,
nor abuse moved him one whit. He had but a single purpose in life; he
was born to forward the interests of the Duke of St. Quentin. He would
forward them, if need were, over our bleeding corpses.

On top of all his disobedience and disrespect he was most amiable to M.
Etienne, treating him with a calm assumption of friendliness that would
have maddened a saint. Yet it was not hypocrisy; he liked his young
lord, as we all did. He would not let him imperil Monsieur, but aside
from that he wished him every good fortune in the world.

M. Etienne argued no more. He was wroth and sore over Vigo's attitude,
but he said little. He accepted the advance of money--"Of course
Monsieur would say, What coin is his is yours," Vigo explained--and
despatched me to settle his score at the Three Lanterns.

I set out on my errand