I will open the door, and do you look
out for him, Gervais."

I had a knife and had it in my hand, ready to charge for freedom. But
the door opened slowly, and Gervais looked out for me--to the effect
that my knife went one way and I another before I could wink. I reeled
against the wall and stayed there, cursing myself for a fool that I had
not trusted to fair words instead of to my dagger.

"Well done, my brave Gervais!" cried he of the vivid voice--a tall
fair-haired youth, whom I had seen before. So had I seen the stalwart
blackbeard, Gervais. The third man was older, a common-looking fellow
whose face was new to me. All three were in their shirts on account of
the heat; all were plain, even shabby, in their dress. But the two young
men wore swords at their sides.

The half-opened shutters, overhanging the court, let plenty of light
into the room. It had two straw beds on the floor and a few old chairs
and stools, and a table covered with dishes and broken food and
wine-bottles. More bottles, riding-boots, whips and spurs, two or three
hats and saddle-bags, and various odds and ends of dress littered the
floor and the chairs. Everything was of mean quality except the bearing
of the two young men. A gentleman is a gentleman even in the Rue
Coupejarrets--all the more, maybe, in the Rue Coupejarrets. These two
were gently born.

The low man, with scared face, held off from me. He whose name was
Gervais confronted me with an angry scowl. Yeux-gris alone--for so I
dubbed the third, from his gray eyes, well open under dark
brows--Yeux-gris looked no whit alarmed or angered; the only emotion to
be read in his face was a gay interest as the blackavised Gervais put me
questions.

"How came you here? What are you about?"

"No harm, messieurs," I made haste to protest, ruing my stupidity with
that dagger. "I climbed in at a window for sport. I thought the house
was deserted."

He clutched my shoulder till I could have screamed for pain.

"The truth, now. If you value your life you will tell the truth."

"Monsieur, it is the truth. I came in idle mischief; that was the whole
of it. I had no notion of breaking in upon you or any one. They said the
house was haunted."

"Who said that?"

"Maitre Jacques, at the Amour de Dieu."

He stared at me in surprise.

"What had you been asking about this house?"

Yeux-gris, lounging against the table, struck in:

"I can tell you that myself. He told Jacques he saw us in