l who used this sobbing man for
their stepping-stone, and, to attain their ends and gain their purposes,
trampled his dull soul in blood and mire.

One looked at another in consternation. Fear grew in eyes that a moment
before were bold; cheeks turned pale that a moment before were hectic. If
_he_ changed as rapidly as this, if so little dependence could be placed
on his moods or his resolutions, who was safe? Whose turn might it not
be to-morrow? Or who might not be held accountable for the deeds done
this day? Many, from whom remorse had seemed far distant a while before,
shuddered and glanced behind them. It was as if the dead who lay stark
without the doors, ay, and the countless dead of Paris, with whose
shrieks the air was laden, had flocked in shadowy shape into the hall;
and there, standing beside their murderers, had whispered with their cold
breath in the living ears, "A reckoning! A reckoning! As I am, thou
shalt be!"

It was Count Hannibal who broke the spell and the silence, and with his
hand on his brother's shoulder stood forward.

"Nay, sire," he cried, in a voice which rang defiant in the roof, and
seemed to challenge alike the living and the dead, "if all deny the deed,
yet will not I! What we have done we have done! So be it! The dead are
dead! So be it! For the rest, your Majesty has still one servant who
will do your will, one soldier whose life is at your disposition! I have
said I will go, and I go, sire. And you, churchman," he continued,
turning in bitter scorn to the priest, "do you go too--to church! To
church, shaveling! Go, watch and pray for us! Fast and flog for us!
Whip those shoulders, whip them till the blood runs down! For it is all,
it seems, you will do for your King!"

Charles turned. "Silence, railer!" he said in a broken voice. "Sow no
more troubles! Already," a shudder shook his tall ungainly form, "I see
blood, blood, blood everywhere! Blood? Ah, God, shall I from this time
see anything else? But there is no turning back. There is no undoing.
So, do you go to Biron. And do you," he went on, sullenly addressing
Marshal Tavannes, "take him and tell him what it is needful he should
know."

"'Tis done, sire!" the Marshal cried, with a hiccough. "Come, brother!"

But when the two, the courtiers making quick way for them, had passed
down the hall to the door, the Marshal tapped Hannibal's sleeve.

"It was touch and go," he muttered; it was plain he h