ad made a movement to recover. "I
fight with other weapons than that! And if you lay a finger on me"--he
extended his arms to their widest extent--"I will crush the life out of
you. That is better," as Claude stood glaring helplessly at him--"I
teach you prudence, at any rate. And as," with a sneer, "you are so apt
at learning, I will do you, if you choose, a greater kindness that man
ever did you, or woman either!"

The young man, breathing quickly, did not speak. Perhaps his eyes were
watching for an opening; at the least appearance of one he would have
flung himself upon his enemy.

"You do not choose. And yet, I will do it. In one word--Go!

Teque his, puer, eripe flammis!"

He pointed to the door with a gesture tragic enough. "Go and live, for
if you stay you die! Wait not until the chain is drawn before the door,
until boards darken the windows, and men cross the street when they
would pass! Until women hide their heads as they go by, and the market
will not sell, nor the water run for you! For then, as surely as she
will perish, you will perish with her!"

"So be it!" Claude cried. And in his turn he pointed, not without
dignity, to the door. "Go you, and our blood be upon your head!"

Basterga shrugged his shoulders, and in one moment put the thing and his
grand manner away from him. "Enough! we will go," he said. "You are
satisfied, Messer Syndic? Yes. Farewell, young sir, you have my last
word." And while the young man stood glowering at him, he opened the
street door, and the two passed out.

"You will not go on with this?" Blondel muttered with a backward
gesture, as the two paused.

"Nothing," Basterga answered in a low voice, "will suit our purpose
better. It will amuse Geneva and fill men's mouths till the time come.
For you too, Messer Blondel," he continued, with a piercing look, "will
live and not die, I take it?"

The other knew then that the hour had come to set his seal to the
bargain: and equally, that if at this eleventh hour he would return, the
path was open. But _facilis_--known is the rest, and the grip which a
strong nature gains on a weaker, and how hardly fear, once admitted, is
cast out. Within the Syndic's sight rose one of the gates, almost within
touch rose the rampart of the city, long his own, which he was asked to
betray. The mountains of his native land, pure, cold and sunlit, stood
up against the blue depth of winter sky, eloquent of the permanence of
things, and the