found
guilty--indeed, there was no other verdict possible, since he calmly
admitted everything--of treason, disobedience of orders, a whole
catalogue of crimes. The Marquis acted on the old feudal idea that he
possessed all the rights of the ancient nobility, the high and low, the
middle justice. And, indeed, he represented the King with full powers.
The court, completely under his influence, had condemned the young
soldier to death. Marteau might have appealed, he might have
protested, but he did neither. He accepted the inevitable. What was
the difference? No appeal would have been entertained, no protest
would have availed. It all came to this, he would either have to give
up the Eagle or his life.

Well, life was not worth very much to him, as he had said. Even though
he realized from her desperate avowal of the night before that the
interest of the Countess in him was more than she would have admitted,
had not the words been surprised and wrung from her by his deadly
peril, he knew that there was absolutely nothing to be hoped for in
that direction. Even though his comrades, alarmed by the imminence of
his danger, and aroused by the energetic determination of the old
Marquis, besought him to give up the Eagle, he refused. He would have
considered himself a forsworn man had he done so.

The Marquis had visited the prisoner and had condescended to make a
personal appeal to him, imploring him by that old duty and friendship
which had subsisted between the families, but his appeals had been as
fruitless as his commands and his threats. The old noble was iron
hard. He had no sympathy with the Empire or its Emperor, but the
determination of the young officer did arouse a certain degree of
admiration. He would fain have spared him if he could, but, as he had
sacrificed everything he possessed for the King, and counted the
sacrifice as nothing, his sympathies did not abate his determination to
punish treason and contumacy one whit.

The Marquis was accustomed to having things his own way, and the long
period of exile had not changed his natural bent of mind in that
particular. He was angry, too, at the stubbornness which he
nevertheless admired. In other directions the Marquis was balked. He
had seen through the little drama that had been played by Marteau and
the Countess Laure in her bedchamber. That was one reason why he would
fain have saved him, because he had so gallantly allowed himself to
occup