Well, what would you do if you found out about the five thousand
dollars?"

"I would see what happened to it; and afterwards I would see that a girl
of Bonaventure did not marry a Protestant, and a thief."

Ferrol rose from his chair, coughing a little. Walking over to Shangois,
he caught him by both ears and shook the shaggy head back and forth.

"You little scrap of hell," he said in a rage, "if you ever come within
fifty feet of me again I'll send you where you came from!"

Though Shangois's eyes bulged from his head, he answered:

"I was only ten feet away from you last night under the elm!"

Suddenly Ferrol's hand slipped down to Shangois's throat. Ferrol's
fingers tightened, pressed inwards.

"Now, see, I know what you mean. Some one has robbed Nicolas Lavilette
of five thousand dollars. You dare to charge me with it, curse you. Let
me see if there's any more lies on your tongue!"

With the violence of the pressure Shangois's tongue was forced out of
his mouth.

Suddenly a paroxysm of coughing seized Ferrol, and he let go and
staggered back against the window ledge. Shangois was transformed--an
animal. No human being had ever seen him as he was at this moment. The
fingers of his one hand opened and shut convulsively, his arms worked
up and down, his face twitched, his teeth showed like a beast's as he
glared at Ferrol. He looked as though he were about to spring upon the
now helpless man. But up from the garden below there came the sound of a
voice--Christine's--singing.

His face quieted, and his body came to its natural pose again, though
his eyes retained an active malice. He turned to go.

"Remember what I tell you," said Ferrol: "if you publish that lie,
you'll not live to hear it go about. I mean what I say." Blood showed
upon his lips, and a tiny little stream flowed down the corner of his
mouth. Whenever he felt that warm fluid on his tongue he was certain of
his doom, and the horror of slowly dying oppressed him, angered him.
It begot in him a desire to end it all. He had a hatred of suicide; but
there were other ways. "I'll have your life, or you'll have mine. I'm
not to be played with," he added.

The sentences were broken by coughing, and his handkerchief was wet and
red.

"It is no concern of the world," answered Shangois, stretching up his
throat, for he still felt the pressure of Ferrol's fingers--"only of the
girl and her brother. The girl--I saved her once before from your friend
V