"What!" he said, "do you believe that I have taken the trouble to offer the mass to those whose throats we are cutting yonder?"
"Sire," said Henry, disengaging his arm, "will you not die in the religion of your fathers?"
"Yes, par la mordieu! and you?"
"Well, sire, I will do the same!" replied Henry.
Charles uttered a roar of rage and, with trembling hand, seized his arquebuse, which lay on the table.
Henry, who stood leaning against the tapestry, with the perspiration on his brow, and nevertheless, owing to his presence of mind, calm to all appearance, followed every movement of the terrible king with the greedy stupefaction of a bird fascinated by a serpent.
Charles cocked his arquebuse, and stamping with blind rage cried, as he dazzled Henry's eyes with the polished barrel of the deadly gun:
"Will you accept the mass?"
Henry remained mute.
Charles IX. shook the vaults of the Louvre with the most terrible oath that ever issued from the lips of man, and grew even more livid than before.