Here lay the unfortunate young man whom the head of the Charnys had ordered to let himself be slain for the Queen's sake. He had punctiliously obeyed.
[CHAPTER XXVI.]
BILLET'S SORROW.
At the time when the Queen and her consort were leaving Versailles, never more to return under its roof, the following scene was taking place in one of its inner yards, damp with the rain which a bitter fall gale was beginning to dry up.
Over a dead body a man clad in black was bending: a man in the Royal Lifeguards uniform knelt on the other side. Three paces off stood a third person, with fixed eyes and closed hands.
The body was of a young man not more than twenty-three, all of whose blood seemed to have poured out through ghastly wounds in the head and chest. His furrowed and livid white breast appeared yet to heave with the disdainful breath of hopeless defense. The head thrown back and the mouth open in pain and anger, recalled the fine figure of speech of the Ancient Romans:
And with a long-drawn wail the spirit fled to the abode of shades.
The man in black was Gilbert: the Lifeguards officer, Count Charny; the bystander, Billet.
The corpse was Viscount Valence Charny's.