“Grant that a blunder has been made—as of course it has—and say if you like that I made it; whether is it better to waste time in wrangling over it or to see how to repair it?” He paused a moment to note how this was taken, and then added: “At least you have the man safe under bolts and bars.”
“And in doing it have changed your niece’s passive resistance into active violent hatred.”
“Oh, if it comes to that, it would never have been a love match on her side;” and he laughed.
“To hell with your sneers,” cried the Governor fiercely.
“Life’s too sour a thing to be taken so seriously. I meant no taunt; no more than a fact. You would have had to force it; and will have to do no more now. Her rage will cool. As I say, you have the man and can treat him at will, either as the scamp de Cobalt or the spy I was able to prove him. Give her some few hours to think over his danger, and then see how far she’ll be ready to go to save his life.”
“Who can the fellow be?” De Proballe took heart at the question. He was not going to be thrown overboard at once; and he answered with gathering assurance.
“Nay, rather, what does it matter who he is? He came here as Gerard de Cobalt; he owned it to me; I can swear to that. Treat him as no other. I called him by his name that your people might hear; what I said to you before the arrest stands as good now as then—deal with him for that murder at Cambrai. You have him tight enough by that rope and can answer his repudiation by simply disbelieving it and regarding it as made when he found himself in a mess. Gerard de Cobalt he was, and Gerard de Cobalt I should let him remain.”
“But who is he? And what does he here?”
“Have you no persuasive methods in this Castle of yours? I have heard that many a prisoner has before now been led to confess his crime and so save an infinite amount of trouble in collecting proofs.”
“My mind misgives me,” murmured the Governor uneasily.