"Your pardon, Madame; but as it happens I have no use for ladies' trinkets, while all that you have been good enough to tell me only makes me the more eager to examine the contents of this carriage."
"But there's nothing of value in it," asserted Madame unblushingly, "except what we are offering you now."
"That is as may be, Madame. I would wish to ascertain."
"You impious malapert!" she cried out wrathfully, "would you dare lay hands upon a woman?"
"No, Madame, certainly not," he replied. "I will merely, as I have had the honour to tell you, order my men to shoot M. le Comte de Cambray in the right leg."
"You vagabond! you thief! you wouldn't dare," expostulated Madame, who seemed now on the verge of hysteria.
"Attention, my men!" he called once more over his left shoulder.
"It is no use, ma tante," here interposed Crystal with sudden calm. "We must yield to brute force. Let us get out and allow this abominable thief to wreak his impious will with us, else we lay ourselves open to further outrage at his hands. Be sure that retribution, swift and certain, will overtake him in the end."
"Come! that's wisely spoken," said the man, who seemed in no way perturbed by the scornful glances which Crystal and Madame now freely darted upon him. He stood a little aside, holding the door open for them to step out of the carriage.
"Where is M. le Comte de Cambray?" queried Crystal as she brushed past him.