“And me, citizen? Dost thou remember the Abbaye St Germain and the killings of September?”
I struck in with the question. I was willing, I think, for the girl’s sake, to identify myself with a past incident.
He looked at me bitterly, but with no recognition in his eyes.
“I deplore the cursed fortune,” he cried in grief, “that preserved me but for this!”
“How now, old fool!” said Crépin, with impatience. “Thou shalt go free when Michel has revealed to me thy secret place of hoarding.”
M. de Lâge gave the crying snarl of a wolf.
“Let him go—the ingrate and the traitor! What, Michel! dost thou mangle the hand that gave thee soft litter for thy couch and honest bread for thy belly? Look, Michel!—the white garlands on the walls there! Dost thou remember how thou wrought’st them to pleasure thy mistress—to win her from the depression she suffered in the sombre oak and its long history of gloom? There they cling unfinished,—thy solemn rebuke, Michel. Thy attachment to her was the one reality, thou wouldst say, in a world of shadows, and yet the blatant fanfare of those shadows was all that was needed to win thee from the reality. And what is the price of thy kiss, Judas?”
The man hung his head.
“Not your life, monsieur,” he muttered.
“Nay; but only that which makes my life endurable. And the forfeit—what is that?”