"Not of mankind, M. Étienne. Only of Lucas. Not of Monsieur, or you, or Vigo."
"And of Mayenne?"
"I don't make out Mayenne," I answered. "I thought he was the worst of the crew. But he let me go. He said he would, and he did."
"Think you he meant to let you go from the first?"
"Who knows?" I said, shrugging. "Lucas is always lying. But Mayenne—sometimes he lies and sometimes not. He's base, and then again he's kind. You can't make out Mayenne."
"He does not mean you shall," M. Étienne returned. "Yet the key is not buried. He is made up, like all the rest of us, of good and bad."
"Monsieur," I said, "if there is any bad in the St. Quentins I, for one, do not know it."
"Ah, Félix," he cried, "you may believe that till doomsday—you will—of Monsieur."
His face clouded a little, and he fell silent. I knew that, besides his thoughts of his lady, came other thoughts of his father. He sat gravely silent. But of last night's bitter distress he showed no trace. Last night he had not been able to take his eyes from the miserable past; but to-day he saw the future. A future not altogether flowery, perhaps, but one which, however it turned out, should not repeat the old mistakes and shames.
"Félix," he said at length, "I see nothing for it but to eat my pride."