I retreated, covered by the shining muzzle, to a spot that pleased him.
"Now are we more comfortable," Peyrot observed, pulling a chair over against the wall and seating him, the pistol on his knee. "Monsieur was saying?"
Monsieur crossed his legs, as if of all seats in the world he liked his present one the best. He had brought none of the airs of the noble into this business, realizing shrewdly that they would but hamper him, as lace ruffles hamper a duellist. Peyrot, treeless adventurer, living by his sharp sword and sharp wits, reverenced a count no more than a hod-carrier. His occasional mocking deference was more insulting than outright rudeness; but M. Étienne bore it unruffled. Possibly he schooled himself so to bear it, but I think rather that he felt so easily secure on the height of his gentlehood that Peyrot's impudence merely tickled him.
"I was wondering," he answered pleasantly, "how long you have dwelt in this town and I not known it. You are from Guienne, methinks."
"Carcassonne way," the other said indifferently. Then memory bringing a deep twinkle to his eye, he added: "What think you, monsieur? I was left a week-old babe on the monastery step; was reared up in holiness within its sacred walls; chorister at ten, novice at eighteen, full-fledged friar, fasting, praying, and singing misereres, exhorting dying saints and living sinners, at twenty."
"A very pretty brotherhood, you for sample."
"Nay, I am none. Else I might have stayed. But one night I took leg-bail, lived in the woods till my hair grew, and struck out for Paris. And never regretted it, neither."
He leaned his head back, his eyes fixed contemplatively on the ceiling, and burst into song, in voice as melodious as a lark's:
Piety and Grace and Gloom,
For such like guests I have no room!
Piety and Gloom and Grace,
I bang my door shut in your face!
Gloom and Grace and Piety,
I set my dog on such as ye!
Finishing his stave, he continued to beat time with his heel on the floor and to gaze upon the ceiling. But I think we could not have twitched a finger without his noting it. M. Étienne rose and leaned across the table toward him.