The duke listened with an ironical smile.
“They did not deceive me, then, when they told me that this army of rebels had a chaplain! Ah! Monsieur, you should sink to the earth with shame. You, a priest, mingle with such scoundrels as these—with these enemies of our good King and of our holy religion! Do not deny this! Your haggard features, your swollen eyes, your disordered attire soiled with dust and mud betray your guilt. Must I, a soldier, remind you of what is due your sacred calling? Hold your peace, Monsieur, and depart!”
The counsel for the prisoner sprang up.
“We demand,” they cried, “that this witness be heard. He must be heard! Military commissions are not above the laws that regulate ordinary tribunals.”
“If I do not speak the truth,” resumed the abbe, “I am a perjured witness, worse yet, an accomplice. It is your duty, in that case, to have me arrested.”
The duke’s face expressed a hypocritical compassion.
“No, Monsieur le Cure,” said he, “I shall not arrest you. I would avert the scandal which you are trying to cause. We will show your priestly garb the respect the wearer does not deserve. Again, and for the last time, retire, or I shall be obliged to employ force.”
What would further resistance avail? Nothing. The abbe, with a face whiter than the plastered walls, and eyes filled with tears, came back to his place beside Maurice.
The lawyers, meanwhile, were uttering their protests with increasing energy. But the duke, by a prolonged hammering upon the table with his fists, at last succeeded in reducing them to silence.
“Ah! you wish testimony!” he exclaimed. “Very well, you shall have it. Soldiers, bring in the first witness.”