And, gathering up all the energy of which the human heart is capable, he had made a supreme effort at the decisive moment, and kept his word.
Turning quietly to his counsel at the moment when the last words of the president were lost among the din of the crowd, he said,—
“Did I not tell you that the day would come when you yourself would be the first to put a weapon into my hands?”
M. Folgat rose promptly.
He showed neither the anger nor the disappointment of an advocate who has just had a cause which he knew to be just.
“That day has not come yet,” he replied. “Remember your promise. As long as there remains a ray of hope, we shall fight. Now we have much more than mere hope at this moment. In less than a month, in a week, perhaps to-morrow, we shall have our revenge.”
The unfortunate man shook his head.
“I shall nevertheless have undergone the disgrace of a condemnation,” he murmured.
The taking the ribbon of the Legion of Honor from his buttonhole, he handed it to M. Folgat, saying—
“Keep this in memory of me, and if I never regain the right to wear it”—