"Greeting to the best, the most faithful friend of the woman whom I most love and venerate in the world; greeting to Victoria's foster-brother."
"Your speech is true. I am the obscurest but also the most devoted friend of Victoria," I answered looking fixedly at Tetrik, "and it is the duty of a friend to unmask scamps and traitors."
"I am of your opinion, friend Schanvoch," Tetrik answered with simplicity. "A friend's first duty is to unmask scamps and traitors. I fear the roaring lion with its jaws wide open less than the serpent that creeps in the dark."
"Now, then, I, Schanvoch, have this to say to you, Tetrik. You are one of the dangerous reptile that you have just mentioned. I consider you a traitor! And I purpose to unmask your treason!"
"Schanvoch!" cried Victoria interrupting me in a reproachful tone.
"I perceive that the old Gallic love for raillery, one of our franchises, has returned with our gods and our freedom," replied the governor smiling.
And turning to Victoria he added:
"Our friend Schanvoch possesses the art of dry humor—the most amusing of all—"
"My brother speaks seriously and out of an honorable impulse," the Mother of the Camps broke in saying. "And I grieve thereat, since I know that he is mistaken; but he is sincere in his error—"
Tetrik let his eyes wander alternately from Victoria to me with no little amazement; for a moment he was silent; thereupon he said in a serious and penetrating voice: