The astonishment, the terror, of the commander can be comprehended. In these words, he saw a divine revelation; he thought he heard the voice of the Lord commanding this expiation, and, contrary to the prediction of the Bohemian, believed that the anger of Heaven had decreed himself to be the victim which should fall under the blows of Pog.
Finally, in accepting the combat, he assured the rescue of Reine des Anbiez; he would return a daughter to her father, and prisoners to their weeping families,—a last proof that divine justice desired to strike him alone, since it offered him the means of repairing the evils his crime had called down upon his own.
When we reflect that the constant remorse of Pierre des Anbiez, while it did not impair his reason, had predisposed him to a sort of religious fatalism by no means orthodox, but calculated to make a deep impression upon his earnest and gloomy nature, we may comprehend the crushing effect produced on him by the language of Hadji.
After a moment’s silence, he said to the Bohemian,
“Go up on deck, I will give you my orders.”
Then he sent for the overseer, and commanded him to conduct Hadji on deck, to watch over him, and to take him under his protection.
CHAPTER XL. THE CHALLENGE
The commander sent for the chaplain of the black galley to descend into his chamber. While Pierre des Anbiez confessed his sins,—with the exception of the murder reserved for the great act of penitence of the order,—and received absolution, the Bohemian went up on deck. The first person whom he met there was the captain of the Holy Terror to the Moors, by the Grace of God.
Hadji, affecting an easy and impertinent familiarity, approached Luquin Trinquetaille and said to him: “Who would have believed, my boy, that we would see each other again here, when that pretty girl enraged you so much by giving me flame-coloured ribbons at Maison-Forte?”