Boldly, a little uncertainly, as the soldier had walked, the mountebank, now, to all appearance, a man of the ranks in the service of his Excellency, the Governor, strode down the wide, stone-paved way separating the outhouses and a number of desultory ancient structures from the officers' quarters, hard against the ramparts. In the sky's dome the stars still shone, although a small mottled patch of cloud obscured the moon; on either side no lights appeared in windows, and friendly shadows favored him, until he approached at the end of the way the broad, open entrance between the soldiers' barracks and the officers' row. There, set in the stone above the key of the time-worn arch, flared a smoky lamp, dimly revealing the surrounding details; but the young man did not stop; had drawn quite close to the medieval structure, when unexpectedly another tread, on the soldiers' side of the entrance, mingled with his own; rang for a moment in unison; then jingled out of time. He who approached came to a sudden standstill; cast a quick glance over his shoulder, only to be brought to an abrupt realization that it was now too late to retreat. A black silhouette, suddenly precipitated across the pavement, preceded a dark figure that stepped quickly out and barred the way, while at the same time, a voice, loud and incisive, challenged.
CHAPTER XXI
THE STAIRWAY OF SILVER
The stillness of the moment that followed was tense; then thickly the young man answered something irrelevant about a clown, a bottle and a loaf; with cap drawn down and half-averted face, he lurched a little forward in the darkness, and the sentinel's weapon fell. "Oh, that's you, is it, Henri?" he said in a different tone, stepping back. "How did you leave the fellow?"
"Eating the bread and calling for more!" As he spoke, the other stopped, swaying uncertainly; above the arch, the wick, ill-trimmed, brightened and darkened to the drafts of air through break and slit of the old lamp; and briefly he awaited a favorable moment, when the flame blew out until almost extinguished; then with hand near sword-hilt, somewhat over-briskly, but in keeping with the part, he stepped toward the arch; through it, and quickly past the sentinel.
"You seem to have been feasting and drinking a little yourself, to-night, comrade?" called out the latter after him. "I noticed it when you went in, and— But aren't you taking the wrong way?" As the other, after starting toward the barracks, straightened, and then abruptly wheeled into the road, running up the Mount.
"Bah!" A moment the young man paused. "Can't a soldier," articulating with difficulty, "go to see his sweetheart without—"
"Eh bien!" The sentinel shrugged his shoulders. "It isn't my business. I think, though, I know where they'll put you to-morrow, when they find out through the guard at the barracks."
To this ominous threat the other deigned no response, only, after the fashion of a man headstrong in insobriety, as well as in affairs of gallantry, continued his upward way; at first, speedily; afterward, when beyond hearing of the man below, with more stealth and as little noise as possible, until the road, taking a sudden angle, brought him abruptly to an open space at the foot of a great flight of stone stairs.