"Sent by old Pierre when he heard we were coming for you!" added the poet. "Your drinking-cups, lads! Unfasten the skin for yourselves! To mon capitaine!"—
Once, twice, deeply they drank—toast and vintage alike to their taste; then straightening, looked at the Black Seigneur whose eyes yet burned in the direction my lady had gone. With a start he seemed to recall himself to the demands of the moment; his first questions they expected; the ship—where did she lie? Snug and trim in a neighboring cove, ready to slip out, if occasion required and danger pressed—which contingency they did not just then expect, since at the moment was his Excellency more concerned with affairs on the land than matters pertaining to the sea. What these paramount interests were, the young man, on whose thin cheek now burned a little color, did not at once ask; only gazed inquiringly over the group, where one, whom he might have expected, was absent.
"Sanchez—he is not with you?"
A look of constraint appeared for an instant on the poet's face.
"No, he's with the people, I expect. You see," he went on, "things have been happening since you elected to enact the mountebank. The bees have been busy, and this little hive they call France is now full of bother and bustle. The bees that work have been buzzing about those that don't; they made a great noise at Versailles, but the King Drone only listened; did not try to stop it, fearing their sting. They hummed at the door of the Bastille, until the parasite bees, not liking the music, opened the doors, let them all in—"
"The Bastille has fallen?" The listener's voice rang out; his eyes, searching sharply the features of the bard, seemed to demand only the truth, plain, unadorned.
"It has," answered the other gravely. "And the tune sung in and around Paris has kept on spreading until now it is everywhere! You may hear it in the woods; along the marshes; out over the strand! The very Mount, immovable, seems to listen. When will the storm break? To-day? To-morrow? It needs but a word from Paris, and then—"
The poet broke off, and silently the Black Seigneur seemed to be weighing the purport of the news; for some moments stood as a man deep in thought; then, arousing himself, spoke a few words, and gave a brief order. Swiftly the riders swept away in the direction from which they had come, and only when they had gone some distance did the young man once more turn to the poet with a question. Whereupon the latter, spurring his horse nearer his chief, launched into eloquent explanation.
"And then," ended the bard, "the Governor's daughter walked into our ambush as unsuspectingly as a mouse into a trap!"
"The Governor's daughter cozened by Nanette!"