"So poor Monsieur de l'Estang is dead!" he said. "That is a shining light, indeed, put out. He died yesterday evening you say--God forgive me that I should regret him at such a moment as this, and wish that he had been left to us. There was not a nobler or a wiser, or, what is the same thing, a better man in France. I have known him from my childhood, gentlemen, and you must not think me weak that I cannot bear this loss as manly as might be," and he dashed a tear away from his eye. "That they should torture such a venerable form as that!" he added; "that they should stretch upon the rack him, who never pained or tortured any one! These things are too fearful, gentlemen, almost to be believed. The time will come when they shall be looked upon but as a doubtful tale. Is it not six of our pastors, in Poitou alone, that they have broken on the wheel? Out upon them, inhuman savages! Out upon them! I say. But what was this you told me of some ladies having been freed from the prison?--Oh, here is Riquet. Now, sirrah, what are your tidings? Who are these personages from Paris?"
"One of them, Sir," replied Riquet, whose tone was changed in no degree by the new situation in which he was placed, "one of them is your Lordship's own man, or rather your Lordship's man's man, Peter. He is the personage that I left in Paris to give the order for your liberation that you wot of."
"Ay!" said the Count; "what made him so long in following us? He was not detained, by any chance, was he?"
"Oh no, my Lord," replied the valet, "he was not detained, only he thought--he thought--I do not know very well what he thought. But, however, he stayed for two or three days, and is only just come on hither."
"Does he bring any news?" demanded the Count.
"None, but that the Prince de Conti is dead, very suddenly indeed, of the smallpox, caught of his fair wife; that all Protestants are ordered to quit Paris immediately; and that the Duke of Berwick has made formal abjuration."
"I grieve for the Prince de Conti," said the Count, "he was promising and soldier-like; though the other, the young Prince de la Roche-sur-Yon, is full of still higher qualities. So, the boy Duke of Berwick has abjured. That might be expected. No other news?"
"None, my Lord, from him," replied the man, who evidently was a little embarrassed in speaking on the subject of his fellow-servant; and he added immediately, "The other gentleman seems to have news; but he will communicate it to none but yourself."
"I will speak with them both," replied the Count. "Bring them hither immediately, Riquet."
"Why, my Lord," said the valet, "as to Peter, I do not well know where----"