Still the Count kept his temper. "You refuse, then?" he demanded.
"Yes, that I do," answered the governor in a rude tone; "and the sooner you take yourself back to the land the better, for I am in no humour to be trifled with."
It was with difficulty that the Count restrained himself; but there was one chance more, and he tried it.
"Yet another word, my good friend," he said. "There is a matter in which you can favour us without endangering your own safety, or getting into discredit with the government. If we attempt to pass to the ships in what boats we can find, will you pledge me your word that you do not fire into them?"
"If you do not make haste away from the gates of this fortress," replied the governor, who saw, by the quivering of the Count's lip the contempt that he could not help feeling, "I will fire upon you where you are, and will sink the boat of every traitor that comes within shot."
"Sir," said the Count, "you are a dastardly, pitiful, contemptible scoundrel. It is only happy for you that the drawbridge is between us, or I would treat you like an ill-conditioned hound, and lash you within an inch of your life under my horse's feet."
"You shall hear more, traitor; you shall hear more in a minute," replied the governor. "And mind I tell you, the faster you go the better for you."
Thus saying, he turned away, and mounted the zigzag staircase in the rock with a rapid step. The Count paused, and turned his horse; but at that very moment he saw a party of horsemen at the other end of the causeway apparently coming towards him with great speed, part of them upon the sands, which by this time had been left dry, part of them following the road in the midst.
"It is Du Bar and the rest," said he, in a low voice, to one of the gentlemen near him. "I have a very great mind to stay here, and try to punish that fellow for his insolence. I could swim that little bit of sea in a moment, and the drawbridge once in our possession, the castle would be ours."
"Count, Count," shouted the officer of the guard from the fortress-side of the drawbridge "for God's sake make haste and ride back. I hear that governor of ours giving orders for charging the cannon with grape. He will fire upon you as sure as I am alive, for he sent word to the Chevalier d'Evran last night that he would do so."