“The man’s an arrant coward. Ten guineas that he doesn’t come. Why, monsieur, he couldn’t have entrapped us better himself. Ye’ve made the bait too tempting. He’ll smell a rat.”
“Pouf! Cornbury, he has it all his own way. Twenty guineas that he comes.”
Cornbury did not answer; he was bending towards the door, his mouth and eyes agape, as though to make his hearing better. But only the clatter of the game and the sound of the coarsened voices of the players came up the dimly lighted stairway. Upon the coming of this man hung Mornay’s only chance for success.
Five minutes they waited in silence, but at last there was a sound of footsteps upon the stairs, and in a moment Captain Ferrers and Mr. Wynne stood before them. The exuberance and confidence of Captain Ferrers’s smile found no echo in the face of Wynne, who looked sullenly and suspiciously at Cornbury and the Frenchman, as though the adventure were little to his liking. Mornay arose from his bench with great politeness, the perfection of courtesy and good-will, and waved Captain Ferrers to a seat. Cornbury sat puffing volumes of smoke, with an appearance of great contentment and unconcern.
Captain Ferrers was clearly taken off his guard, and his smile became the broader. He had at first thought Monsieur Mornay’s promise to come to the Fleece a mere French flippancy. Surely, after what had happened he could expect no clemency from Ferrers. Monsieur Mornay would have been flattered had he known how much of Captain Ferrers’s thoughts he had occupied during the last few hours. The Frenchman’s demeanor in the house of Mistress Clerke, his earnestness, his self-confidence, his assurance and poise, outdid anything that Ferrers remembered of that presumptuous person. A man with one leg in the grave or a lifetime of imprisonment staring him in the face would only play such a part because of one or two circumstances: he was using a desperate resort to gain some great end—perhaps to influence Mistress Barbara for clemency in the case of the death of Sir Henry Heywood; or else he was the real heir of the estate which Mistress Barbara was enjoying. To tell the truth, Ferrers did not care what he was. If the Frenchman came to the Fleece Tavern, he would be in the Tower by midnight. The prison would know no distinctions. He hated this man as one hates another to whom he is under obligations and who has done him a great injury. And if he was the real heir, come to dispossess Mistress Barbara and balk him in a marriage that meant a fortune beyond the wildest dreams, the worse for him. He should suffer for it!
All of these things passed again somewhat heavily through his mind. The air of unconcern and assurance which he met in the faces of both Mornay and the Irishman disarmed him. He thought how easy it had been to gain his ends, and comfortably fingered the whistle in his pocket with which he should presently call in his hounds upon his enemy. Nor would his pistols be required. If he had wished he could have sent his constables up from below to take these men in the trap they had made for themselves. But he enjoyed the situation. It was as easy as a game of quinze with the mirror behind your opponent’s back.
“Monsieur Ferraire,” began Mornay, pleasantly, “I am meeting you to-night at great risk of my life. I thank you that you have kept my plans and this rendezvous a secret.”
Ferrers’s small eyes blinked as though they had been liberally peppered, but the smile did not disappear.