But an order from the top of the stairs fell like a thunderbolt on the captives: Madame Proserpine summoned Master Pignoux and his wife to her presence.
"I will come, I am coming, as fast as I can!" cried the hostess, hurrying upstairs.
And she appeared before the lieutenantess and respectfully requested to know her wishes, taking care not to seem to recognize her, or else to humble herself before her as a personage of vastly greater consequence than the servant who used to take the marquis's little dogs out to walk.
"My orders were for your husband to appear also," observed La Bellinde, flattered by Madame Pignoux's submission. "Go and call him, my good woman."
"Excuse me," said La Pignoux, "my husband is in a terrible heat, and too much smoked up to appear in a dirty cap and apron before a lady like you."
"Do you think that you are more enticing, you old gallows-bird?" cried the captain. "Bah! you can't fool me. I want to see the face of your donkey of a husband, and no excuse will go down. Look you, rascals," he said to La Proserpine's attendants, "how happens it that when your lieutenant gives an order, you make her repeat it? Death of my life! Must I go myself and fetch that double-dyed traitor?"
At that moment, Bois-Doré, who had been compelled by force to ascend the staircase, was pushed into the room, and so roughly that he well-nigh fell on his knees at La Proserpine's feet.
Poor Mario followed, trembling with fear for him and with wrath against the villainous troopers. If his old father had fallen, the child would have lost patience and have defended him at the risk of being cut in pieces.
Luckily for them both, the marquis did not lose his head and determined to risk everything, staking his fate on the success of his disguise.
As luck would have it, Proserpine paid no heed to his features. She knew the genuine Pignoux very well; she did not deign to raise her eyes to his face at once, engrossed as she was by the exceedingly familiar homage paid to her by Lieutenant Saccage, who, being seated by her side, made the most of every moment when Macabre was not watching them closely.