Mario eluded the outrage by darting nimbly under the reitre's foot, and, standing in front of the other brute, said to him coolly:
"I am here, and this is my message; for I gave your lieutenant the countersign. You cannot stay in this inn, because a large body of armed men is coming here to-night. You cannot attack the château, which is well guarded. You must go back where you came from, or you will get into trouble; Sancho sends this message to you."
"Your Sancho is truly an old ass," retorted the captain.
And he added, accompanying each word with an oath which it is hardly worth while to repeat in order to convey an idea of the charm of his conversation:
"I haven't travelled a hundred leagues through a hostile country to go back empty-handed. Go and tell the man who sent you that Captain Macabre knows the country better than he does and cares devilish little about a well-guarded château! Tell him that I have forty horsemen, for there are fifteen more behind me, who are coming on in charge of my wife, and that forty reitres are as good as an army. Come, off with you, and go to the devil, gypsy!"
"Don't send him away, captain," said Saccage, who seemed the more judicious member of the council; "it's of no use for us to have anything more to do with that Spanish lunatic and that gypsy scum. It is quite unnecessary to send this sharp young messenger to say that you are going on. They would follow us and would simply embarrass us and burn and rob all around us. Do what your wife told you. Stay here till midnight, and then you will arrive long before daybreak, for it's only two leagues from here to Briantes. So don't let this little fellow go. I'll throw him out of the window, if you choose; that will prevent his running."
"No! no unnecessary severity," bleated the captain in falsetto. "I have become a humane and gentle man since I have had a tender-hearted spouse. Is the house properly guarded?"
"A fly could not get in without my permission."
"Then let us sup in peace, as soon as my Proserpine arrives. Have you given orders?"
"Yes; but in spite of Madame Proserpine's fine promises about the comforts of this inn, we shall sup but poorly here, I am afraid. The wonderful cook of whom she said so much is in bed, at the point of death, and the woman is losing her wits. The servant is a traitor whom we have to watch, and the maid is a frightened old fool who breaks everything she touches and doesn't forward matters."