"Stop a minute, I'm not there yet. I was to wait the King's third letter, was I not?"
"Yes, yes," he said impatiently. "You have had two already, and so the next must be the third—any fool can see that!"
"Just so, dear Monsieur Volran; and it was a fool who saw it. Since when was his Majesty among the prophets? Yesterday the second letter came, came because the King was kept waiting, and yet this, written two months ago, foresaw it, and so the next will be the third. How, two months ago, could the King know, there would be need for a second and so promise a third? My compliments on your imagination, but you do not lie well."
"Lie, Monsieur, lie?"
"Bah! Never bluster with your sheath empty; bare hands cannot bully hard steel. God forgive us! but we all lie at times. I did awhile back when I said I knew no Latin. I know one tag—a worthy monk taught it to me a month ago, when, out hawking, the kite missed its stoop. How is this it ran? Laqueo—let me see; laqueo Venantium—ah! I forget. Like you, I am rusty. But I remember its meaning. Shall I translate, Monsieur scholar-tapster? It has something to do with an escape from the snare of the fowler."
"Oh," he cried, stamping, "you shall pay for this!"
With my hand upon the door I turned upon him.
"Dare so much as lift a finger, dare so much as breathe a threat, and King's man though you are, bound up in the same bundle as me though you are, you'll find the Morsigny gallows waiting for you here at La Voulle; nor will Louis say more than, Curse him for a blundering ass! It is I who hold the King's orders, not you; cross me in my obedience at your peril!" and passing out, I struck the door noisily with the letter.
The crackle of the paper was a louder voiced threat than my own, and as such the man I left swearing behind me understood it.