"I think," said she contemptuously, with a glance at the scattered group in the alcove, "we could soon be alone if Monseigneur thought it desirable."
Of the hint and the contempt I alike took no notice, of the latter because of the former; the threat that underlay it fixed me to my seat. To have moved then, was to move upon compulsion. But as we continued our play with the dice as if the words had never been said, her companion interposed hastily.
"No, no. I confess I thought of that before you came. But brawling would serve neither you nor me, no, nor those who—who—trust us."
"That there is trust between us, Monseigneur, I am glad to know," she answered, "for as yet, I have not seen much of it—on one side."
So far they had spoken with no pretence at concealment, their object, I surmised, being to disabuse us of all suspicion of deep matters. But now their voices fell to a murmur, over which the click of the dice on the wood of the table sounded to my tense nerves like a clash of swords. Let it be remembered that I was but a country lad. All this was new to me, and the pricking threat of danger, the secrecy, the very air of Paris itself, fired my blood.
And so the minutes passed; the girl—I was sure she was a girl, so sweet was her voice, so gentle, and with a stirring music in it that was strange to me in women's voices. Since then I have heard a like music throbbing from a bird's song in the pure blue of a summer's noon, and been thrilled by it as I was then; yes, I was sure it was a girl.
The girl it was who spoke most, spoke with a varying mood that charmed and angered me; even when mechanically flinging the dice I feigned not to see the eagerness, the insistence, the passion, the pleading whose murmured words fell like tears. What right had that stolid clod—clod was what Paris had called us in her streets, and the name stuck—what right had he to be so coldly unmoved, so silent, that he only answered her by a word or a gesture of denial? But she would take no denial, and with the brave spirit of a good woman returned to her pleading, pushing the petition home urgently, even strengthening her arguments by two outstretched arms, and a hand upon his shoulder. How did I know all that? Ah! every clod on which the sun strikes has a soul within it, and so I knew.
Yet what did he answer?
"All must be as the King wills," said he, his words roughening with distinctness as if he were not altogether sorry to be overheard. "All as the King wills, remember that, Mademoiselle. He is the potter, I the clay; he is everything, I nothing—nothing."
"Nothing!" she echoed, her voice rising level with his own, "why! all France knows that you are the King in everything but name. What you say to-day, Louis says to-morrow; why deny it? Let us come to the bare truth. We desire peace, desire it with all our heart, and you say you will do nothing. Is that to be your answer, Monseigneur?"