The marquis stirred and drew his hand across his lips. "Where is Monsieur le Comte?"
"He is waiting in the hall. Shall I call … ?"
"Wait!" interrupted the marquis. Presently he cleared his throat and said in a thin, dry voice: "Tell Monsieur le Comte for me that I am sleeping and may not be disturbed."
"Monsieur," said Jehan that night, "pardon, but do you ever … do you ever think of Margot Bourdaloue?"
The marquis raised himself as though to hurl a curse at his luckless servant. But all he said was; "Sometimes, Jehan, sometimes!"
CHAPTER XXV
OF ORIOLES AND WOMAN'S PREROGATIVES
"Tell Monsieur le Comte for me that I am sleeping and may not be disturbed!"
All through the long night the marquis's thin, piercing voice rang in the Chevalier's ears, and rang with sinister tone. He could find no ease upon his pillow, and he stole quietly forth into the night. He wandered about the upper town, round the cathedral, past the Ursulines, under the frowning walls of the citadel, followed his shadow in the moonlight and went before it. Those grim words had severed the last delicate thread which bound father and son. To have humiliated himself! To have left open in his armor a place for such a thrust! He had gone with charity and forgiveness, to be repulsed! He had held forth his hand, to find the other's withdrawn!