"D'Halluys?" cried Victor, stepping back.
"Yes, Monsieur. Pardon the intrusion, but I have something to say to Monsieur le Chevalier."
He bared his head, looked serenely into Victor's doubting eyes, and turned to the Chevalier, whose face was without any sign of welcome or displeasure. "Monsieur," the vicomte began, "it is very embarrassing—Patience, Monsieur de Saumaise!" for Victor had laid his hand upon his sword; "my errand is purely pacific. It is very embarrassing, then, to approach a man so deeply in trouble as yourself. I know not what madness seized you to-night. I am not here to offer you sympathy; sympathy is cheap consolation. I am here to say that no man shall in my presence speak lightly of your misfortune. Let me be frank with you. I have often envied your success in Paris; and there were times when this envy was not unmixed with hate. But a catastrophe like that to-night wipes out such petty things as envy and hate."
"Take care, Monsieur," said Victor haughtily. He believed that he caught an undercurrent of raillery.
"Why, Monsieur, what have I said?" looking from one to the other.
"Proceed, Vicomte," said the Chevalier, motioning Victor to be quiet. He was curious to learn what the vicomte had to say.
"To continue, then: you are a man of extraordinary courage, and I have always admired you even while I envied you. To-night I lost to you some fifty pistoles. Give me the happiness of crossing out this trifling debt," and the vicomte counted out fifty golden pistoles which he laid on the table. There was no particle of offense in his actions.
"To prove to you my entire good will, I will place my life into your keeping, Monsieur le Chevalier. Doubtless Saumaise has told you that at present Paris is uninhabitable both to himself and to me. The shadows of the Bastille and the block cast their gloom upon us. We have conspired against the head of the state, which is Mazarin. There is a certain paper, which, if seen by the cardinal, will cause the signing of our death warrants. Monsieur de Saumaise, have you any idea who stole your cloak?"
"It was not my cloak, Monsieur," said Victor, with a frown; "it was loaned to me by Monsieur le Chevalier."
"Yours?" cried the vicomte, turning to the Chevalier.