“Pray do not go!” said the stranger suddenly—“I should like to talk to you a little longer, if you have no objection. Is there not some place near, where we can go out of this rain and have a glass of wine together?”
Sergius Thord stood irresolute,—gazing at him, half in liking, half in distrust.
“Sir,” he said at last, “I do not know you—and you do not know me. If I told you my name, you would probably not seek my company!”
“Will you tell it?” suggested the stranger cheerfully—“Mine is at your service—Pasquin Leroy. I fear my fame as an author has not reached your ears!”
Thord shook his head.
“No. I have never heard of you. And probably you have never heard of me. My name is Sergius Thord.”
“Sergius Thord!” echoed the stranger; “Now that is truly remarkable! It is a happy coincidence that we should have met to-night. I have just seen your name in this very paper which you caught me reading—see!—the next heading under that concerning the King and the Jesuits—‘Thord’s Rabble.’ Are not you that same Thord?”
“I am!” said Thord proudly, his eyes shining as he took the paper and perused quickly the few flashy lines which described the crowd outside the Cathedral that afternoon, and set him down as a crazy Socialist, and disturber of the peace, “And the ‘rabble’ as this scribbling fool calls it, is the greater part of this city’s population. The King may intimidate his Court; but I, Sergius Thord, with my ‘rabble’ can intimidate both Court and King!”
He drew himself up to his full majestic height—a noble figure of a man with his fine heroic head and eagle-like glance of eye,—and he who had called himself Pasquin Leroy, suddenly held out his hand.
“Let me see more of you, Sergius Thord!” he said,—“You are the very man for me! They say in this paper that you spoke to a great multitude outside the Cathedral this afternoon, and interfered with the religious procession; they also say you are the head of a Society called the Revolutionary Committee;—now let me work for you in some department of that business!”