“You are quite right, Monsieur, there is nothing that can give me the least pleasure; I find everything very miserable and stale.”
“Yet,” said Luc, thinking of the black coffin, “probably you are afraid of death.”
The cynic crossed himself with a trembling hand and paled perceptibly.
“How dare you use that word?” he cried. “Have I not said that I will not hear it? But those who believe are saved,” he added, with more animation than he had yet shown, “and I am saved, for I believe. No one can say that I am not a religious man.”
“You hang between loathing of life and fear of damnation, then,” returned Luc, marvelling. “Monsieur, I very greatly pity you that your superstitions bring you no greater comfort.”
“Superstitions?”
“I take it you are a Christian,” said the Marquis calmly.
The other shrank back from him.
“And you?” he asked.
“I follow a creed that enables me to smile at death and hell-fire,” said Luc simply.