“There is only one thing for me to do,” he said, in bitter mockery of his son’s words. “If you mean what you say, if you hold the beliefs you avow, you leave at once and for ever the house of de Clapiers, you will never look on me or your mother again, and you will not obtain from me a single louis if you are starving—as you will starve in your folly and wickedness.”
The old clock struck the half-hour. Those same bells had chimed when Luc had first come into his father’s presence in his fine uniform and been blessed with proud gladness by the man who was spurning him now.
Luc trembled a little, then sat down.
“I meant,” he replied, “all I said, Monseigneur.”
“And I also mean what I say.”
Luc was silent; his hands fell into his lap. His father remained motionless, erect, hard, grey in the grey shadows.
“I must go—even on these terms I must go.” His voice was yearning, full of regret, of sorrow, but not of weakness.
“Then go—at once.”
The young man got to his feet.
“Like—this?”