"Where's François d'Hergemont?"
Vorski no doubt considered that chance had placed an unexpected trump in his hands and that the game was perhaps not absolutely lost, for he maintained an obstinate silence.
"You refuse to answer?" asked Don Luis. "One . . . two . . . three times: do you refuse? . . . Very well!"
He gave a low whistle.
Four men appeared from a corner of the hall, four men with swarthy faces, resembling Moors. Like Don Luis, they wore jackets and sailor's caps with shiny peaks.
A fifth person arrived almost immediately afterwards, a wounded French officer, who had lost his right leg and wore a wooden leg in its place.
"Ah, is that you, Patrice?" said Don Luis.
He introduced him formally:
"Captain Patrice Belval, my greatest friend; Mr. Vorski, a Hun."
Then he asked: