“You see, Jean,” she said, “how little this wretch knows me! I would rather die ten times over than be his mistress. People are dying all around us all the time, and we shall go anyhow, a little sooner or a little later, and it doesn’t matter, particularly as you are to go too.”
“Certainly,” replied Jean with equal coolness. “You never were a coward, Diane, and most women, I think, would die rather than become this man’s mistress. As for myself”—Jean snapped his fingers in the air—“I have been looking death in the eye for ten months. It isn’t so bad, I assure you.”
Egmont, looking at them, flew into a maniacal rage. He reviled them, using horrible language. He cursed them; he laughed at them like a fiend. His revenge was not complete, because he could not conquer their souls and destroy their courage as he could kill and mutilate their bodies.
Two raps on the floor brought the guards.
“Take this scoundrel,” he said, “and put him in a cell. Lock this woman up. Twenty-four hours will see the end of all of them.”
“Have courage, Jean,” cried Diane, as she walked away between her jailers. “I promise you to die before I become the mistress of this man or any other man.”
The next day at noon a shuffling procession of a jailer and two National Guards opened the door of François’ cell, and walked in. The jailer, a good-natured ruffian, read the name and number written on the door, and then said to François:
“You, Jean Leroux, are to be shot at six o’clock this evening.”
“All right,” answered François, cheerfully. “I ask one thing—I should like to see the Bishop of Bienville, who is in this corridor. He can’t help me to escape, he is too fat, but I should like to see him.”
There are as many kinds of murderers as there are murders, and the jailer in this case was an amiable murderer.