"That it should be this fool, of all fools!" he began. "Who shall say there is no such thing as luck? Monsieur, I am sure it will please you to know into whose hands you have fallen."
He took off his mask, and there was the red-splashed face of Captain Ferragant.
Surprise made me dumb for a moment, for he had hitherto disguised his voice. He sat looking at me with a most cruel expression of malevolent triumph.
"So, this is where you have fled,—and you are the chief of the robbers!" said I.
"Call me that if you like. It matters nothing what names you prefer to use. No ears will ever hear them but mine; and mine will not be long afflicted with the sound."
I shuddered, for I knew the implacability of this man, and my death meant the death of the Countess,—death in the dark, mouldy basement of the tower, death by stifling and starvation while she waited in vain for me, a slow and solitary death, rendered the more agonizing to her mind by suspense and fears. And this horrible fate must needs be hers just when the cause of her sorrows and dangers had been removed! It was a thought not to be endured.
"You will have your jest," said I. "But I see no reason why you should bear me malice. The Count de Lavardin is now a dead man, I hear. I can no longer be against him, nor you for him. Therefore bygones should be bygones, and I suppose you will make terms with me as with any other man who happened to come before you as I do."
"You do me an injustice, young gentleman: I am not so mercenary,—I do not always make terms. It is true, I served the Count for pay; that is what my company is for, and if he had not gone out of his chateau to hunt his wife, we might have defended the place till the enemy was tired out. But he allowed himself to be caught in the road,—you have heard the news, then? What do they say of me?"
"That when you saw the Count was killed, you ran away."
"Yes, I was of no use to the Count then, and his own men in the chateau were not well inclined toward me. They were for giving up the place, the moment he was dead. I thought best to save my good fellows for better service elsewhere."