The marshal of France raised his hand from the table as if commanding silence. His suave and courtier-like demeanour had changed into something more natural to the man. There came the gaunt forward thrust of a wolf on the trail into the set of his head. His long teeth gleamed, and his eyelids closed down upon his eyes till these became mere twinkling points.
"I have that at hand which hath already tamed the lion," he said, "and is able to lead him into the cage with cords of silk."
He rose from the table, and, going to a curtain that concealed the narrow door of an antechamber, he drew it aside, and there came forth, clothed in a garment of gold and green, close-fitting and fine, clasped about the waist with a twining belt of jewelled snakes, the Lady Sybilla.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE LION TAMER
On this summer afternoon the girl's beauty seemed more wondrous and magical than ever. Her eyes were purple-black, like the berries of the deadly nightshade seen in the twilight. Her face was pale, and the scarlet of her lips lay like twin geranium petals on new-fallen snow.
Gilles de Retz followed her with a certain grim and ghastly pride, as he marked the sensation caused by her entrance.
"This," he said, "is my lion tamer!"