His companion nodded approvingly.
"So much will see us through—that is, with care. Give them here to me," he added after a moment's thought; "I will pay them out with more economy, being of the country through which we pass."
But Laurence, though sufficiently headlong and reckless, had not been born a Scot for naught.
"Wait till there is necessity," he replied cautiously, "and the angels shall not be lacking. Till then they are quite safe with me. For security I carry them in a secret place ill to be gotten at hastily."
Gilles de Sillé turned away with some movement of impatience, yet without saying another word upon the subject.
"To the stables," he said; then turning to the concierge he added, "I suppose we can have horses to ride after my lord?"
"So far as I am concerned," growled Labord, "you can have all the horses you want—and break your necks off each one of them if you will. It will save some good hemp and hangman's hire. Such devil's dogs as you two be bear your dooms ready written on your faces."
And this saying nettled our Laurence, who prided himself no little on an allure blonde and gallant.
But Gilles de Sillé cared no whit for the servitor's sneers, so long as they got horses between their knees and escaped out of Paris that night. In an hour they were ready to start, and Laurence had expended one of his gold angels on the provend for the journey, which his companion and he stored in their saddle-bags.
And in this manner, like an idle lad who for mischief puts body and soul in peril, went forth Laurence MacKim to take up service with the redoubtable Messire Gilles de Laval, Sieur de Retz, High Chamberlain of Charles the Seventh, Marshal of France, and lately companion-in-arms of the martyred Maid of Orleans.