"He'll kill himself, the fool," muttered Todd. "The mist piles in like thin cotton."
"It is too late even for his death to be of assistance," said Ronsard, with bitter animosity. His small eyes darted loathing after his young compatriot. He thrust pudgy hands deep into pockets below the equator of his belt, and rocked to and fro on his heels. Suddenly the pent-up discomfort, the apprehension, the strain of the situation clutched him anew. "God!" he cried aloud, and shook himself until the fat trembled. "As you say, Monsieur, no man is worth all this, nor woman either, least of all that puling hind yonder! Only a great cause is worth it,—the service for one's native land. I have tried to think of France—of France only. My country is to be cheated. I can do nothing; yet still I wallow in this tepid slime! How has it come about? You will give Haganè the paper, if he brings the woman with him!" He broke off, and after a keen look into Todd's unresponsive face began to walk in short, broken steps up and down the stone flooring.
His words had rung out clearly. Pierre must have heard each one; but if so, he made no sign. Pierre had now but one thing to think of,—his price, the woman that would soon be here.
Todd leaned against a corner pedestal, and Ronsard, after a moment, paused in his meaningless exercise, and stood again before his colleague. The two pairs of eyes met and fenced. Todd might have been made of wood. After a long glance Ronsard freed his right hand from its pocket and began pulling at the moist, red underlip. "You will of course, in any case, give up the paper at first appearance of Haganè and Madame?" His voice slid querulously upward with interrogation in the pause.
"Yes," said Todd, distinctly. "I conceive it to be my part to return the paper at that moment."
"Er—had we not better pause to see whether Madame tends to prove after all—recalcitrant?"
"The bargain said nothing of that. Pierre gets his price,—the person of Yuki, so they always worded it; Haganè gets the paper. It is simple enough. We don't need a lightning-calculator."
"Hark!" said Pierre, pausing, stricken, just beneath them. "Is it not the sound of—wheels?"
All became silent, alert, intent. The faint, low crackle and clatter of a kuruma on gravel, a vehicle slowly drawn, came apparently from the far end of the garden, just under the spot where the moon rose.
From the battlements of the white house beside them, the great pale house standing upright like an opened volume in the night, a queer flutter came, swart wings went beating against the stars, and a crow laughed aloud with raucous joy.