"Yes," I answered, with a touch of bitterness. "I wish they had not shot my poor man before they went."
He shrugged his shoulders. "They were my friends," he said. "You must not expect me to blame them. But that is not all."
"No," I said, wiping my sword. "There is this gentleman in the mask." And I turned to go towards him.
"M. de Berault!" There was something abrupt in the way in which Cocheforêt called my name after me.
I stood. "Pardon?" I said, turning.
"That gentleman?" he answered, hesitating, and looking at me doubtfully. "Have you considered--what will happen to him, if you give him up to the authorities?"
"Who is he?" I said sharply.
"That is rather a delicate question," he answered, frowning, and still looking at me fixedly.
"Not from me," I replied brutally, "since he is in my power. If he will take off his mask, I shall know better what I intend to do with him."
The stranger had lost his hat in his fall, and his fair hair, stained with dust, hung in curls on his shoulders. He was a tall man, of a slender, handsome presence, and though his dress was plain and almost rough, I espied a splendid jewel on his hand, and fancied I detected other signs of high quality. He still lay against the bank in a half-swooning condition, and seemed unconscious of my scrutiny. "Should I know him if he unmasked?" I said suddenly, a new idea in my head.