The Bat, with the light touch of one who had handled many a dying man, felt the Duke's pulse, without rousing him. "He will bear it," he said, "in a litter."
"Over that road? Think what a road it is!"
"Needs must!"
"He brought the money, found me gone, and followed," des Ageaux murmured in a voice softening by feeling. "You think we dare take him?"
"To leave him to the Captain of Vlaye were worse."
"Worse for us," des Ageaux muttered doubtfully. "That is true."
"Worse for all," the Bat grunted. He took liberties in private that for all the world he would not have had suspected.
Still his master, who had been so firm above-stairs, hung undecided over the sick man's couch. "M. de Vlaye would not be so foolish as to harm him," he said.
"He would only pluck him!" the Bat retorted. "And wing us with the first feather, the Lady Countess with the second, the Crocans with the third, and the King with the fourth." He stopped. It was a long speech for him.
Des Ageaux assented. "Yes, he is the master-card," he said slowly. "I suppose we must take him. But Heavens knows how we shall get him there."