"Yes, some half-league from Vlaye and three leagues from here. You have heard of Vlaye, then, Monsieur--Monsieur des Voeux?"
"Without doubt, M. le Vicomte."
"Indeed! In what way, may I ask?" There was a faint tinge of suspicion in his tone.
"At Rochechouart I was told that the roads in that direction were not over safe."
The Vicomte laughed in his sardonic fashion. "They begin to cry out, do they?" he said. "The fat burgesses who fleece us? Not very safe, ha, ha! The roads! Not so safe as their back-shops where they lend to us at cent per cent!"--with bitterness. "It is well that there is some one to fleece them in their turn!"
"They told me as much as that," des Ageaux replied with gravity. "So much, indeed, that I was surprised to find your gates still open! They gave me to understand that no man slept without a guard within four leagues of Vlaye."
"They told you that, did they?" the Vicomte answered. And he chuckled, well satisfied. It pleased him to think that if he and his could no longer keep Jacques Bonhomme in order, there were others who could. "They told you not far from the truth. A little later, and you had been barred out even here. Not that I fear the Captain of Vlaye. Hawks pike not out hawks' eyes," with a lifting of the head, and an odd show of arrogance. "We are good friends, M. de Vlaye and I."
"Still you bar your gates, soon or late?" the Lieutenant replied with a smile.
A shadow fell across the Vicomte's face. "Not against him," he said shortly.
"No, of course not," des Voeux replied. "I had forgotten. You have the Crocans also at no great distance. I was forgetting them."