"Back, back!" she cried, "or you are a dead man—or frog—or monkey—or whatever you are!"
Each of these names was accompanied with a step in advance; and there was too savage a lustre in her look to allow the unfortunate baron to doubt for a moment that his life was in the highest peril.
"Madam," he expostulated, "do be careful—'tis sharp as a needle."
"Back, back!" she continued, advancing with each word upon his retreating steps—"you thread-paper—you doll-at-a-fair—you stuffed cockatoo—back, back!" And on arriving at the bed-room door, she gave a prodigiously powerful lunge in advance, and drove her victim fairly into the room, and, with an exclamation of pride and triumph, locked him in. But, exhausted with the excitement, she had only time to lay the sword on the table, wave the key three times round her head in sign of victory, and fall fainting into the arms of Cecil Hope, who at that moment rushed into the room.
CHAPTER VI.
The ceremony in the town-hall passed off with the greatest éclât; and the dinner was probably thought the finest part of the day's entertainment by all but the newly re-established noble himself. Flushed with the glories of the proceeding, and also with the wine he had swallowed to his own health and happiness, he sallied forth with his friends of the preceding day—except, of course, the Baron Beauvilliers—and, as he himself expressed it, was awake for anything, up to any lark.
"A lark, says my lord?" inquired the Duke de Vieuxchateau.
"Ay," replied the marquis, "if it's as big as a turkey, all the better. That champaign is excellent tipple, and would be cheap at eighty-four shillings per dozen."
The French nobles did not quite understand their companion's phraseology, but were quite willing to join him in any extravagance.
"What shall we do?" cried one; "shall we break open the jail?"