Taking hold of the baton which Taddeo bore, more completely to assume the roll of the villager, he brandished and twisted it in his fingers, well enough to have made Fan-Fan, the king of the stick-players of the day, envious.
"Shall I follow your eccelenza?" asked Signor Pignana.
"Certainly," said he, "but as a rear-guard, twenty paces behind me, in order that you may give evidence, as a mere passer by, that the man I shall beat to death wished to beat me. This will make me more interesting in the eyes of the people this difficulty will attract."
When he saw Signor Pignana about to leave the room with him, he said, "No! Mademoiselle Crepineau, the Argus of this house, saw only three men come in; what will she think when she sees four leaving? Go out then by the secret door, Pignana, and join us at the corner of the rue Belle-Chasse."
The door of the library was closed on Signor Pignana.
"Do you not wish me to go with you?" asked the Vicomte of Monte-Leone.
"For shame!" said Monte-Leone, "four to one—we would look like the allied army marching against Monaco. Remain then a few minutes with the doctor. The consultation of the Milord naturally enough may be long."
The Auvergnat and the peasant of the boulirue passed before the chair of Mademoiselle Crepineau, one with his handkerchief over his cheek, and the other with a bandage over his eye. Recollecting that they had been since eight o'clock with the doctor, she could not refrain from saying, "The doctor is a very skilful man, but he is slow. After all," added she, "he may have taken a multitude of things from them, though no one heard them cry out. People of their rank do not mind pain."
As they approached Verneuil-street, the Count proceeded a few steps in advance of Taddeo. "Wait for me here," said he, pointing out a house which stood yet farther back than the others, on the alignment of the street, "and come to me if I call out." He then left the young man, assumed a vulgar air, and straggled towards his hotel. Soon he saw in an angle of the wall opposite to his house a motionless shadow, which was certainly that of the man Pignana had pointed out to him. The Count had a quick and keen eye, which recognized objects even in the dark. He saw the two eyes which watched him, and which were fixed on his hotel. They were moved from time to time, but only that on turning again they might more easily recognize every passer. Monte-Leone, with the presence of mind which never left him, and which characterized all the decisive actions of his life, no sooner conceived his plan than he put it into execution. He was anxious to know with what enemies he had to deal, and could conceive of no better way than to question the man himself. The question he put, it is true, was rather brusque, as will be seen. When a few paces behind the man, who had not the least suspicion, and had suffered him to come close to him, the Count faced about and rushed on the stranger. He clasped his throat with one hand, and with the other seized the stranger's weapons, which he naturally enough concluded he wore. The latter uttered a cry, and an only cry, which, by the by, was terrible. He was then silent. A stranger passing by might have fancied those men were speaking confidentially together, but never that one was strangling the other.
"One word," said Monte-Leone. "Tell me why you are here."