“What assurance have I as to that?”
“The word of a gentleman.”
“In your case I prefer something else.”
The Marquis flushed angrily. Why he controlled himself I do not know, unless it was because he was so desperately anxious to carry out his plan and I was his only instrument.
“What do you propose?” he asked.
“To go before a notary and draw up an agreement, leaving the papers in his hands, including the ring and the coin, and a signed statement, acquitting me of complication in the robbery. These papers he is to give to me in the morning, if I succeed. Furthermore, I won’t go into the matter without the assistance of an old sailor with whom I cruised.”
“Take as many assistants as you please, Monsieur,” said the Marquis; “and now we will go to my apartments. Will you honor me?”
He rose and offered me his arm.
“I have to do your dirty work,” I replied, “and that obliges me to walk by your side, I suppose, but it doesn’t compel me to take your arm.”
My soul revolted against carrying out my part of the plot, even though by so doing I was obliging a lady. True, she might be—and if his words were true, she was—in love with du Trémigon, but I was sure she could not know him as I knew him. Besides, what were the love affairs of the Marquis and his cousin to me? I had no personal interest in either of them.