“I will make you tell me, you dog!” cried Melun.
“You won't,” answered Westerham, suavely.
“By Heaven!” shouted Melun, “but I will. There are more unpleasant things done in this place than you ever dreamt of in your philosophy. The times of the Inquisition are not past for some people.”
“It will take a little more than you to frighten me, you cur,” said Westerham, in a low voice.
Melun's face blazed with passion. He drew back a pace, and then struck Westerham heavily across the mouth.
On his part Westerham did not hesitate for a moment. He lifted both his fettered hands and brought his steel-bound wrists down with a crash on Melun's head; and the captain went sprawling to the floor.
“Look you here,” cried Westerham to the dumbfounded ruffians who stood watching the scene as though they were chained to their chairs. “Look you here; I will deal with men, but not with curs such as this.”
He touched Melun with his boot.
“You cannot deny,” he continued, purposely dropping to a certain extent into their own jargon, “that I was game. I was prepared to die, but I am not prepared to be struck by swine like this.
“Why,” he went on, turning Melun's prostrate body over with his foot, “he is a liar through and through.