Robespierre became alert on the instant.
"You would set some man at liberty?"
"Yes."
"Your lover, is it not?"
"I pray you, do not ask me."
"Do not ask you!" repeated Robespierre. "And yet you ask me to pardon him. Why should I do it?"
"To prove that you know what clemency is."
"I would rather show it in some other way. I should be a fool to set your lover at liberty, so that you both might laugh at me."
"I have not said that it was my lover."
"No, but I say so."