Have you anything to say?"
"I have to say that it is false, monsieur; that His Majesty has no
more faithful or loving subject than am I."
The President shrugged his shoulders, and a shade of annoyance
crossed his face.
"If you are come here for no other purpose than to deny the
statements that I make, I am afraid that we are but wasting time,"
he cried testily. "If you desire it, I can summon Monsieur de
Castelroux to swear that at the time of your arrest and upon being
charged with the crime you made no repudiation of that charge."
"Naturally not, monsieur," I cried, somewhat heated by this
seemingly studied ignoring of important facts, "because I realized
that it was Monsieur de Castelroux's mission to arrest and not to
judge me. Monsieur de Castelroux was an officer, not a Tribunal,
and to have denied this or that to him would have been so much
waste of breath."
"Ah! Very nimble; very nimble, in truth, Monsieur de Lesperon,
but scarcely convincing. We will proceed. You are charged with
having taken part in several of the skirmishes against the armies
of Marshals de Schomberg and La Force, and finally, with having
been in close attendance upon Monsieur de Montmorency at the battle
of Castelnaudary. What have you to say?"
"That it is utterly untrue."
"Yet your name, monsieur, is on a list found among the papers in
the captured baggage of Monsieur le Duc de Montmorency."
"No, monsieur," I denied stoutly, "it is not.
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