An hour perhaps went by, and I had made some progress with my memoir,
when my door was opened and the cheery voice of Castelroux greeted
me from the threshold.
"Monsieur, I have brought a friend to see you."
I turned in my chair, and one glance at the gentle, comely face and
the fair hair of the young man standing beside Castelroux was enough
to bring me of a sudden to my feet.
"Mironsac!" I shouted, and sprang towards him with hands outstretched.
But though my joy was great and my surprise profound, greater still
was the bewilderment that in Mironsac's face I saw depicted.
"Monsieur de Bardelys!" he exclaimed, and a hundred questions were
contained in his astonished eyes.
"Po' Cap de Dieu!" growled his cousin, "I was well advised, it seems,
to have brought you."
"But," Mironsac asked his cousin, as he took my hands in his own,
"why did you not tell me, Amedee, that it was to Monsieur le Marquis
de Bardelys that you were conducting me?"
"Would you have had me spoil so pleasant a surprise?" his cousin
demanded.
"Armand," said I, "never was a man more welcome than are you. You
are but come in time to save my life."
And then, in answer to his questions, I told him briefly of all that
had befallen me since that night in Paris when the wager had been
laid, and of how, through the cunning silence of Chatellerault, I
was now upon the very threshold of the scaffold. His wrath burst
forth at that, and what he said of the Count did me good to hear.
Pages:
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181