But you'll grant me the
honour, will you not? Pardieu! It will earn me a place in history."
"Or the graveyard," quoth I, by way of cooling his ardour.
"Peste! What an augury!" Then, with a laugh: "But," he added,
indicating Saint-Eustache, "that long, lean saint - I forget of what
he is patron - hardly wears a murderous air."
To win peace from him, I promised that he should stand by me. But
the favour lost much of its value in his eyes when presently I added
that I did not wish the seconds to engage, since the matter was of
so very personal a character.
Mironsac and Castelroux, assisted by Saint-Eustache, closed the
heavy portecochere, and so shut us in from the observation of
passers-by. The clanging of those gates brought the landlord and a
couple of his knaves, and we were subjected to the prayers and
intercessions, to the stormings and ravings that are ever the prelude
of a stable-yard fight, but which invariably end, as these ended, in
the landlord's withdrawal to run for help to the nearest
corps-de-garde.
"Now, my myrmillones," cried La Fosse in bloodthirsty jubilation, "to
work before the host returns."
"Po' Cap de Dieu!" growled Castelroux, "is this a time for jests,
master joker?"
"Jests?" I heard him retorting, as he assisted me to doff my doublet.
"Do I jest? Diable! you Gascons are a slow-witted folk! I have a
taste for allegory, my friend, but that never yet was accounted so
low a thing as jesting.
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