“I leave him to you,” he repeated.  “Do as you choose.  If you deem his life a precious thing, cherish it.  When did you learn a taste for insolence, Etienne?  Time was when you were touchy on that score.”

“Time never was when I did not love courage.”

“Oh, it is courage!” With a sneer he turned away.

“Gervais,” said Yeux-gris, “have the kindness to unlock the door.”

Gervais wheeled around, his face an angry question.

Yeux-gris answered it with cold politeness: 

“That Felix Broux may pass out.”

“By Heaven, he shall not!”

“You gave your word you would leave him to me.  Did you lie?”

“I do leave him to you!” Gervais thundered.  “I would slit his impudent throat; but since you love him, you may have him to eat out of your plate and sleep in your bosom.  I will put up with it.  But go out of that door till the thing is done, sang dieu! he shall not!”

“If he goes straight to the duke, what then?  He will say he found us living in my house.  What harm?  We are no felons.  Let him say it.”

“And put Lucas on his guard?” returned Gervais.  He was angry, yet he spoke with evident attempt at restraint.  “Put Lucas on the trail?  He is wary as a cat.  Let him get wind of us here, and he will never let us catch him.”

“Well,” said Yeux-gris, reluctantly, “it is true.  And though I will not have the boy harmed, he shall stay here.  I will not put a spoke in the wheel.  We will take no risks till Lucas is shent.  The boy shall be held prisoner.  And afterward—­”

“I will come myself and let him out,” said Gervais, and laughed.

I glanced at my protector, not liking to think of that moment, whenever it might be, “afterward.”  He went up to Gervais.

“My cousin, are we friends or foes?  For, faith! you treat me strangely like a foe.”

“We are friends.”

“I am your friend, since it is in your cause that I am here.  I have stood at your shoulder like a brother—­you cannot deny it.”

“No,” Gervais answered; “you stood my friend,—­my one friend in that house,—­as I was yours.  I stood at your shoulder in the Montluc affair—­you cannot deny that.  I have been your ally, your servant, your messenger to mademoiselle, your envoy to Mayenne.  I have done all in my power to win you your lady.”

A shadow fell over Yeux-gris’s open face.

“That task needs a greater power than yours, my Gervais.”

He regarded Gervais with a rueful smile, his thoughts of a sudden as far away from me as if I had never set foot in the Rue Coupejarrets.  He shook his head, sighing, and said, with a hand on Gervais’s shoulder:  “It’s beyond you, cousin.”

Gervais brought him back to the point.

“Well, I’ve done what I could for you.  But you don’t help me when you let loose a spy to warn Lucas.”

“He shall not go.  You know well, cousin, you will be no gladder than I when that knave is dead.  But I will not have Felix Broux suffer because he dared speak for the Duke of St. Quentin.”