“Peste, you need not drown me!” he cried testily.  “I am well; it was but a moment’s dizziness.”  He got up again at once, but was forced to seize my shoulder to keep from falling.

“It was that damnable potion he made me drink,” he muttered.  “I am all well else; I am not weak.  Curse the room; it reels about like a ship at sea.”

I put my arm about him and led him back to bed; nor did he argue about it but lay back with his eyes shut, so white against the white bed-linen I thought him fainted for sure.  But before I could drench him again he raised his lids.

“Felix, will you go get a shutter?  For I see clearly that I shall reach Mlle. de Montluc this night in no other way.”

“Monsieur,” I said, “I can go.  I can tell your mistress you cannot walk across this room to-night.  I can do my best for you, M. Etienne.”

“My faith!  I think I must e’en let you try.  But what to bid you say to her—­pardieu!  I scarce know what I could say to her myself.”

“I can tell her how sorely you are hurt—­how you would come, but cannot.”

“And make her believe it,” he cried eagerly.  “Do not let her think it a flimsy excuse.  And yet I do think she will believe you,” he added, with half a laugh.  “There is something very trust-compelling about you, Felix.  And assure her of my lifelong, never-failing service.”

“But I thought monsieur was going to take service with Henry of Navarre.”

“I was!” he cried.  “I am!  Oh, Felix, was ever a poor wight so harried and torn betwixt two as I?  Whom Jupiter would destroy he first makes mad.  I shall be gibbering in a cage before I have done with it.”

“Monsieur will be gibbering in his bed unless he sleeps soon.  I go now, monsieur.”

“And good luck to you!  Felix, I offer you no reward for this midnight journey into the house of our enemies.  For recompense you will see her.”

XIII

Mademoiselle.

I went to find Maitre Menard, to urge upon him that some one should stay with M. Etienne while I was gone, lest he swooned or became light-headed.  But the surgeon himself was present, having returned from bandaging up some common skull to see how his noble patient rested.  He promised that he would stay the night with M. le Comte; so, eased of that care, I set out for the Hotel de Lorraine, one of the inn-servants with a flambeau coming along to guide and guard me.  M. Etienne was a favourite in this inn of Maitre Menard’s; they did not stop to ask whether he had money in his purse before falling over one another in their eagerness to serve him.  It is my opinion that one gets more out of the world by dint of fair words than by a long purse or a long sword.

We had not gone a block from the inn before I turned to the right-about, to the impatience of my escort.

“Nay, Jean, I must go back,” I said.  “I will only delay a moment, but see Maitre Menard I must.”