“What are you going to do?” cried the marquis, a vague terror lending him speech.  “I have lied . . .”

“What! have you turned coward, too?  What am I going to do?  Patience, Monsieur, and you will see.”  The Chevalier flung apart the doors.  His roistering friends greeted his appearance with delight.  “A toast, Messieurs!” he cried, flourishing his sword.

Only the Vicomte d’Halluys and Victor saw that something unusual had taken place.

“Your friend,” whispered the vicomte, “appears to be touched with a passing madness.  Look at his eyes.”

“What has happened?” murmured Victor, setting down his glass.

“Bah!  Monsieur le Marquis has stopped the Chevalier’s allowance;” and the vicomte sighed regretfully.  From where he sat he could see the grim, motionless figure of the marquis, standing with his back to the fire.

“Fill up the goblets, Messieurs; to the brim!” The Chevalier stumbled among the fallen bottles.  He reached the head of the table.  Feverishly he poured out a glass of wine, spilling part of it.  With a laugh he flung the bottle to the floor.  “Listen!” with a sweeping glance which took in every face.  “To Monsieur le Marquis, my noble father!  Up, up!” waving his rapier.  Yes, madness was in his eyes; it bubbled and frothed in his veins, burned and cracked his lips.  “It is droll!  Up, you beggars! . . . up, all of you!  You, Vicomte; you, Saumaise!  Drink to the marquis, the noble marquis, the pious marquis, who gives to the Church!  Drink it, you beggars; drink it, I say!” The sword-blade rang on the table.

“To the marquis!” cried the drunkards in chorus.  They saw nothing; all was dead within, save appetite.

“Ah, that is well!  Listen.  All this about you will one day be mine?  Ah!  I shall be called Monsieur le Marquis; I shall possess famous chateaux and magnificent hotels?  Fools! ’twas all a lie!  I who was am not.  I vanish from the scene like a play-actor.  Drink it, you beggars!  Drink it, you wine-bibbers!  Drink it, you gamesters, you hunters of women!  Drink to me, the marquis’s . . . bastard!”

Twelve glasses hung in mid air; twelve faces were transfixed with horror and incredulity; twelve pairs of eyes stared stupidly at the mad toast-master.  In the salon the marquis listened with eyes distended, with jaw fallen, lips sunken inward and of a color as sickly as blue chalk. . . .  A maudlin sob caught one roisterer by the throat, and the tableau was broken by the falling of his glass to the table, where it lay shattered in foaming wine.

“Paul,” cried Victor; “my God, Paul, are you mad?”

“I know you not.”  Then with a sudden wave of disgust, the Chevalier cried:  “Now, one and all of you, out of my sight!  Away with you!  You look too hardily at the brand of pleasure on my brow.  Out, you beggars, sponges and cheats!  Out, I say!  Back to the devil who spawned you!” He drove them forth with the flat of his sword.  He saw nothing, heard nothing, knew nothing save that he was mad, possessed of a capital frenzy, the victim of some frightful dream; save that he saw through blood, that the lust to kill, to rend, and to destroy was on him.  The flat of his sword fell rudely but impartially.