“We must find the traitor out, and throw him through the window,” said the young men.

Still, a disagreeable sensation had come over the assembly.  They now only spoke in whispers, and each regarded his neighbor with distrust.  Some withdrew; the meeting grew thinner.  Marion de Lorme repeated to every one that she would dismiss her servants, who alone could be suspected.  Despite her efforts a coldness reigned throughout the apartment.  The first sentences of Cinq-Mars’ address, too, had left some uncertainty as to the intentions of the King; and this untimely candor had somewhat shaken a few of the less determined conspirators.

Gondi pointed this out to Cinq-Mars.

“Hark ye!” he said in a low voice.  “Believe me, I have carefully studied conspiracies and assemblages; there are certain purely mechanical means which it is necessary to adopt.  Follow my advice here; I know a good deal of this sort of thing.  They want something more.  Give them a little contradiction; that always succeeds in France.  You will quite make them alive again.  Seem not to wish to retain them against their will, and they will remain.”

The grand ecuyer approved of the suggestion, and advancing toward those whom he knew to be most deeply compromised, said: 

“For the rest, gentlemen, I do not wish to force any one to follow me.  Plenty of brave men await us at Perpignan, and all France is with us.  If any one desires to secure himself a retreat, let him speak.  We will give him the means of placing himself in safety at once.”

Not one would hear of this proposition; and the movement it occasioned produced a renewal of the oaths of hatred against the minister.

Cinq-Mars, however, proceeded to put the question individually to some of the persons present, in the election of whom he showed much judgment; for he ended with Montresor, who cried that he would pass his sword through his body if he had for a moment entertained such an idea, and with Gondi, who, rising fiercely on his heels, exclaimed: 

“Monsieur le Grand Ecuyer, my retreat is the archbishopric of Paris and L’Ile Notre-Dame.  I’ll make it a place strong enough to keep me from being taken.”

“And yours?” he said to De Thou.

“At your side,” murmured De Thou, lowering his eyes, unwilling to give importance to his resolution by the directness of his look.

“You will have it so?  Well, I accept,” said Cinq-Mars; “and my sacrifice herein, dear friend, is greater than yours.”  Then turning toward the assembly: 

“Gentlemen, I see in you the last men of France, for after the Montmorencys and the Soissons, you alone dare lift a head free and worthy of our old liberty.  If Richelieu triumph, the ancient bases of the monarchy will crumble with us.  The court will reign alone, in the place of the parliaments, the old barriers, and at the same time the powerful supports of the royal authority.  Let us be conquerors, and France will owe to us the preservation of her ancient manners and her time-honored guarantees.  And now, gentlemen, it were a pity to spoil the ball on this account.  You hear the music.  The ladies await you.  Let us go and dance.”