A solitary lamp threw its light on De Thou.  The young man was kneeling on a cushion, surmounted by a large ebony crucifix.  He seemed to have fallen asleep while praying.  His head, inclining backward, was still raised toward the cross.  His pale lips wore a calm and divine smile.

“Holy Father, how he sleeps!” exclaimed the astonished Capuchin, thoughtlessly uniting to his frightful discourse the sacred name he every day pronounced.  He suddenly retired some paces, as if dazzled by a heavenly vision.

“Nonsense, nonsense!” he said, shaking his head, and passing his hand rapidly over his face.  “All this is childishness.  It would overcome me if I reflected on it.  These ideas may serve as opium to produce a calm.  But that is not the question; say yes or no.”

“No,” said Cinq-Mars, pushing him to the door by the shoulder.  “I will not accept life; and I do not regret having compromised De Thou, for he would not have bought his life at the price of an assassination.  And when he yielded at Narbonne, it was not that he might escape at Lyons.”

“Then wake him, for here come the judges,” said the furious Capuchin, in a sharp, piercing voice.

Lighted by flambeaux, and preceded by a detachment of the Scotch guards, fourteen judges entered, wrapped in long robes, and whose features were not easily distinguished.  They seated themselves in silence on the right and left of the huge chamber.  They were the judges delegated by the Cardinal to judge this sad and solemn affair—­all true men to the Cardinal Richelieu, and in his confidence, who from Tarascon had chosen and instructed them.  He had the Chancellor Seguier brought to Lyons, to avoid, as he stated in the instructions he sent by Chavigny to the King Louis XIII—­“to avoid all the delays which would take place if he were not present.  M. de Mayillac,” he adds, “was at Nantes for the trial of Chulais, M. de Chateau-Neuf at Toulouse, superintending the death of M. de Montmorency, and M. de Bellievre at Paris, conducting the trial of M. de Biron.  The authority and intelligence of these gentlemen in forms of justice are indispensable.”

The Chancellor arrived with all speed.  But at this moment he was informed that he was not to appear, for fear that he might be influenced by the memory of his ancient friendship for the prisoner, whom he only saw tete-a-tete.  The commissioners and himself had previously and rapidly received the cowardly depositions of the Duc d’Orleans, at Villefranche, in Beaujolais, and then at Vivey,—­[House which belonged to an Abbe d’Esnay, brother of M. de Villeroy, called Montresor.] two miles from Lyons, where this wretched prince had received orders to go, begging forgiveness, and trembling, although surrounded by his followers, whom from very pity he had been allowed to retain, carefully watched, however, by the French and Swiss guards.  The Cardinal had dictated to him his part and answers word for word; and in consideration of this docility, they had exempted him in form from the painful task of confronting mm. de Cinq-Mars and De Thou.  The chancellor and commissioners had also prepared M. de Bouillon, and, strong with their preliminary work, they visited in all their strength the two young criminals whom they had determined not to save.