ant as bells. Their voice occupies sky as well
as earth, and they overwhelm the senses, so that a man's blood must keep
pace with their beat. They can suit every part, jangling in wild joy,
or copying the slow pace of sorrow, or pealing in ordered rhythm, blithe
but with a warning of mortality in their cadence. But this bell played
dance music. It summoned to an infernal jig. Blood and fever were in its
broken fall, hate and madness and death.

Gaspard checked his plunging horse. "By God, it is from St. Germains
l'Auxerrois! The Palace church. The King is in it. It is a plot against
our faith. They have got the pick of us in their trap and would make an
end of us."

From every house and entry men and women and priests were pouring to
swell the army that pressed roaring eastwards. No one heeded the two as
they sat their horses like rocks in the middle of a torrent.

"The Admiral is gone," said Gaspard with a sob in his voice. "Our few
hundred spears cannot stand against the King's army. It remains for us
to die with him."

Champernoun was cursing steadily in a mixture of English and Spanish,
good mouth-filling oaths delivered without heat. "Die we doubtless
shall, but not before we have trounced this bloody rabble."

Still Gaspard did not move. "After to-night there will be no gentlemen
left in France, for we of the religion had all the breeding." Then he
laughed bitterly. "I mind Ribaut's last words, when Menendez slew him.
'We are of earth,' says he, 'and to earth we must return, and twenty
years more or less can matter little!' That is our case to-night, old
friend."

"Maybe," said the Englishman. "But why talk of dying? You and I are
Spanish caballeros. Walsingham told me that the King hated that nation,
and that the Queen-mother loved it not, but it would appear that now we
are very popular in Paris."

"Nay, nay, this is no time to play the Nicodemite. It is the hour for
public confession. I'm off to the dead Admiral to avenge him on his
assassins."

"Softly, Gaspard. You and I are old companions in war, and we do not
ride against a stone wall if there be a gate. It was not thus that
Gourgues avenged Ribaut at St. John's. Let us thank God that we hold a
master card in this game. We are two foxes in a flock of angry roosters,
and by the Lord's grace we will take our toll of them. Cunning, my
friend. A stratagem of war! We stand outside this welter and, having
only the cold passion of revenge, can think cool