el they haven't stoned him. But they
will, sooner or later. It only needs that some one should suggest it."

"That is very likely," said Andre-Louis, and smiled. "He doesn't show
himself much; not in the streets, at least. So that he has not the
courage you suppose; nor any kind of courage, as I told him once. He has
only insolence."

At parting Le Chapelier again exhorted him to give thought to what he
proposed. "Send me word if you change your mind. I am lodged at the
Cerf, and I shall be here until the day after to-morrow. If you have
ambition, this is your moment."

"I have no ambition, I suppose," said Andre-Louis, and went his way.

That night at the theatre he had a mischievous impulse to test what Le
Chapelier had told him of the state of public feeling in the city. They
were playing "The Terrible Captain," in the last act of which the empty
cowardice of the bullying braggart Rhodomont is revealed by Scaramouche.

After the laughter which the exposure of the roaring captain invariably
produced, it remained for Scaramouche contemptuously to dismiss him in a
phrase that varied nightly, according to the inspiration of the moment.
This time he chose to give his phrase a political complexion:

"Thus, O thrasonical coward, is your emptiness exposed. Because of your
long length and the great sword you carry and the angle at which you
cock your hat, people have gone in fear of you, have believed in you,
have imagined you to be as terrible and as formidable as you insolently
make yourself appear. But at the first touch of true spirit you crumple
up, you tremble, you whine pitifully, and the great sword remains in
your scabbard. You remind me of the Privileged Orders when confronted by
the Third Estate."

It was audacious of him, and he was prepared for anything--a laugh,
applause, indignation, or all together. But he was not prepared for what
came. And it came so suddenly and spontaneously from the groundlings and
the body of those in the amphitheatre that he was almost scared by it--as
a boy may be scared who has held a match to a sun-scorched hayrick. It
was a hurricane of furious applause. Men leapt to their feet, sprang up
on to the benches, waving their hats in the air, deafening him with
the terrific uproar of their acclamations. And it rolled on and on, nor
ceased until the curtain fell.

Scaramouche stood meditatively smiling with tight lips. At the last
moment he had caught a glimpse of M. de La Tour d'A