the haze that hung
before my vision I saw the soldier seize him as he crossed the
threshold. Through the noise of waters I heard the captain's cry of
triumph.

"Oh, M. Etienne!" I gasped, in agony that my pain had been for nothing.
Now all was lost. Then the blur lifted, and my amazed eyes beheld not my
master, but--Lucas!

"How now, sirrah?" he cried to the dragoon. "Hands off me, knaves!" For
the second soldier had seized his other arm.

"I regret to inconvenience monsieur," the captain answered, "but he is
wanted at the Bastille."

"Wanted? I?" Lucas cried, fear flashing into his eyes.

He felt an instant's terror, I deem, lest Mayenne had betrayed him.
Quick as he was, he did not see that he had been taken for another man.

"You, monsieur. You are wanted for the murder of your man, Pontou."

He grew white, looking instinctively at me, remembering where I had been
at three o'clock this morning.

"It is a lie! He left my service a month back and I have never seen him
since."

"Tell that to the judges," the captain said, as he had said to me. "I am
not trying you. The handcuffs, men."

One of them produced a pair. Lucas struggled frantically in his captors'
grasp. He dragged them from one end of the room to the other, calling
down all the curses of Heaven upon them; but they snapped the handcuffs
on for all that.

"If this is Mayenne's work--" he panted.

The officer caught nothing but the name Mayenne.

"The boy said you were a friend to his Grace, monsieur, but orders are
orders. I have the warrant for your arrest from M. de Belin."

"At whose instigation?"

"How should I know'? I am a soldier of the guard. I have naught to do
with it but to arrest you."

"Let me see the warrant."

"I am not obliged to. But I will, though. It may quiet your bluster."

He took out the warrant and held it at a safe distance before Lucas's
eyes. A great light broke in on that personage.

"Mille tonnerres! I am not the Comte de Mar!"

"Oh, you say that now, do you? Pity you had not thought of it sooner."

"But I am not the Comte de Mar! I am Paul de Lorraine, nephew to my Lord
Mayenne."

"Why don't you say straight out that you're the Duc de Guise?"

"I am not the Due de Guise," Lucas returned with dignity. He must have
been cursing himself that he had not given his name sooner. "But I am
his brother."

"You take me for a fool."

"Aye, who shall hang for his folly!"

"You must think me a fool," the cap