tain repeated. "The Duke of Guise's
eldest brother is but seventeen--"

"I did not say I was legitimate."

"Oh, you did not say that? You did not know, then, that I could reel off
the ages of every Lorraine of them all. No, M. de Mar, I am not so
simple as you think. You will come along with me to the Bastille."

"Blockhead! I'll have you broken on the wheel for this," Lucas stormed.
"I am no more Count of Mar than I am King of Spain. Speak up, you old
turnspit," he shouted to Maitre Menard. "Am I he?"

Poor Maitre Menard had dropped down on his iron box, too limp and sick
to know what was going on. He only stared helplessly.

"Speak, rascal," Lucas cried. "Am I Comte de Mar?"

"No," the maitre answered in low, faltering tones. He was at the last
point of pain and fear. "No, monsieur officer, it is as he says. He is
not the Comte de Mar."

"Who is he, then?"

"I know not," the maitre stammered. "He came here last night. But it is
as he says--he is not the Comte de Mar."

"Take care, mine host," the officer returned; "you're lying."

I could not wonder at him; if I had not been in a position to know
otherwise, I had thought myself the maitre was lying.

"If you had spoken at first I might have believed you," the captain
said, bestowing a kick on him. "Get out of here, old ass, before I cram
your lie down your throat. And clear your people away from this door.
I'll not walk through a mob. Send every man Jack about his business, or
it will be the worse for him. And every woman Jill, too."

"M. le Capitaine," Maitre Menard quavered, rising unsteadily to his
feet, "you make a mistake. On my sacred word, you mistake; this is
not--"

"Get out!" cried the captain, helping him along with his boot. Maitre
Menard fell rather than walked out of the door.

A gray hue came over Lucas's face. His first fright had given way to
fury at perceiving himself the victim of a mistake, but now alarm was
born in his eyes again. Was it, after all, a mistake? This obstinate
disbelief in his assertion, this ordering away of all who could swear to
his identity--was it not rather a plot for his ruin? He swallowed hard
once or twice, fear gripping his throat harder than ever the dragoon's
fingers had gripped mine. Certainly he was not the Comte de Mar; but
then he was the man who had killed Pontou.

"If this is a plot against me, say so!" he cried. "If you have orders to
arrest me, do so. But arrest me by the name of Paul de Lorrain