em must have lurked about," I said.
"Huguet's sword-arm was useless; he could not defend himself."

"Or else he fainted from his wound, he bled so," M. Etienne answered.
"And one of those who fled last came upon him helpless and did this."

"Why didn't I follow him instead of sitting down, a John o'dreams?" I
cried. "But I was thinking of you and Monsieur; I forgot Huguet."

"I forgot him, too," Monsieur sorrowed. "Shame to me; he would not have
forgotten me."

"Monsieur," his son said, "it was no negligence of yours. You could have
saved him only by following when he ran. And that was impossible."

"In sight of the door," Monsieur said sadly. "In sight of his own door."

We held silent. Monsieur got soberly to his feet.

"I never lost a better man."

"Monsieur," I cried, "he asks no better epitaph. If you will say that
of me when I die, I shall not have lived in vain."

He smiled at the outburst, but I did not care; if he would only smile, I
was content it should be at me.

"Nay, Felix," he said. "I hope it will not be I who compose your
epitaph. Come, we must get to the house and send after poor Huguet."

"Felix and I will carry him," M. Etienne said, and we lifted him between
us--no easy task, for he was a heavy fellow. But it was little enough to
do for him.

We bore him along slowly, Monsieur striding ahead. But of a sudden he
turned back to us, laying quick fingers on the poor torn breast.

"What is it, Monsieur?" cried his son.

"My papers."

We set him down, and the three of us examined him from top to toe,
stripping off his steel coat, pulling apart his blood-clotted linen,
prying into his very boots. But no papers revealed themselves.

"What were they, Monsieur?"

A drawn look had come over Monsieur's face.

"Papers which the king gave me, and which I, fool and traitor, have
lost."

I ran back to the spot where we had found Huguet; there was his hat on
the ground, but no papers. I followed up the red trail to its beginning,
looking behind every stone, every bunch of grass; but no papers. In my
desperation I even pulled about the dead man, lest the packet had been
covered, falling from Huguet in the fray. The two gentlemen joined me
in the search, and we went over every inch of the ground, but to no
purpose.

"I thought them safer with Huguet than with me," Monsieur groaned. "I
knew we ran the risk of ambush. Myself would be the object of attack; I
bade Huguet, were we waylaid, to run w