a horse. You have put my eye almost out. Do
you imagine that I am well provided for like yourself and have nothing to
do but to flirt with girls? I need my eyes in order to work, by God!
Because you are a bourgeois and I am a workman--"

"I am not more of a bourgeois than you," replied the artist, rather glad
to see his adversary's fury exhaust itself in words, and his attitude
assume a less threatening character; "pick up your compass and return to
your work. Here," he added, taking two five-franc pieces from his pocket.
"You were a little boorish and I a little hasty. Go and bathe your eyes
with a glass of wine."

Lambernier scowled and his eyes darted ugly, hateful glances. He
hesitated a moment, as if he were thinking what he had better do, and was
weighing his chances of success in case of a hostile resolve. After a few
moments' reflection, prudence got the better of his anger. He closed his
compass and put it in his pocket, but he refused the silver offered him.

"You are generous," said he, with a bitter smile; "five francs for each
blow of the whip! I know a good many people who would offer you their
cheek twelve hours of the day at that price. But I am not one of that
kind; I ask nothing of nobody."

"If Leonardo da Vinci could have seen this fellow's face just now,"
thought the artist, "he would not have had to seek so long for his model
for the face of Judas. Only for my poniard, my fate would have been
settled. This man was ready to murder me."

"Listen, Lambernier," said he, "I was wrong to strike you, and I would
like to atone for it. I have been told that you were sent away from the
chateau against your will. I am intimate enough with Monsieur de
Bergenheim to be useful to you; do you wish me to speak to him for you?"

The carpenter stood motionless in his place, with his eyes fixed upon his
adversary while the latter was preparing his horse to mount, eyes which
seemed filled with hatred to their very depths. His face suddenly changed
its expression and became abjectly polite when he heard himself addressed
anew. He shook his head two or three times before replying.

"Unless you are the very devil," he said, "I defy you to make this
gentleman say yes when he has once said no. He turned me away like a dog;
all right. Let them laugh that win. It was that old idiot of a Rousselet
and that old simpleton of a coachman of Mademoiselle de Corandeuil's who
told tales about me. I could tell tales also if I l