small, but Navarre, if he lived, might fill that cloak; or Guise, or
Anjou, or the King himself. And while some would not have scrupled to
strike the blood royal, more would have been quick to protect and avenge
it. And so before the dark uncertainty of the mask, before the riddle of
the smiling eyes which glittered through the slits, they stared
irresolute; until a hand, the hand of one bolder than his fellows, was
raised to pluck away the screen.

The unknown dealt the fellow a buffet with his fist. "Down, rascal!" he
said hoarsely. "And you"--to the officer--"show me instantly to M. de
Biron!"

But the lieutenant, who stood in fear of his men, looked at him
doubtfully.

"Nay," he said, "not so fast!" And one of the others, taking the lead,
cried, "No! We may have no need of M. de Biron. Your name, monsieur,
first."

With a quick movement the stranger gripped the officer's wrist.

"Tell your master," he said, "that he who clasped his wrist _thus_ on the
night of Pentecost is here, and would speak with him! And say, mark you,
that I will come to him, not he to me!"

The sign and the tone imposed upon the boldest. Two-thirds of the watch
were Huguenots, who burned to avenge the blood of their fellows; and
these, overriding their officer, had agreed to deal with the intruder, if
a Papegot, without recourse to the Grand Master, whose moderation they
dreaded. A knife-thrust in the ribs, and another body in the ditch--why
not, when such things were done outside? But even these doubted now; and
M. Peridol, the lieutenant, reading in the eyes of his men the suspicions
which he had himself conceived, was only anxious to obey, if they would
let him. So gravely was he impressed, indeed, by the bearing of the
unknown that he turned when he had withdrawn, and came back to assure
himself that the men meditated no harm in his absence; nor until he had
exchanged a whisper with one of them would he leave them and go.

While he was gone on his errand the envoy leaned against the wall of the
gateway, and, with his chin sunk on his breast and his mind fallen into
reverie, seemed unconscious of the dark glances of which he was the
target. He remained in this position until the officer came back,
followed by a man with a lanthorn. Their coming roused the unknown, who,
invited to follow Peridol, traversed two courts without remark, and in
the same silence entered a building in the extreme eastern corner of the
enceinte