a learned Englishman of our time."

Claude glowered at him, almost as much at a loss as the Syndic, but for
another reason. To exchange commonplaces with the man who held the woman
he loved by an evil hold, who owned a power so baneful, so foul--to
bandy words with such an one was beyond him. He could only glare at him
in speechless indignation.

"You bear malice, I fear," the big man said. There was no doubt that he
was master of the situation. "Do you know that in the words of the same
learned person whom I have cited--a marvellous exemplar amid that
fog-headed people--vindictive persons live the life of witches, who as
they are mischievous, so end they unfortunate."

The blood left Claude's face. "What do you mean?" he muttered, finding
his voice at last.

"Who hates, burns. Who loves, burns also. But that is by the way."

"Burns?"

"Ay," with a grin, "burns! It seems to come home to you. Burns! Fie,
young man; you hate, I fear, beyond measure, or love beyond measure, if
you so fear the fire. What, you must leave us? It is not very mannerly,"
with sarcasm, "to go while I speak!"

But Claude could bear no more. He snatched his cap from the table, and
with an incoherent word, aimed at the Syndic and meant for
leave-taking, he made for the door, plucked it open and disappeared.

The scholar smiled as he looked after him. "A foolish young man," he
said, "who will assuredly, if he be not stayed, end unfortunate. It is
the way of Frenchmen, Messer Blondel. They act without method and strike
without intention, bear into age the follies of youth, and wear the
gravity neither of the north nor of the south. But that reminds me," he
continued, speaking low and bending towards the other with a look of
sympathy--"you are better, I hope?"

The words were harmless, but they conveyed more than their surface
meaning, and they touched the Syndic to the quick. He had begun to
compose himself; now he had much ado not to gnash his teeth in the
scholar's face. "Better?" he ejaculated bitterly. "What chance have I of
being better? Better? Are you?" He began to tremble, his hands on the
arms of his chair. "Otherwise, if you are not, you will soon have cause
to know what I feel."

"I am better," Basterga answered with fervour. "I thank Heaven for it."

Blondel rose to his feet, his hands still clutching the chair. "What!"
he cried. "You--you have not tried the----"

"The _remedium_?" The scholar shook his head. "No, on the cont