hesitancy.

"Eh?" And the arched brows drew together for an instant. "But no matter.
There are enough and to spare even for Fouquier-Tinvillle's voracious
appetite. His name?"

"The ci-devant Vicomte Antole d'Ombreval."

"Qui-ca?" The question rang sharp as a pistol-shot, sounding the
more fearful by virtue of the contrast with the gentle tones in which
Robespierre had spoken hitherto. The little man's face grew evil.
"d'Ombreval?" he cried. "But what is this man to you? It is by your
favour alone that I have let him live so long, but now--" He stopped
short. "What is your interest in this man?" he demanded, and the
question was so fiercely put as to suggest that it would be well for La
Boulaye that he should prove that interest slight indeed.

But whatever feelings may have been swaying Caron at the moment, fear
was not one of them.

"My interest in him is sufficiently great to cause me to seek his
freedom at your hands," he answered, with composure.

Robespierre eyed him narrowly for a moment, peering at him over his
spectacles which he had drawn down on to his tip-tilted nose. Then the
fierceness died out of his mien and manner as suddenly as it had sprung
up. He became once more the weak-looking, ineffectual man that had first
greeted La Boulaye: urbane and quiet, but cold-cold as ice.

"I am desolated, my dear Caron, but you have asked me for the one man in
the prisons of France whose life I cannot yield you. He is from Artois,
and there is an old score 'twixt him and me, 'twixt his family and mine.
They were the grands seigneurs of the land on which we were born, these
Ombrevals, and I could tell you of wrongs committed by them which would
make you shudder in horror. This one shall atone in the small measure
we can enforce from him. It was to this end that I ordered you to effect
his capture. Have patience, dear Caron, and forgive me that I cannot
grant your request. As I have said, I am desolated that it should be
so. Ask me, if you will, the life of any other--or any dozen others--and
they are yours. But Ombreval must die."

Caron stood a moment in silent dismay. Here was an obstacle upon which
he had not counted when he had passed his word to Suzanne to effect the
release of her betrothed. At all costs he must gain it, he told himself,
and to that end he now set himself to plead, advancing, as his only
argument--but advancing it with a fervour that added to its weight--that
he stood pledged to save the