ll at ease now, and more than ever in the mood for joyous company,
Gonzague turned to re-enter the supper-room, but the hunchback clawed at
him and brought him to a halt. Gonzague stared at his follower in a
bewilderment which the hunchback proceeded partially to enlighten. "You
have forgotten something."

"What?" asked Gonzague, in amazement.

The hunchback made a little, appealing gesture. "Little AEsop wants his
reward."

Gonzague thought he understood now. "True. What is your price?"

The hunchback, more bowed than ever, with his hair more than ever huddled
about his face, swayed his crippled body whimsically, and when he spoke
he spoke, apologetically: "I am a man of strange fancies, highness."

Gonzague was annoyed at these preliminaries to a demand, this beating
about the bush for payment. "Don't plague me with your fancies. Your
price?"

The hunchback spoke, slowly, like a man who measures his words and enjoys
the process of measurement: "If I killed Lagardere, it was not solely to
please you. It was partly to please myself. I was jealous."

Gonzague smiled slightly. "Of his swordsmanship?"

The hunchback protested, vehemently. "No, I was his equal there. I was
jealous of his luck in love."

Gonzague laughed. "AEsop in love!"

The hunchback seemed to take the laugh in good part. "AEsop is in love,
and you can give him his heart's desire. She was in Lagardere's keeping.
She is now in yours. Give her to me."

Gonzague almost reeled under the amazing impudence of the suggestion.
"Gabrielle de Nevers! Madman!"

He laughed as he spoke, but the hunchback interrupted his laugh. "Wait.
You have to walk over two dead women to touch the wealth of Nevers. I
offer to take one woman out of your way. Do not kill Gabrielle; give her
to me."

Gonzague stared for a while at the hunchback in silence. "I believe the
rogue is serious," he said, more as a reflection addressed to himself
than as a remark addressed to the hunchback.

But the hunchback answered it: "Yes, for I love her. Give her to me, and
I will take her far away from Paris, and you shall never hear of her
again. She will no longer be the daughter of Nevers; she will be the wife
of AEsop the hunchback."

The proposition was not unpleasing to Louis of Gonzague. It certainly
seemed to offer a way of getting rid of the girl without the necessity of
killing her, and Gonzague was too fastidious to desire to commit murder
where murder was wholly unnecessa