United States or Equatorial Guinea ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Then through the silence there came the sound of furtive foot-steps on the stairs, the creaking of a loose board and finally the stealthy opening of the door. In all his adventurous career Chauvelin had never felt so calm. His heart beat quite evenly, his senses were undisturbed by the slightest tingling of his nerves.
But there was such a look of inward fury and of triumph in his pale, deep-set eyes, such lines of cruelty around his thin, closed lips, that Jeannette Marechal, even with the picture before her mind of Jean Paul Marat in his maddest moods, fled, with the unreasoning terror of her kind, before the sternly controlled, fierce passion of this man. Chauvelin never noticed that she went.
Chauvelin uttered an exclamation of impatience: "Enough of this, citizen Tournefort. Keep your eye on the man and hold your tongue. I am spent with fatigue." "No wonder," murmured Tournefort. Then he added insinuatingly: "Why not let me go in there and apprehend Rateau now? We should have the diamonds and "
"Chance, by all means," quoth His Highness gaily. "Chance! Chance!" repeated the others eagerly. In the midst of so hostile a crowd, Chauvelin felt it unwise to resist. Moreover, one second's reflection had already assured him that this throwing of the dice could not seriously interfere with the success of his plans.
She blushed, for my silence confirmed the lady's assertion, and she felt that the fact of my having lent her such stones was a palpable proof of the great esteem in which I held her. Madame de Chauvelin asked me to dance a minuet with Agatha, and my partner executed the dance with wonderful grace.
He checked himself abruptly, and once more that strange, enigmatical look crept into his eyes. "I took Jeanne Lange to a place of comparative safety," he said after a slight pause, "but since then she has been set entirely free." "Free?" "Yes. Chauvelin himself brought me the news," he replied with a quick, mirthless laugh, wholly unlike his usual light-hearted gaiety.
Therefore when Chauvelin beckoned to her to draw near, she went up to the window, and leaning her head against the deep stone embrasure, she looked out into the night. Chauvelin, without speaking, extended his hand out towards the city as if to invite Marguerite to gaze upon it.
I knew even before Chauvelin came to me, and stood there hoping to gloat over the soul-agony a man who finds that he has been betrayed by his dearest friend. But that d d reprobate did not get that satisfaction, for I was prepared.
"Himself, citizen, at your service," replied Chauvelin with his quiet, ironical manner. "I am the bearer of a letter for you from Sir Percy Blakeney. Have I your permission to enter?" Mechanically Armand stood aside, allowing the other man to pass in. He closed the door behind his nocturnal visitor, then, taper in hand, he preceded him into the inner room.
He dragged another chair to the fire, and Chauvelin, whose impatience was by now quite beyond control, sat down beside the hearth, in such a way as to command a view of the door. Desgas had been gone nearly a quarter of an hour.
Word Of The Day