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Updated: June 16, 2025
His fabric of lies would be torn down; he would be tried and hanged on the Mont es Pendus, or even be torn to pieces by this crowd. Yet he could not have moved a foot from where he was if he had been given a million pounds. The sight of Ranulph's face revealed to Detricand the true meaning of this farce and how easily it might become a tragedy.
All that Detricand had said moved the Court powerfully, but when the withered little flower of a man, the Chevalier, told in quaint brief sentences the story of the Sieur de Mauprat, his sufferings, his exile, and the nobility of his family, which had indeed, far back, come of royal stock, and then at last of Guida and the child, more than one member of the Court turned his head away with misty eyes.
He stopped short on seeing Detricand. They knew each other slightly, and they bowed. Philip frowned. He saw that something had occurred between the two. Detricand on his part realised the significance of that familiar "Guida!" called from outside. He took up his cap. "It is greeting and good-bye, I am just off for France," he said.
A dark, sinister expression crossed his face, an evil thought pulled down the corners of his mouth as he stepped from the cask. His son went to him and taking his arm, said: "Come, you've done enough for to-day." The old man made no reply, but submissively walked away into the Coin & Anes. Once however he turned and looked the way Detricand had gone, muttering.
She had straight- forwardness, a firm if limited intellect, a clear-mindedness belonging somewhat to narrowness of outlook, but a genuine capacity for understanding the right and the wrong of things. Guida, so Detricand thought, might break her heart and live on; this woman would break her heart and die: the one would grow larger through suffering, the other shrink to a numb coldness.
Having drunk the wine he lay back murmuring thanks and satisfaction, his eyes closed. Presently they opened. He nodded at Detricand. "I have not tasted wine these five years," he said; then added, "You you took too much wine in Jersey, did you not, monsieur? I used to say an office for you every Litany day, which was of a Friday."
Presently Detricand and Philip were the only names mentioned, but at last, as by common consent, Philip was settled upon, for such evidence as there was pointed that way. The gossips set about to recall all that had happened when Philip was in Jersey last.
Then Detricand said his farewells, for it was ten o'clock, and he must be away at three, when his boat was to steal across to Brittany, and land him near to the outposts of the Royalist army under de la Rochejaquelein. There were letters to write and packing yet to do. He set to work gaily. At last everything was done, and he was stooping over a bag to fasten it. The candle was in the window.
It was clear to Detricand that she expected some one else; it was also clear that his coming gave no especial pleasure to her, though she looked at him with interest. She had thought of him more than once since that day when the famous letter from France to the chevalier was read.
Twice Detricand's hand was gashed slightly, and then he pinioned the wrist of his enemy, and tripped him up. The miscreant fell half across the opening in the floor. One foot, hanging down, almost touched the running water. Detricand had his foe at his mercy. There was the first inclination to drop him into the stream, but that was put away as quickly as it came.
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