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As to the tobacco, it was of the Maragnan quality, and he had always deemed it impossible to sell it for less than sixty sous. After hearing the case, the council decided that two of its members, Messieurs Damours and de la Tesserie, should make an inspection at La Mothe's store, in order to taste his wine and tobacco and gauge his hogsheads. Away they went; and afterwards they made their report.
Laying her arm about him in the old attitude of protection which had so stirred La Mothe's heart, she held him close to her, the anxiety of her watchfulness no less evident than his own. The darkness of her dread had deepened tenfold. Valmy could bring no good to Amboise, no good to Stephen La Mothe. There was no long delay.
At the appeal La Mothe's grip upon the chair grew more tense, and his hand so shook that the whole chair was shaken as he felt the girl stiffen against his knuckles. What his hopes were he did not dare admit, though the foundations of his faith were never shaken. Better even than the girl he understood how great was the issue Commines played for in his effort to move her from her silence.
All day La Mothe's unexpected question had troubled her, and vaguely she had connected it with the attempt upon the Dauphin at the Burnt Mill, though how she, the Dauphin's almost one friend in Amboise, could have knowledge of the attempt she could not understand.
La Mothe's voice was strange even to his own ears, so harsh and dry was it, the voice of age rather than of youth, and, indeed, he felt as if in this last hour he had suddenly grown so old that the world was a weariness. "There were three in this plot," answered Commines, unmoved from his slow gravity, "Hugues, the Dauphin, and Mademoiselle de Vesc. Hugues is dead, but two still remain."
With the failure of the attack she had thought the incident closed, but now Jean Saxe had a story to tell, a story in some way linked to Stephen La Mothe's question, a question which flushed the pallor of even her weariness when she remembered how widely it had differed from what her thought had been. But Jean Saxe was in no haste with his tale.
"And we are ready to go," said the girl, ranging her horse by the side of Grey Roland, so that La Mothe was within touch of her hand. "Neither you nor the priest La Mothe and La Mothe only," he answered, his voice roughening into passion for the first time. "Come, sir, I hold your parole." "But this does not touch Monsieur La Mothe's parole."
It is decenter buried out of sight and does not interest me. How am I to gain entrance to Amboise?" Villon turned to him with an elaborate appearance of carelessness, but the unctuous complacency was wiped from his face, and the narrow eyes and mouth showed how deep was his anger at La Mothe's disgusted contempt.
Do you be Calvet; I want a real battle to-day, and you will fight all the better with Ursula looking on." As for Ursula de Vesc, she drew her skirts together and ran up the unprotected flight of stairs humming an air not Stephen La Mothe's triolet, you may be sure as if she had not a care in the world.
"Put yourself in the King's place and consider the truth dispassionately." "Consider dispassionately how a father can best kill his own son; yes, Uncle?" But Commines took no umbrage at the crude sarcasm, a sarcasm aimed at himself and the King alike. He understood it as a sign that La Mothe's mind was recovering from the shock which had swung its balance awry.
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