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Updated: June 26, 2025
Æsop, unable to make Lagardere break ground, and unable to get within Lagardere's guard, now began to taunt his antagonist savagely, calling him a child-stealer and a woman-wronger, with other foul terms of abuse that rolled glibly from his lips in the ugliness of his rage and fear.
I feared they would be destroyed if I did not save them." As she spoke she put the packet into Lagardere's extended right hand, and as his fingers closed upon it the horn that he had heard before was wound again in the distance, but this time it seemed to his keen ears that the sound was nearer than before. The woman in the window gave a shiver.
A moment later the doors parted a little, and Gonzague entered the room, closing the doors behind him. He advanced at once to where the hunchback awaited him. "Your news?" he cried. The hunchback made a gesture of reassurance. "Sleep in peace. I have settled Lagardere's business." Gonzague gave a great sigh of satisfaction. "He is dead?" he questioned. The hunchback spoke, warmly.
"Who is it?" the second shadow questioned, and again the voice sounded youthful to Lagardere's ears. "It looks like Saldagno," said the first shadow; and, coming a little farther forward, he called dubiously into the gloom: "Is that you, Saldagno?"
Something in Lagardere's carriage, something in his voice, convinced the little marquis that his enemy was speaking the truth, and that he was, indeed, a gentleman. "Braggart!" he cried, and, drawing his sword, he struck Lagardere across the breast with the flat of his blade. Lagardere was quite unmoved by the affront.
"Splendid!" he cried. "What is the parry?" "It is as clear as day," Lagardere answered. "This is how the trick is done," and again, as he spoke, his blade explained his text, gleaming and twisting in the cunning evolutions of the riposte. Cocardasse, who had drawn his own sword, repeated Lagardere's words and parodied Lagardere's gestures faithfully.
On the word the eighteen men charged, the original seven leading; the eleven recruits, less whole-hearted in the business, came less alertly in the rear. The charge of the assassins was abruptly arrested by Lagardere's bulwark, and over that bulwark the swords of the two defenders flashed and leaped, and before every thrust a man went down.
I do not think you ever did an honest, a kindly, or a generous deed in your life. I know that you have done many vile things, and would do more if time were given to you; but the time is denied, Master Æsop, and yet you may serve a good cause in your death." Even as he spoke Lagardere's tranquillity of defence suddenly changed into rapidity of attack.
Lagardere looked at her thoughtfully. "Could you love such a man as he?" he asked, gravely. "He is young, he is brave, he is witty; he might well win a girl's heart." Gabrielle returned Lagardere's earnest look with a look of surprise. "He is a noble. I am a poor girl." Lagardere smiled wistfully. "How if you were no longer to be a poor girl, Gabrielle?
Lagardere's voice was as cheerful as if there were no such thing in the world as exile. "Well, there I was at my wit's end, and my nimble wits found work for me.
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