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Rh with mock sweetness, and then glanced at Antoine with a smile which completed his conquest.

"Come," he answered; "you always get your way."

They crossed the courtyard at a leisurely pace and passed slowly through the gate, the two men exchanging words with the guards, and then turned in the direction of Malincourt.

"If the Governor asks for me while we're away, there'll be trouble for me," said Antoine somewhat ruefully.

"If he asked for me and I wasn't away, there would be greater trouble for me," she retorted. "But if you repent, we'll go back."

"Don't spit such fire at me, Lucette; I meant nothing."

"We'd better hasten, I think," said Dauban, and they quickened their steps to a rapid pace. Lucette played the one man against the other with great adroitness until they were near Malincourt and the cedar-gate was in sight, when she began to set them by the ears.

"Jacques tells me there is a price of a thousand crowns on Gerard de Cobalt's head. Is that so, Antoine?"

"Yes. It was announced in the Castle and has been proclaimed in the city."

"Is it true you have a mind to earn it?"

"A thousand crowns is a thousand crowns."

"And blood money is blood money, too. Is it not so, Jacques?"

"If it has to be earned by somebody, why not one as well as another?"

"I see no flaw in that reasoning either," and Antoine laughed.

"Is that why you told Jacques you could use me to earn it?" asked Lucette, looking at him fixedly.

"Did he say that?" asked Antoine, glancing angrily at Dauban. He bore him no good will for having forced himself into this walk, nor for the angry words Lucette had spoken to him, and her looks.