Page:Cerise, a tale of the last century (IA cerisetaleoflast00whytrich).pdf/430

 Florian, what have you done? You tell me you have failed with his confidential servant."

"What, Slap-Jack!" answered Florian, and the name brought Alice's heart to her mouth as the two priests again approached her hiding-place. "Impossible! I tell you he is as true as steel. Why, he sailed with us in the brigantine. We were all like brothers. Ah, Malletort, you cannot understand these things!"

"I can understand any scruple, any superstition, any weakness of humanity, for I see examples every day," replied the Abbé, "but I cannot and will not understand that such imaginary obstacles are insurmountable. Bah! You have carte blanche in promises, you have even a round sum to draw upon in hard cash. Will you tell me that man's honesty or woman's virtue is not to be bought if you bid high enough? The whole business is simply a game of bouillote. Not the best card, nor even the deepest purse, but the boldest player sweeps the stakes. Florian, I fear you have done but little in all these long weeks; that was why, at great risk, I sent you a note, begging an interview, that I might urge on you the importance of despatch."

"It was a risk," observed Florian. "The note was brought by Sir George himself."

Malletort laughed. "He carried his fate without knowing it," commented the Abbé. "After all, it is the destiny of mankind. Every one of us bears about with him the germ of that which shall some day prove his destruction. I don't know that one's step is the heavier till palsy has begun to tingle, or one's appetite the worse till digestion already fails. Come, Florian, the plot is nearly ripe now, and there is little more time to lose. We must have Sir George in it up to his neck. He carries this district with him, and I am then sure of all the country north of the Trent. You have impressed on him, I trust, that it is an earldom to begin with, if we win?"

"And if we lose?" asked the other wistfully.

Malletort smacked his tongue against the roof of his mouth, making, at the same time, a significant gesture with his hand under his ear.

"A leap from a ladder would finish it," he remarked