Page:George Gibbs--Love of Monsieur.djvu/91

 Ferrers and stared. One or two venturesome fellows rushed out, but a sight of the resolute faces of the outriders, who guarded the leaders’ heads, was enough to make them pause, and the coach clattered on to safety. There were twenty plum-colored calashes in the city, and Mornay knew that detection would be difficult if not impossible at this time of the evening, when the streets were cleared and the coach could wind deviously to the distant purlieus of Fenchurch Street. Soon the clamor they had made was lost in the turns of the winding streets, and the coach was brought by a distant route to the spot at which Monsieur Mornay had entered it—not a stone’s-throw from the Swan.

Cornbury was awaiting him upstairs. He had puffed the room full of smoke, and a look of relief passed over his face as Mornay entered. “Well, monsieur?” he asked.

Mornay did not answer. He tossed his hat down and threw himself into a chair.

“I’ve lost,” he muttered at last. He said no more, and Cornbury did not press him for information. But presently, when the supper 79