Page:Stanley Weyman--Count Hannibal.djvu/260

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“ why,” Madame St. Lo asked, sticking her arms akimbo, “why stay in this forsaken place a day and a night, when six hours in the saddle would set us in Angers?”

“Because,” Tavannes replied coldly—he and his cousin were walking before the gateway of the inn—“the Countess is not well, and will be the better, I think, for staying a day.”

“She slept soundly enough! I’ll answer for that!”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“She never raised her head this morning, though my women were shrieking ‘Murder!’ next door, and—Name of Heaven!” Madame resumed, after breaking off abruptly, and shading her eyes with her hand, “what comes here? Is it a funeral? Or a pilgrimage? If all the priests about here are as black, no wonder M. Rabelais fell out with them!”

The inn stood without the walls for the convenience of those who wished to take the road early: a little also, perhaps, because food and forage were cheaper, and the wine paid no town-dues. Four great roads met before the house, along the most easterly of which the sombre company which had caught Madame St. Lo’s attention could be seen