Page:Stanley Weyman--Count Hannibal.djvu/70

58 came an answer—the roar of an arquebuse. The ball whizzed past Count Hannibal’s head, and, splashing the plaster from the wall within a pace of Tignonville, dropped to the ground.

Tavannes laughed. “Bungler!” he cried. “Were you in my troop I would dip your trigger-finger in boiling oil to teach you to shoot! But you weary me, dogs. I must teach you a lesson, must I?” And he lifted a pistol and levelled it. The crowd did not know whether it was the one he had discharged or another, but they gave back with a sharp gasp. “I must teach you, must I?” he continued with scorn. “Here, Bigot, Badelon, drive me these blusterers! Rid the street of them! A Tavannes! A Tavannes!”

Not by word or look had he before this betrayed that he had supports. But as he cried the name, a dozen men armed to the teeth, who had stood motionless under the Croix du Tiroir, fell in a line on the right flank of the crowd. The surprise for those nearest them was complete. With the flash of the pikes before their eyes, with the cold steel in fancy between their ribs, they fled every way, uncertain how many pursued, or if any pursuit there was. For a moment the mob, which a few minutes before had seemed so formidable that a regiment might have quailed before it, bade fair to be routed by a dozen pikes.

And so, had all in the crowd been what he termed them, the rabble and sweepings of the streets, it would have been. But in the heart of it, and felt rather than seen, were a handful of another kidney; Sorbonne students and fierce-eyed priests, with three or four mounted archers, the nucleus that, moving through the streets, had drawn together this concourse. And these with threats and curse and gleaming eyes stood fast, even Tavannes’ dare-devils recoiling before the tonsure. The check thus caused allowed those who had budged a breathing space. They