"You will not be satisfied till you have got that boy hanged with your
damned tongue," he said, in a stern voice.

"I would rather see him hanged and saved than living and a Huguenot,"
she answered, gloomily. "To think that a child whom I carried nine
months in my womb should be a bad Catholic, and be doomed to hell for
all eternity!"

She began to weep.

"Old silly," said the furrier; "let him live, if only to convert him.
You said, before the apprentices, a word which may set fire to our
house, and roast us all, like fleas in a straw bed."

The mother crossed herself, and sat down silently.

"Now, then, you," said the old man, with a judicial glance at his son,
"explain to me what you were doing on the river with--come closer,
that I may speak to you," he added, grasping his son by the arm, and
drawing him to him--"with the Prince de Conde," he whispered.
Christophe trembled. "Do you suppose the court furrier does not know
every face that frequents the palace? Think you I am ignorant of what
is going on? Monseigneur the Grand Master has been giving orders to
send troops to Amboise. Withdrawing troops from Paris to send them to
Amboise when the king is at Blois, and making them march through
Chartres and Vendome, instead of going by Orleans--isn't the meaning
of that clear enough? There'll be troubles. If the queens want their
surcoats, they must send for them. The Prince de Conde has perhaps
made up his mind to kill Messieurs de Guise; who, on their side,