She paused, half-turned, and looked at him over her shoulder, scorn
in her glance, a sneer on her scarlet mouth, insolence in every
line of her.

"I think, monsieur, that I have heard a little more than enough,"
said she. "I am assured, at least, that in you I have but a
fair-weather friend, a poor lipserver."

"Ah, not that, madame," he cried, and his voice was stricken. "Say
not that. I would serve you as would none other in all this world
- you know it, Marquise; you know it."

She faced about, and confronted him, her smile a trifle broader, as
if amusement were now blending with her scorn.

"It is easy to protest. Easy to say, 'I will die for you,' so long
as the need for such a sacrifice be remote. But let me do no more
than ask a favour, and it is, 'What of my good name, madame? What
of my seneschalship? Am I to be gaoled or hanged to pleasure you?'
Faugh!" she ended, with a toss of her splendid head. "The world is
peopled with your kind, and I - alas! for a woman's intuitions -
had held you different from the rest."

Her words were to his soul as a sword of fire might have been to
his flesh. They scorched and shrivelled it. He saw himself as she
would have him see himself - a mean, contemptible craven; a coward
who made big talk in times of peace, but faced about and vanished
into hiding at the first sign of danger. He felt himself the
meanest, vilest thing a-crawl upon this sinful earth, and she - dear