Marius felt that the time for deeds was come. This fatuous
conversation was but a futile waste of time. He set down his glass,
and sitting back in his chair he fixed his sullen black eyes full
upon his half-brother's smiling brown ones.

"I think we have exchanged compliments enough," said he, and Fortunio
wagged his head approvingly. There were too many men in the
courtyard for his liking, and the more time they waited, the more
likely were they to suffer interruption. Their aim must be to get
the thing done quickly, and then quickly to depart before an alarm
could be raised. "Our trouble at Condillac concerns Mademoiselle de
La Vauvraye."

Florimond started forward, with a ready assumption of lover-like
solicitude.

"No harm has come to her?" he cried. "Tell me that no harm has come
to her."

"Reassure yourself," answered Marius, with a sneer, a greyness that
was of jealous rage overspreading his face. "No harm has come to
her whatever. The trouble was that I sought to wed her, and she,
because she is betrothed to you, would have none of me. So we
brought her to Condillac, hoping always to persuade her. You will
remember that she was under my mother's tutelage. The girl, however,
could not be constrained. She suborned one of our men to bear a
letter to Paris for her, and in answer to it the Queen sent a
hot-headed, rash blunderer down to Dauphiny to procure her
liberation. He lies now at the bottom of the moat of Condillac."