The blood rushed to Cavalier's head, his face flamed, and after a
moment's pause, fixing his eye boldly upon M. de Baville, and speaking in
a voice which was now as firm as it had been tremulous a moment before,
he said, "If you have only brought me here, sir, to speak to me in such a
manner, you might better have left me in my mountains, and come there
yourself to take a lesson in hospitality. If I am a rebel, it is not I
who am answerable, for it was the tyranny and cruelty of M. de Baville
which forced us to have recourse to arms; and if history takes exception
to anything connected with the great monarch for whose pardon I sue
to-day, it will be, I hope, not that he had foes like me, but friends
like him."

M. de Baville grew pale with anger; for whether Cavalier knew to whom he
was speaking or not, his words had the effect of a violent blow full in
his face; but before he could reply M. de Villars interposed.

"Your business is only with me, sir," he said; "attend to me alone, I
beg: I speak in the name of the king; and the king, of his clemency,
wishes to spare his subjects by treating them with tenderness."

Cavalier opened his mouth to reply, but the intendant cut him short.

"I should hope that that suffices," he said contemptuously: "as pardon is
more than you could have hoped for, I suppose you are not going to insist
on the other conditions you laid down?"

"But it is precisely those other conditions," said Cavalier, addressing
himself to M. de Villars, and not seeming to see that anyone else was
present, "for which we have fought. If I were alone, sir, I should give