pistols and a few louder reports from the guns, and the mob fled,
screaming, back into the yard, leaving a score of dead and wounded
on the polished floor of the hall.

Old M. des Cadoux laughed in the dark, as with his sword hanging
rom his wrist he tapped his snuff-box.

"Ma foi," said he to his neighbour, "they are discovering that it is
not to be the triumphal march they had expected. A pinch of rappee,
Stanislas?"

But the respite was brief. In a moment they saw the glare increase
at the door, and presently a half-dozen of the rabble entered with
torches, followed by some scores of their comrades. They paused at
sight of that company ranged upon the stairs, as well they might,
for a more incongruous sight could scarcely be imagined. Across the
bodies of the slain, and revealed by the lifting powder smoke, stood
that little band of thirty men, a blaze of gay colours, a sheen of
silken hose, their wigs curled and powdered, their costly ruffles
scintillant with jewels; calm, and supercilious, mocking to a man.
There was a momentary gasp of awe, and then the spell was broken by
the aristocrats themselves. A pistol spoke, and a volley followed.
In the hall some stumbled forward, some hurtled backward, and some
sank down in nerveless heaps. But those that remained did not again
retreat. Reinforced by others, that crowded in behind, they charged
boldly up the stairs, headed by a ragged, red capped giant named
Souvestre - a man whom the Marquis had once irreparably wronged.

The sight of him was a revelation to Bellecour. This assault was
Souvestre's work; the fellow had been inciting the people of