Detricand turned towards the door, Philip d'Avranche entered impetuously.

He stopped short on seeing Detricand. They knew each other slightly, and
they bowed. Philip frowned. He saw that something had occurred between
the two. Detricand on his part realised the significance of that
familiar "Guida!" called from outside. He took up his cap.

"It is greeting and good-bye, I am just off for France," he said.

Philip eyed him coldly, and not a little maliciously, for he knew
Detricand's reputation well, the signs of a hard life were thick on him,
and he did not like to think of Guida being alone with him.

"France should offer a wide field for your talents just now," he answered
drily; "they seem wasted here." Detricand's eye flashed, but he answered
coolly: "It wasn't talent that brought me here, but a boy's folly; it's
not talent that's kept me from starving here, I'm afraid, but the
ingenuity of the desperate."

"Why stay here? The world was wide, and France but a step away. You
would not have needed talents there. You would no doubt have been
rewarded by the Court which sent you and Rullecour to ravage Jersey--"

"The proper order is Rullecour and me, monsieur." Detricand seemed
suddenly to have got back a manner to which he had been long a stranger.
His temper became imperturbable, and this was not lost on Philip; his
manner had a balanced serenity, while Philip himself had no such perfect
control; which made him the more impatient. Presently Detricand added in
a composed and nonchalant tone: