'
'You speak with a bitterness that I suppose I must excuse,' said I;
'yet which of us has the more reason to be bitter? This man, my
uncle, M. de Keroual, fled. My parents, who were less wise
perhaps, remained. In the beginning, they were even republicans;
to the end they could not be persuaded to despair of the people.
It was a glorious folly, for which, as a son, I reverence them.
First one and then the other perished. If I have any mark of a
gentleman, all who taught me died upon the scaffold, and my last
school of manners was the prison of the Abbaye. Do you think you
can teach bitterness to a man with a history like mine?'
'I have no wish to try,' said he. 'And yet there is one point I
cannot understand: I cannot understand that one of your blood and
experience should serve the Corsican. I cannot understand it: it
seems as though everything generous in you must rise against that--
domination.'
'And perhaps,' I retorted, 'had your childhood passed among wolves,
you would have been overjoyed yourself to see the Corsican
Shepherd.'
'Well, well,' replied Mr. Romaine, 'it may be. There are things
that do not bear discussion.'
And with a wave of his hand he disappeared abruptly down a flight
of steps and under the shadow of a ponderous arch.
CHAPTER V--ST.
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