“You ask for Montsoreau?” he thundered.  “You will have Montfaucon if you do not quickly go to your homes!”

At which, and at the glare of his eye, the more timid took fright.  Feeling his gaze upon them, seeing that he had no intention of withdrawing, they began to sneak away by ones and twos.  Soon others missed them and took the alarm, and followed.  A moment and scores were streaming away through lanes and alleys and along the main street.  At last the bolder and more turbulent found themselves a remnant.  They glanced uneasily at one another and at Tavannes, took fright in their turn, and plunging into the current hastened away, raising now and then as they passed through the streets a cry of “Vive Montsoreau!  Montsoreau!”—­which was not without its menace for the morrow.

Count Hannibal waited motionless until no more than half a dozen groups remained in the open.  Then he gave the word to dismount; for, so far, even the Countess and her women had kept their saddles, lest the movement which their retreat into the inn must have caused should be misread by the mob.  Last of all he dismounted himself, and with lights going before him and behind, and preceded by Bigot, bearing his cloak and pistols, he escorted the Countess into the house.  Not many minutes had elapsed since he had called for silence; but long before he reached the chamber looking over the square from the first floor, in which supper was being set for them, the news had flown through the length and breadth of Angers that for this night the danger was past.  The hawk had come to Angers, and lo! it was a dove.

Count Hannibal strode to one of the open windows and looked out.  In the room, which was well lighted, were people of the house, going to and fro, setting out the table; to Madame, standing beside the hearth—­which held its summer dressing of green boughs—­while her woman held water for her to wash, the scene recalled with painful vividness the meal at which she had been present on the morning of the St. Bartholomew—­the meal which had ushered in her troubles.  Naturally her eyes went to her husband, her mind to the horror in which she had held him then; and with a kind of shock—­perhaps because the last few minutes had shown him in a new light—­she compared her old opinion of him with that which, much as she feared him, she now entertained.

This afternoon, if ever, within the last few hours, if at all, he had acted in a way to justify that horror and that opinion.  He had treated her—­brutally; he had insulted and threatened her, had almost struck her.  And yet—­and yet Madame felt that she had moved so far from the point which she had once occupied that the old attitude was hard to understand.  Hardly could she believe that it was on this man, much as she still dreaded him, that she had looked with those feelings of repulsion.

She was still gazing at him with eyes which strove to see two men in one, when he turned from the window.  Absorbed in thought, she had forgotten her occupation, and stood, the towel suspended in her half-dried hands.  Before she knew what he was doing he was at her side; he bade the woman hold the bowl, and he rinsed his hands.  Then he turned, and without looking at the Countess, he dried his hands on the farther end of the towel which she was still using.