“It is all to me!” she retorted.

At that he glared at her, the veins of his forehead swelling suddenly.  But after a seeming struggle with himself he put the insult by, perhaps for future reckoning and account.

“I did what I could,” he said sullenly.  “Had I willed it he had died there and then in the room below.  I gave him his life.  If he has risked it anew and lost it, it is naught to me.”

“It was his life you gave me,” she repeated stubbornly.  “His life—­and the others.  But that is not all,” she continued; “you promised me a minister.”

He nodded, smiling sourly to himself, as if this confirmed a suspicion he had entertained.

“Or a priest,” he said.

“No, a minister.”

“If one could be obtained.  If not, a priest.”

“No, it was to be at my will; and I will a minister!  I will a minister!” she cried passionately.  “Show me M. de Tignonville alive, and bring me a minister of my faith, and I will keep my promise, M. de Tavannes.  Have no fear of that.  But otherwise, I will not.”

“You will not?” he cried.  “You will not?”

“No!”

“You will not marry me?”

“No!”

The moment she had said it fear seized her, and she could have fled from him, screaming.  The flash of his eyes, the sudden passion of his face, burned themselves into her memory.  She thought for a second that he would spring on her and strike her down.  Yet though the women behind her held their breath, she faced him, and did not quail; and to that, she fancied, she owed it that he controlled himself.

“You will not?” he repeated, as if he could not understand such resistance to his will—­as if he could not credit his ears.  “You will not?” But after that, when he had said it three times, he laughed; a laugh, however, with a snarl in it that chilled her blood.

“You bargain, do you?” he said.  “You will have the last tittle of the price, will you?  And have thought of this and that to put me off, and to gain time until your lover, who is all to you, comes to save you?  Oh, clever girl! clever!  But have you thought where you stand—­woman?  Do you know that if I gave the word to my people they would treat you as the commonest baggage that tramps the Froidmantel?  Do you know that it rests with me to save you, or to throw you to the wolves whose ravening you hear?” And he pointed to the window.  “Minister?  Priest?” he continued grimly. “Mon Dieu, Mademoiselle, I stand astonished at my moderation.  You chatter to me of ministers and priests, and the one or the other, when it might be neither!  When you are as much and as hopelessly in my power to-day as the wench in my kitchen!  You!  You flout me, and make terms with me!  You!”

And he came so near her with his dark harsh face, his tone rose so menacing on the last word, that her nerves, shattered before, gave way, and, unable to control herself, she flinched with a low cry, thinking he would strike her.