Count Hannibal

In spite of which the long oak table that filled the middle of the

chamber shone with use: so did the great metal standish which it bore.

And though the seven men who sat about the table seemed, at a first

glance and in that gloomy light, as rusty and faded as the rubbish behind

them, it needed but a second look at their lean jaws and hungry eyes to

be sure of their vitality.

He who sat in the great chair at the end of the table was indeed rather

plump than thin. His white hands, gay with rings, were well cared for;

his peevish chin rested on a falling-collar of lace worthy of a Cardinal.

But though the Bishop's Vicar was heard with deference, it was noticeable

that when he had ceased to speak his hearers looked to the priest on his

left, to Father Pezelay, and waited to hear his opinion before they gave

their own. The Father's energy, indeed, had dominated the Angerins,

clerks and townsfolk alike, as it had dominated the Parisian devotes

who knew him well. The vigour which hate inspires passes often for solid

strength; and he who had seen with his own eyes the things done in Paris

spoke with an authority to which the more timid quickly and easily

succumbed.

Yet gibbets are ugly things; and Thuriot, the printer, whose pride had

been tickled by a summons to the conclave, began to wonder if he had done

wisely in coming. Lescot, too, who presently ventured a word.

"But if M. de Tavannes' order be to do nothing," he began doubtfully,

"you would not, reverend Father, have us resist his Majesty's will?"

"God forbid, my friend!" Father Pezelay answered with unction. "But his

Majesty's will is to do--to do for the glory of God and the saints and

His Holy Church! How? Is that which was lawful at Saumur unlawful here?

Is that which was lawful at Tours unlawful here? Is that which the King

did in Paris--to the utter extermination of the unbelieving and the

purging of that Sacred City--against his will here? Nay, his will is to

do--to do as they have done in Paris and in Tours and in Saumur! But his

Minister is unfaithful! The woman whom he has taken to his bosom has

bewildered him with her charms and her sorceries, and put it in his mind

to deny the mission he bears."

"You are sure, beyond chance of error, that he bears letters to that

effect, good Father?" the printer ventured.

"Ask my lord's Vicar! He knows the letters and the import of them!"

"They are to that effect," the Archdeacon answered, drumming on the table

with his fingers and speaking somewhat sullenly. "I was in the

Chancellery, and I saw them. They are duplicates of those sent to

Bordeaux."