"Challenge M. de Noyard, and kill him!"
I stared in astonishment.
"Now you may know whether or not I love him," she added.
"But, mademoiselle,--why--"
"Ah, that is the one thing about which I must always refuse to be
questioned! I ask you this service. Will you grant it?"
"If he has given you offence," I said, "certainly I will seek him at
once."
"Not a word of me is to be said between you! He must not know that I have
spoken to you."
"But a man is not to be killed without reason."
"A pretext is easily invented."
"Certainly,--a pretext to hide the cause of a quarrel from the world. But
the real cause ought to be known to both antagonists."
"I shall not discuss what ought or ought not to be. I ask you, will you
fight this man and try to kill him? I request nothing unusual,--men are
killed every day in duels. You are a good swordsman; Bussy d'Amboise
himself has said so. Come! will you do this?" She looked up at me with a
slight frown of repressed petulance.
"If you will assure me that he has affronted you, and permit me to let
him know, privately, the cause of my quarrel."
"Oh!" she exclaimed, with irritation, "must a lady give a hundred reasons
when she requests a service of a gentleman?"
"One sufficient reason, when it is a service like this."
"Well, I shall give none. I desire his death,--few gentlemen would ask a
further reason.
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