"His
daughter may not have her father's weakness for Huguenots, and if she
bears resentment against the governor on her father's account, her desire
of the reward may outweigh that resentment. Covetousness is strong in
women. You would not expect great filial devotion in a hired spy and
traitress. Moreover, for all I know, this woman may not be Mile, de
Varion, although Montignac so named her to me. She may have assumed that
character at his suggestion, in order to get your confidence and
sympathy, not daring to pretend to be a Huguenot, lest some habitual act
might betray the deception."
"Enough, M. de Berquin," I said. "I do your wit the credit of admitting
that so well-wrought a lie was never before told. Only two things prevent
its being believed. It is to me that you tell it, and it is of Mile, de
Varion! You complained a while ago of being chilly. Let us now warm
ourselves!"
And so we went at it. I had no reason now to repeat the trick by which I
had before disarmed him. Indeed, I wished him to keep sword in hand that
I might have no scruples about killing him. I never could bring myself to
give the death thrust to an unarmed man. Yet I was determined that the
brain whence had sprung so horrible a story against my beloved should
invent no more, that the lips which had uttered the accusation should not
speak again. Yet he gave me a hard fight. It was for his life that he now
wielded sword, and he was not now taken by surprise as he had been in our
former meetings, or unsteadied by a desire of making a great flourish
before a lady.
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