"At your command? No!" the priest shrieked with passion. "His Majesty
knows whether I serve him."
"I know," Charles cried, stamping his foot in a fury, "that you all serve
me when it pleases you! That you are all sticks of the same faggot, wood
of the same bundle, hell-babes in your own business, and sluggards in
mine! You kill to-day and you'll lay it to me to-morrow! Ay, you will!
you will!" he repeated frantically, and drove home the asseveration with
a fearful oath. "The dead are as good servants as you! Foucauld was
better! Foucauld? Foucauld? Ah, my God!"
And abruptly in presence of them all, with the sacred name, which he so
often defiled, on his lips, Charles turned, and covering his face burst
into childish weeping; while a great silence fell on all--on Bussy with
the blood of his cousin Resnel on his point, on Fervacques, the betrayer
of his friend, on Chicot, the slayer of his rival, on Cocconnas the
cruel--on men with hands unwashed from the slaughter, and on the
shameless women who lined the walls; on all who used this sobbing man for
their stepping-stone, and, to attain their ends and gain their purposes,
trampled his dull soul in blood and mire.
One looked at another in consternation. Fear grew in eyes that a moment
before were bold; cheeks turned pale that a moment before were hectic.
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