Instant pursuit, instant vengeance--only these, he fancied,
could restore him in his fellows' eyes.
In his heart he knew what would become him better. But vanity is a
potent motive: and his conscience, even when supported by La Tribe,
struggled but weakly. From neither would he hear more.
"You have travelled with him, until you side with him!" he cried
violently. "Have a care, monsieur, have a care, lest we think you
papist!" And walking over to the men, he bade them saddle; adding a sour
word which turned their eyes, in no friendly gaze, on the minister.
After that La Tribe said no more. Of what use would it have been?
But as darkness came on and cloaked the little troop, and the storm which
the men had foreseen began to rumble in the west, his distaste for the
business waxed. The summer lightning which presently began to play
across the sky revealed not only the broad gleaming stream, between which
and a wooded hill their road ran, but the faces of his companions; and
these, in their turn, shed a grisly light on the bloody enterprise
towards which they were set. Nervous and ill at ease, the minister's
mind dwelt on the stages of that enterprise: the stealthy entrance
through the waterway, the ascent through the trap, the surprise, the
slaughter in the sleeping-chamber.
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