Belle-Rose — page 377: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

366 - THE RUE DE L’ARBRE-SEC. exercises of the body, did not lose sight of it. They arrived together behind St. Germain 1’Auxerrois, Rue de 1l’Arbre-. Sec. The street was deserted and somber; Belle-Rose find- ‘ing the place propitious to his design, rushed forward and leaped in a bound to the portiere of the carriage which he opened. Déroute had placed his hand upon the horses’ bits; Grippard had charged himself with the lackey. Ever ything stopped at the same time. ‘*Whip the horses!’’ cried Monsieur de Charny. ‘“Whip, and you are a dead man,” replied Déroute, | showing a pistol to the coachman. The lackey, who was a resolute fellow, plunged his spurs into the horse’s stomach, and struck Grippard on the head with a kind of hunting-knife which he carried in his belt. The corporal’s hat parried the attack, and he replied by a thrust which entered the Jackey’s body; the man fell under the feet of the horse, which reared frantically. Grippard let go the reins, and the frightened animal left ata gallop. The whip escaped the hands of the terrified coachman. The stopping of the carriage and the fall of the groom had occupied the space of ten seconds. Monsieur de Charny looked at this great black figure which had so brusquely risen before him; but the face was masked, and through the holes in the mask he saw only two eyes whose fiashing fire made him start. “If it is gold that you wish,’’ said he, affecting to laugh, ‘‘here is my purse.’ Belle-Rose took the purse and scattered the gold on the ground. Monsieur de Charny shivered; a secret instinct told him that he was in the presence of a terrible danger. ‘But what do you wish, then?’’ he exclaimed. **Your life.’’ Monsieur de Charny collected all his somber energy for braving his enemy face.to face. ‘Pardon me, monsieur,’’ he replied, ‘IT took you for a robber, and you are an assassin.’ Belle-Rose srew pale under his mask at this insult. ‘*Hach of us has his sword,’’ he coldly said. ““Descend, monsieur. ’ Monsieur de Chany daaconed: They were at the corner of the Rue de 1’Arbre-Sec and the Rue des Forses- St. Germain-]l’Auxerrois; not a light shone at the windows of the neighboring houses, not a voice was heard in the silence. The coachman was upon his seat, mournful and stiff like. a petrified corpse; the groom was gasping for breath upon the ground; the scene was lit up by a torch comicbooks:co