Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini (best color ebook reader txt) 📕

André-Louis shrugged, threw out his arms, and let them fall to his sides again. “You have ruined everything,” he told M. Binet. “The matter could easily have been arranged. Well, well, it is you are master here; and since you want us to pack and be off, that is what we will do, I suppose.”

He went out, too. M. Binet stood in thought a moment, then followed him, his little eyes very cunning. He caught him up in the doorway. “Let us take a walk together, M. Parvissimus,” said he, very affably.

He thrust his arm through André-Louis’, and led him out into the street, where there was still considerable movement. Past the booths that ranged about the market they went, and down the hill towards the bridge. “I don’t think we shall pack tomorrow,” said M. Binet, presently. “In fact, we shall play tomorrow night.”

“Not if I know Polichinelle. You have⁠ ⁠…”

“I am not thinking of Polichinelle.”

“Of whom, then?”

“Of yourself.”

“I am flattered, sir. And in what capacity are you thinking of me?” There was something too sleek and oily in Binet’s voice for André-Louis’ taste.

“I am thinking of you in the part of Scaramouche.”

“Daydreams,” said André-Louis. “You are amusing yourself, of course.”

“Not in the least. I am quite serious.”

“But I am not an actor.”

“You told me that you could be.”

“Oh, upon occasion⁠ ⁠… a small part, perhaps⁠ ⁠…”

“Well, here is a big part⁠—the chance to arrive at a single stride. How many men have had such a chance?”

“It is a chance I do not covet, M. Binet. Shall we change the subject?” He was very frosty, as much perhaps because he scented in M. Binet’s manner something that was vaguely menacing as for any other reason.

“We’ll change the subject when I please,” said M. Binet, allowing a glimpse of steel to glimmer through the silk of him. “Tomorrow night you play Scaramouche. You are ready enough in your wits, your figure is ideal, and you have just the kind of mordant humour for the part. You should be a great success.”

“It is much more likely that I should be an egregious failure.”

“That won’t matter,” said Binet, cynically, and explained himself. “The failure will be personal to yourself. The receipts will be safe by then.”

“Much obliged,” said André-Louis.

“We should take fifteen louis tomorrow night.”

“It is unfortunate that you are without a Scaramouche,” said André-Louis.

“It is fortunate that I have one, M. Parvissimus.”

André-Louis disengaged his arm. “I begin to find you tiresome,” said he. “I think I will return.”

“A moment, M. Parvissimus. If I am to lose that fifteen louis⁠ ⁠… you’ll not take it amiss that I compensate myself in other ways?”

“That is your own concern, M. Binet.”

“Pardon, M. Parvissimus. It may possibly be also yours.” Binet took his arm again. “Do me the kindness to step across the street with me. Just as far as the post-office there. I have something to show you.”

André-Louis went. Before they reached that sheet of paper nailed upon the door, he knew exactly what it would say. And in effect it was, as he had supposed, that twenty louis would be paid for information leading to the apprehension of one André-Louis Moreau, lawyer of Gavrillac, who was wanted by the King’s Lieutenant in Rennes upon a charge of sedition.

M. Binet watched him whilst he read. Their arms were linked, and Binet’s grip was firm and powerful.

“Now, my friend,” said he, “will you be M. Parvissimus and play Scaramouche tomorrow, or will you be André-Louis Moreau of Gavrillac and go to Rennes to satisfy the King’s Lieutenant?”

“And if it should happen that you are mistaken?” quoth André-Louis, his face a mask.

“I’ll take the risk of that,” leered M. Binet. “You mentioned, I think, that you were a lawyer. An indiscretion, my dear. It is unlikely that two lawyers will be in hiding at the same time in the same district. You see it is not really clever of me. Well, M. André-Louis Moreau, lawyer of Gavrillac, what is it to be?”

“We will talk it over as we walk back,” said André-Louis.

“What is there to talk over?”

“One or two things, I think. I must know where I stand. Come, sir, if you please.”

“Very well,” said M. Binet, and they turned up the street again, but M. Binet maintained a firm hold of his young friend’s arm, and kept himself on the alert for any tricks that the young gentleman might be disposed to play. It was an unnecessary precaution. André-Louis was not the man to waste his energy futilely. He knew that in bodily strength he was no match at all for the heavy and powerful Pantaloon.

“If I yield to your most eloquent and seductive persuasions, M. Binet,” said he, sweetly, “what guarantee do you give me that you will not sell me for twenty louis after I shall have served your turn?”

“You have my word of honour for that.” M. Binet was emphatic.

André-Louis laughed. “Oh, we are to talk of honour, are we? Really, M. Binet? It is clear you think me a fool.”

In the dark he did not see the flush that leapt to M. Binet’s round face. It was some moments before he replied.

“Perhaps you are right,” he growled. “What guarantee do you want?”

“I do not know what guarantee you can possibly give.”

“I have said that I will keep faith with you.”

“Until you find it more profitable to sell me.”

“You have it in your power to make it more profitable always for me to keep faith with you. It is due to you that we have done so well in Guichen. Oh, I admit it frankly.”

“In private,” said André-Louis.

M. Binet left the sarcasm unheeded.

“What you have done for us here with Figaro-Scaramouche, you can do elsewhere with other things. Naturally, I shall not want to lose you. That is your guarantee.”

“Yet tonight you would sell me for twenty louis.”

“Because⁠—name of God!⁠—you enrage me by refusing me a service well within your powers. Don’t you think, had I been entirely