"As for Cremieux and my father, they understood each other from the first. It was wonderful to find how much they had in common. And he will help to stop the rioting. He says he will not go away from Aramon till the men are back at work. Cremieux's opinion is that these sporadic risings do no good, even when run on the best lines, without personal violence or destruction of property. To succeed, the thing must be a national movement, concerted and directed from each one of the great towns, otherwise the bourgeois government merely waits till its feet are free elsewhere, and then tramples out one by one all the little revolts." At that moment Deventer caught me by the arm. "Hold hard," he whispered, "here he comes with the Chief. I declare they are as thick as thieves, and yet in an hour he may be leading the rascals over yonder to burn down the Chateau." The restless eyes of Dennis Deventer spied me out. "Ah, Angus me boy," he hailed, "come this way. You two ought to know one another. This is our philosopher's son from Gobelet, who has run away from college to take service under Garibaldi." "If he casts his eyes in that direction," said the dark young man, smiling, "I can find him more profitable work nearer home." "Come, none of your proselytising on my ground!" said Dennis Deventer, laying a heavy hand on his companion's shoulder. "If he chooses to go and get a bullet in him for the sake of France, that is his own affair. But I will not have him mixed up in your little revolutions about which he knows nothing at all." "But I will teach him. He is intelligent--of a fine race--it is such men we need. Let me speak to him, I beg." But Dennis Deventer would listen to nothing. He pushed his visitor out of the hall, laughing and shaking his head good-humouredly. "Take anyone you like from my rank and file," he said, "but leave my staff officers alone." But I did not forget that tall, grave young man, who talked so earnestly and pleaded so strongly for a chance to teach me the wisdom of insurrection. CHAPTER VIII I SEE THE SCARLET TATTER NEAR AT HAND I might have thought much more about Gaston Cremieux and the dark fatality of his eyes, if other things had not immediately distracted my attention. The garrison had had its noon dinner in the great hall, and at one o'clock the family were served in the fine red and gold dining-room, the furnishings of which had been the gift of the Emperor. Dennis Deventer sat at the top of the table with the gleeful air of having dispatched the business of the day.