I gazed about the cell helplessly. Was there no way out? Must I fall victim to this monster of a Roquefort? To fall in fair fight, in warm blood, in the open day, were nothing--a man could go to death then gladly. But slowly, in a dark cellar, with others looking on exulting--ugh! I felt my nerves quivering at the horror of the thought--and then, with set teeth, I put the weakness from me. Other men--yes, and women--had gone to the same fate with smiling lips--why not I, a Marsan? So when Drouet opened the door again he found me looking from my window down upon M. le Comte’s camp, and I flatter myself that he was surprised at the calmness of my greeting. “You will follow me, Monsieur,” he said in a tone somewhat repressed. Perhaps even he was beginning to pity me. “Willingly,” I answered, and after him I went, out into the hall, where two sentries fell in behind me, down the stair, across a gloomy interior court to a great stone tower standing somewhat detached, then down another stair. I felt my head grow giddy as we left behind us the good air and the bright sunshine--perhaps I was nevermore to see them, or to see them only from a racked and crooked body. But again I caught my manhood back to me and went on down the stair with a step tolerably firm. A torch was blazing at the foot, lighting partially a dismal passage which seemed to lead into the very bowels of the earth. Down this Drouet turned, and paused, at last, before a door. “This is the place,” he said in a low tone. “Enter,” and he opened the door and stood aside. I noted how thick it was, how heavy--plainly no cry, however shrill and agonized, could pierce it. For an instant the thought came to me to hurl myself upon my guards, to tear them by the throat until they should be forced to kill me--that would be the easier way. Yet--oh, heart of youth!--perhaps beyond the door there were not certain death--there might yet be a chance--and life was sweet! So I stepped across the threshold and heard the door swing shut behind me. CHAPTER X THE QUESTION TWO torches blazing from brackets in the wall at the farther end threw fantastic shadows along the floor and up against the ceiling. For an instant, as I looked at them, my eyes were dazzled, and then I saw that on a platform below the lights sat Roquefort and by his side d’Aurilly. A dozen men-at-arms stood guard, with something sinister and threatening in their very immobility, and in the corner to one side I caught a glimpse of an array of great, shapeless things, whose uses I did not permit my thoughts to dwell upon. “This way, sirrah!” called Roquefort, and then sat silent until I stood before him, the torchlight full upon my face. It was then I understood why the torches were so placed--the face of the judge in shadow--the face of the prisoner in full light. How many had stood so and felt those eyes probing deep into their souls! For even from the shadow I could catch the menacing gleam of those serpent’s eyes.