There was silence for a while outside the little inn, silence which seemed full of portent, for through the pure mountain air there was wafted the hot breath of men's passions--fierce, dominating, challenging. Love, hatred, prejudices and contempt--all were portrayed on de Marmont's mobile face: they glowed in his dark eyes and breathed through his quivering nostrils. Now he rested his elbow on the table and his chin in his hand, his nervy fingers played a tattoo against his teeth, clenched together like those of some young feline creature which sees its prey coming along and is snarling at the sight. Clyffurde, with those deep-set, earnest grey eyes of his, was silently watching his friend. His hand did not shake, nor did the breath come any quicker from his broad chest. Yet deep down behind the wide brow, behind those same overshadowed eyes, a keen observer would of a surety have detected the signs of a latent volcano of passions, all the more strong and virile as they were kept in perfect control. It was he who presently broke the silence, and his voice was quite steady when he spoke, though perhaps a trifle more toneless, more dead, than usual. "And," he said, "what of Mlle. Crystal in all this?" "Crystal?" queried the other curtly, "what about her?" "She is an ardent royalist, more strong in her convictions and her enthusiasms than women usually are." "And what of that?" rejoined de Marmont fiercely. "I love Crystal." "But when she learns that you . . ." "She shall not learn it," rejoined the other cynically. "We sign our marriage contract to-night: the wedding is fixed for Tuesday. Until then I can hold my peace." An exclamation of hot protest almost escaped the Englishman's lips: his hand which rested on the table became so tightly clenched that the hard knuckles looked as if they would burst through their fetters of sinew and skin, and he made no pretence at concealing the look of burning indignation which flashed from his eyes. "But man!" he exclaimed, "a deception such as you propose is cruel and monstrous. . . . In view, too, of what has occurred in the past few days . . . in view of what may happen if the news which we have heard is true . . ."