“Madame,” said Florian, with his best dignity, “whatever the contrast between the purity of your intentions and of your conduct, I shall cling to the old simple faith of my ancestors. I am a Puysange. I do not care for airdrawn abstractions, I do not palter with such dangerous subtleties as you suggest. I act with the forthright simplicity which becomes a gentleman, and I avenge my wounded honor.” Whereupon, with due respect for the possible incandescence of a halo, Florian struck Hoprig on the jaw. “Now, holy Michael aid me!” cried the saint, and he closed upon Florian, straightforwardly, without any miracle-working. And as Hoprig spoke, there was a great peal of thunder. The crash, with its long shuddering reverberations was utterly appalling, but Hoprig was not appalled. Instead, he had drawn away from Florian, and Hoprig was now smiling deprecatingly. “Dear me!” the saint observed, “but I am always forgetting. And now, I suppose, they will be vexed again.” _28._ _Highly Ambiguous_ And then as the last shaken note of thunder died away, and as Melior fell to comforting the awakened baby, a tall warrior entered. He wore the most resplendent of ancient corselets, and embossed greaves protected his legs, but no helmet hid his flaxen curls. He now laid down an eight-sided shield, emblazoned argent with a cross gules, and he rustled his wings rather indignantly. “Really, Hoprig,” said the new-comer, “this is carrying matters entirely too far; and you must not summon the princes of Heaven from their affairs to take part in your fisticuffs.” “What more can you expect, good Michael, of misguided efforts to make saints of my people?” This was a voice which was not unknown to Florian. And he saw that Janicot too had come,—not in that unreserved condition in which Florian had last seen him, but discreetly clothed and showing in everything as the neat burgess of Florian’s first encounter. And it was evident that this Janicot was not a stranger to St. Michael, either, when the archangel answered: “It is well enough for you to grin, but with us the matter is no joke. This Hoprig has been duly canonized. When he invokes any of us we are under formal obligations to minister unto him, for he is entitled to all the perquisites of a saint: and he puts them to most inappropriate uses. For I must tell you—” “Come, Monseigneur St. Michael,” observed Hoprig, waving toward Melior’s back, where she was comforting the mewing baby without the least attention to anything else,—“come, let us remember that a lady is present.”