"Claimed it was a plot!--that his mother was an honest woman, though neither the priest who performed the ceremony nor the marriage records could be found. He even resisted at first--refused to be turned out--and, skulking about the forest with his gun, kept the deputies at bay. But they surrounded him at last; drove him to the castle, and would have captured him, only he escaped that night, and took to the high seas, where he has been making trouble ever since!" "Trouble?" "He has seriously hampered his Excellency's commerce; interfered with his ships, and crippled his trade with the Orient." "But--the Governor has many boats, many men. Why have they failed to capture him?" "For a number of reasons. In the first place he is one of the most skilful pilots on the coast; when hard pressed, he does not hesitate to use even the Isles des Rochers as a place of refuge." "The Isles des Rochers?" queried the nobleman. "A _chevaux-de-frise_ on the sea, my Lord!" continued the commandant; "where fifty barren isles are fortified by a thousand rocks; frothing fangs when the tide is low; sharp teeth that lie in wait to bite when the smiling lips of the treacherous waters have closed above! There, the Governor's ships have followed him on several occasions, and--few of them have come back!" "But surely there must be times when he can not depend on that retreat?" "There are, my Lord. His principal harbor and resort is a little isle farther north--English, they call it--that offers refuge at any time to miscreants from France. There may they lie peacefully, as in a cradle; or go ashore with impunity, an they like. Oh, he is safe enough there. Home for French exiles, they designate the place. Exiles! Bah! It was there he first found means to get his ship--sharing his profits, no doubt, with the islander who built her. There, too, he mustered his crew--savage peasants who had been turned off the lands of the old Seigneur; fisher-folk who had become outlaws rather than pay to the Governor just dues from the sea; men fled from the _banalité_ of the mill, of the oven, of the wine-press--" "Still must he be a redoubtable fellow, to have done what he did to-night; to have dared mingle with the people, under the Governor's very guns!" "The people! He has nothing to fear from them. An ignorant, low, disloyal lot! They look upon this fellow as a hero. He has played his cards well; sends money to the lazy, worthless ones, under pretext that they are poor, over-taxed, over-burdened. In his company is one Gabriel Gabarie, a poet of the people, as he is styled, who keeps in touch with those stirring trouble in Paris. Perhaps they hope for an insurrection there, and then--" "An insurrection?" The Marquis' delicate features expressed ironical protest; he dismissed the possibility with an airy wave of the hand. "One should never anticipate trouble, Monsieur le Commandant," he said lightly and rose. "Good night."