"You say here that you knew nothing of this plot when you left Paris in the suite of the Duchesse de Castellucchio. When, therefore, did you first know that it was projected?" "At Basle. When I was told that I should have to take part in the slaying of the young Englishman. I refused to play such a part, since it is not my business to take life except as a soldier, unless I was told why the Englishman was to be slain." "And you were told?" "I was told, yet inwardly I resolved to have no share in the matter." "All lies!" roared out Fleur de Mai at this. "He asked what his pay was to be." "I will prove they are not lies," the other said, glancing at his brother vagabond. "When Monsieur le Procureur-Général comes to the time at which you stabbed the young man." "Attend to me and not to the prisoner," La Reynie said to Boisfleury. "You say you resolved to have no share in the matter unless you were told why the Englishman was to be slain. Since, therefore, you were present in the stable--as you affirm in your interrogatory--you had been told. What _were_ you told?" "That the Prince de Beaurepaire, the Capitaine la Truaumont and that scoundrel there," nodding his head at Fleur de Mai, "were all concerned in a plot of which the Englishman had discovered the details. That, also, if La Truaumont were denounced, I, who was truly in his pay and not in that of either the Prince de Beaurepaire or the Duchesse de Castellucchio, would also be denounced." "Every word a lie!" exclaimed Fleur de Mai who, swaggerer to the last, behaved more as if he were one of the Commission himself than a prisoner against whom appearances looked as bad as might well be. "Silence," La Reynie said, addressing him. "If you again interrupt you shall be removed and inquiries made into your actions while you are absent." Then, turning to Boisfleury, he said: "Therefore, knowing that this murder was decided on so as to ensure the safety of you all, you at first resolved to take part in it." "No, Monsieur le Procureur-Général," Boisfleury said quietly, "I decided on no such thing. What I did truly decide on, since I was informed that the young man would but be drawn into a duel with Fleur de Mai, in which his chance might be as good as that of the other--was that I would stand by and see that duel. Thereby I should not appear to be against those two ruffians, La Truaumont and La Preaux, and should obtain time in which to come to a conclusion as to how I might best warn his Majesty against the wicked plot." "Such being your praiseworthy resolve why did you not put it in practice later?" "He did," the President whispered to La Reynie. "He went to Fontainebleau to inform the Marquis de Louvois of that plot."