The Long Night | Page 5

name, gentlemen, put up! put up! Stop them! Will no one stop them!" And in despair, seeing no one move to arrest them, he made as if he would stand between them.
But the bully flourished his blade about his ears, and with a cry the goodman saved himself "Out, skinker!" Grio cried grimly. "And you, say your prayers, puppy. Before you are five minutes older I will spit you like a partridge though I cross the frontier for it. You have basted me with wine! I will baste you after another fashion! On guard! On guard, and----"
"What is this?"
The voice stayed Grio's tongue and checked his foot in the very instant of assault. The student, watching his blade and awaiting the attack, was surprised to see his point waver and drop. Was it a trick, he wondered? A stratagem? No, for a silence fell on the room, while those who held the floor hastened to efface themselves against the wall, as if they at any rate had nothing to do with the fracas. And next moment Grio shrugged his shoulders, and with a half-stifled curse stood back.
"What is this?"
The same question in the same tone. This time the student saw whose voice it was had stayed Grio's arm. Within the door a pace in front of two or three attendants, who had displaced the roisterers on the threshold, appeared a spare dry-looking man of middle height, wearing his hat, and displaying a gold chain of office across the breast of his black velvet cloak. In age about sixty, he had nothing that at a first glance seemed to call for a second: his small pinched features, and the downward curl of the lip, which his moustache and clipped beard failed to hide, indicated a nature peevish and severe rather than powerful. On nearer observation the restless eyes, keen and piercing, asserted themselves and redeemed the face from insignificance. When, as on this occasion, their glances were supported by the terrors of the State, it was not difficult to understand why Messer Blondel, the Syndic, though no great man to look upon, had both weight with the masses, and a hold not to be denied over his colleagues in the Council.
No one took on himself to answer the question he had put, and in a voice thin and querulous, but with a lurking venom in its tone, "What is this?" the great man repeated, looking from one to another. "Are we in Geneva, or in Venice? Under the skirts of the scarlet woman, or where the magistrates bear not the sword in vain? Good Mr. Landlord, are these your professions? Your bailmen should sleep ill to-night, for they are likely to answer roundly for this! And whom have we sparking it here? Brawling and swearing and turning into a profligate's tavern a place that should be for the sober entertainment of travellers? Whom have we here--eh! Let me see them! Ah!"
He paused rather suddenly, as his eyes met Grio's: and a little of his dignity fell from him with the pause. His manner underwent a subtle change from the judicial to the paternal. When he resumed, he wagged his head tolerantly, and a modicum of sorrow mingled with his anger. "Ah, Messer Grio! Messer Grio!" he said, "it is you, is it? For shame! For shame! This is sad, this is lamentable! Some indulgence, it is true"--he coughed--"may be due after late events, and to certain who have borne part in them. But this goes too far! Too far by a long way!"
"It was not I began it!" the bully muttered sullenly, a mixture of bravado and apology in his bearing. He sheathed his blade, and thrust the long scabbard behind him. "He threw a glass of wine in my face, Syndic--that is the truth. Is an old soldier who has shed blood for Geneva to swallow that, and give God thanks?"
The Syndic turned to the student, and licked his lips, his features more pinched than usual. "Are these your manners?" he said. "If so, they are not the manners of Geneva! Your name, young man, and your dwelling place?"
"My name is Claude Mercier, last from Chatillon in Burgundy," the young man answered firmly. "For the rest, I did no otherwise than you, sir, must have done in my case!"
The magistrate snorted. "I!"
"Being treated as I was!" the young man protested. "He would have me drink whether I would or no! And in terms no man of honour could bear."
"Honour?" the Syndic retorted, and on the word exploded in great wrath. "Honour, say you? Then I know who is in fault. When men of your race talk of honour 'tis easy to saddle the horse. I will teach you that we know naught of honour in Geneva, but only of service!