He pointed to his son as he
spoke, and passion shook his slender frame as the breeze shakes a leaf.
Mademoiselle and Genevi?ve sat hand in hand--Yvonne deadly pale, Genevi?ve
weeping.
"What think you he has the effrontery to say? T?tedieu! it seems that he
has profited little by the lesson you read him in the horse-market about
meddling in matters which concern him not. He has come hither to tell me
that he will not permit his sister to wed the Cardinal's nephew; that he
will not have the estates of Canaples pass into the hands of a foreign
upstart. He, forsooth--he! he! he!" And at each utterance of the pronoun
he lunged with his forefinger in the direction of his son. "This he is not
ashamed to utter before Yvonne herself!"
"You compelled me to do so," cried Eug?ne angrily.
"I?" ejaculated the Chevalier. "Did I compel you to come hither with your
'I will' and 'I will not'? Who are you, that you should give laws at
Canaples? And he adds, sir," quoth the old knight excitedly, "that sooner
than allow this marriage to take place he will kill M. de Mancini."
"I shall be happy to afford him the opportunity!" shouted Andrea, bounding
forward.
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