Presently the door closed behind them, and I
sank back upon the half-fettered chains.
I must have sat for more than an hour, when there was a noise
without, and there entered the Commandant, the Marquis de Montcalm,
and the Seigneur Duvarney. The pistol was in my hand, and I did not
put it down, but struggled to my feet, and waited for them to speak.
For a moment there was silence, and then the Commandant said,
"Your guards have brought me word, Monsieur le Capitaine, that you
are violent. You have resisted them, and have threatened them with
their own pistols."
"With one pistol, monsieur le commandant," answered I. Then, in
bitter words, I told them of my treatment by those rascals, and
I showed them how my ankle had been tortured. "I have no fear of
death," said I, "but I will not lie and let dogs bite me with
'I thank you.' Death can come but once, it is a damned brutality
to make one die a hundred and yet live--the work of Turks, not
Christians. If you want my life, why, take it and have done."
The Marquis de Montcalm whispered to the Commandant.
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