For my part, I would have all of life,--husk, kernel, stalk,--aye, and the root that grows amid the dung." He paused a moment, looking at Laurence with the air of a connoisseur.
"Come hither, lad," he said, with a soft and friendly accent; "sit on this seat with your back to the window.

Turn your head so that the lamp shines aright upon your face.

You are not so handsome as was reported, but that there is something wondrously taking about your countenance, I do admit.

There--sit so, and fear nothing." Laurence sat down with the bad grace of a manly youth who is admired for what he privately despises, and wishes himself well quit of.

But, notwithstanding this, there was something so insinuating and pleasant about the marshal's manner that the lad almost thought he must have dreamed the incident of the burned door and the sacrifice upon the iron altar.
"You came hither to search for Margaret of Douglas," said the marshal, suddenly bending forward as if to take him by surprise.
Laurence, wholly taken aback, answered neither yea nor nay, but held his peace.
Then Gilles de Retz nodded sagely, with a quiet satisfaction in his own prevision, which to one less bold and reckless than the young clerk of Dulce Cor would have proved disconcerting.