"If you would oppose Count Felix by the means I have shown you, yes, for yours is too tell-tale a face to be seen at present. If you decide not to claim your rights, yonder is the door you entered by, and you are free to go."
"I will stay," said Herrick after a moment's reflection. "One friend I have whose worth I know, and who may be of value to us among the people. Will you find and bring here Jean who is called the dwarf of St. Etienne?"
"Would you put your trust in a fool!" exclaimed Father Bertrand.
"There is more wisdom, strength, and cunning in that crooked body than lies in most of your straight-limbed men. I know. He is a hater of the Count besides."
"Either he comes, or I go," said Herrick.
"You quickly learn the part you are to play. You command, I obey. Jean shall be found." And the priest smiled, and led the way into another room. "I will return to you as soon as possible. In the meanwhile Mercier shall attend to your wants. You have forgiven him for attacking you in the Rue de la Grosse Horloge?"
"I petition that you do," said Father Bertrand. "I know him. He will be useful to us. A duke should grant so humble a petition when it is the first made to him."
"Send this Mercier. I will not harm him," said Herrick. "If I can mount the throne as easily as I grant the petition, we have no very thorny path to travel."
The dwarf, however, was not to be found that day, although Father Bertrand looked for him in St. Etienne and Mercier sought him at all the haunts he knew of. Jean remained in the house by the wall, and that night again crossed the river to make inquiry of the farmer. A wagoner was at the farm that night, and chancing to hear that he had been to Vayenne that day, Jean questioned him.
"Ay; sure they were on the lookout at the gate," he answered, "but I had seen no soldier or priest, as I told them."
He was an honest fellow, and remembering the coins in his pocket, held his tongue.
It was toward dusk the next day that Jean entered St. Etienne. Lights were burning dimly in one of the chapels where vespers were being said, and as he stood in the shadows of one of the great pillars, Father Bertrand, who was about to leave the church, saw him.
"Jean, there is a friend of yours at my house who wishes to see you."