What was the difference?
No appeal would have been entertained, no protest would have availed.

It all came to this, he would either have to give up the Eagle or his life.
Well, life was not worth very much to him, as he had said.

Even though he realized from her desperate avowal of the night before that the interest of the Countess in him was more than she would have admitted, had not the words been surprised and wrung from her by his deadly peril, he knew that there was absolutely nothing to be hoped for in that direction.

Even though his comrades, alarmed by the imminence of his danger, and aroused by the energetic determination of the old Marquis, besought him to give up the Eagle, he refused.

He would have considered himself a forsworn man had he done so.
The Marquis had visited the prisoner and had condescended to make a personal appeal to him, imploring him by that old duty and friendship which had subsisted between the families, but his appeals had been as fruitless as his commands and his threats.