to a meal which would have graced the table of the
richest Spanish creole in all Louisiana. There were trout from the
neighboring streams, a variety of meats and fowl, good wheaten bread
altogether unlike the unappetizing corn _tortillas_ of the commonfolk,
chocolate and _dulces_, fine raisins from the Paso del Norte, and a
bottle or two of most excellent wine.

Throughout our repast His Excellency addressed himself to me as one
gentleman to another, so that I found myself continually in a stress of
excitement between apprehension and hope. Our conversation was for the
most part directed to European topics, dwelling much, as must every
discussion of transatlantic affairs, upon the career of that most
marvellous of men, the Emperor of the French.

But with the wine and the _cigarros_, His Excellency seemed to
recollect for the first time the small but none the less important
affairs of our own personal concern.

"I begin to be convinced, senor physician, that you are indeed a man of
genteel breeding," he said. "If, however, you will pardon the remark, I
have grave doubt whether a Frenchman of your education would commit so
many errors in the use of his native language."

I smiled. "_Mon Dieu!_ Your Excellency, we of St. Louis have not the
facilities for visiting _la belle_ France possessed by our fellow
creoles of New Orleans. It is a century or more since my ancestors came
to the New World."

"And you have dwelt much among the Anglo-Americans," he insinuated.

"It is true," I replied with candor. "I obtained my diploma as a
physician from the college of Columbia in the city of New York."

He stiffened with a sudden return of austerity. "Senor, I no longer
doubt that you are a _caballero_--a gentleman. I will not press you to
confess your ulterior motive in coming into the domains of His Most
Catholic Majesty. Yet, if you carry secret documents (I am disinclined
to have you searched), I ask you to give me your word whether or not you
carry such despatches."

"Your Excellency," I answered, "I give you my word that I do not. The
documents I handed over into Your Excellency's keeping were all I
brought with me."

"_Satanas!_" he cried, his face flushing with sudden violent anger.
"Such duplicity! Such treachery!"

"If you will be so kind as to explain, senor," I said with unaffected
astonishment.

"You hold to it? _Carrajo!_ How then of the packet in your bosom?"

"That?" I exclaimed, at once perceiving the c