ng or pretense. Should a disgraced fool be
his undoing? From that living entombment should his foeman in cap and
bells yet indirectly summon the force to bend him to the dust, or send
him to the hangman's knot?

Step by step the king's guest had left the palace behind him, until the
surrounding shrubbery shut it from view, but the path, sweeping onward
with graceful curve, brought him suddenly to a beautiful chateau. Lost
in thought, he gazed within the flowering ground, at the ornate
architecture, the marble statues and the little lake, in whose pellucid
depths were mirrored a thousand beauties of that chosen spot--an
improved Eden of the landscape gardener wherein resided the Countess
d'Etampes.

"Why," thought the free baron, brightening abruptly, "that chance which
served me last night, which forced the trooper to speak to-day, now has
led my stupid feet to the soothsayer."

Within a much begilt and gorgeous bower, he soon found himself awaiting
patiently the coming of the favorite. Upon a tiny chair of gold, too
fragile for his bulk, the caller meanwhile inspected the ceilings and
walls of this dainty domicile, mechanically striving to decipher a
painted allegory of Venus and Mars, or Helen and Paris, or the countess
and Francis--he could not decide precisely its purport--when she who
had succeeded Chateaubriant floated into the room, dressed in some
diaphanous stuff, a natural accompaniment to the other decorations; her
dishabille a positive note of modesty amid the vivid colorings and
graceful poses of those tributes to love with which Primaticcio and
other Italian artists had adorned this bower.

"How charming of you!" vaguely murmured the lady, sinking lightly upon
a settee. "What an early riser you must be, Duke."

Although it was then but two hours from noon, the visitor confessed
himself open to criticism in this regard. "And you, as well, Madam,"
he added, "must plead guilty of the same fault. One can easily see you
have been out in the garden, and," he blundered on, "stolen the tints
from the roses."

Sharply the countess looked at him, but read only an honest attempt at
a compliment.

"Why," she said, "you are becoming as great a flatterer as the rest of
them. But confess now, you did not call to tell me that?"

The free baron looked from her through the folding doors into a
retiring apartment, set with arabesque designs, and adorned with inlaid
tables bearing statues of alabaster and en