rilliant company which entered Blois in the wake of
the royal favourite. D'Epernon had dismissed him from his mind. The Abbe
John and--oh, shame!--the doctor of the Sorbonne were both thinking of
Claire. So it came to pass, in revenge, that only Claire of all that
almost royal cavalcade spared a thought to poor Jean-aux-Choux.

As, however, Claire was the only one concerning whom Jean cared an
apple-pip, he would have been perfectly content had he known.

As it was, he waited till the Bearnais had betaken himself to his
slumbers in Anthony Arpajon's best green-tapestried chamber, and then
sailed out, hooded and robed like a Benedictine friar, to make his
observations. In the town of Blois, as almost anywhere else in central
and southern France, the ex-student of Geneva knew his way blindfold. He
skirted the bare rocky side of the castle, whereon now stands the huge
pavilion of Gaston of Orleans.

"They will not come and go by the great door," he said, "but there is
the small postern, by which it is the custom to make exits and entrances
when Court secrets are in the wind."

Accordingly, Jean placed himself behind a great hedge which marked the
limits of the royal domain. The city hummed beneath him like a hive of
bees aroused untimeously. He could hear now and then the voice of some
Leaguer raised in curses of the Valois King and all his favourites. The
voice was usually a little indistinct because of the owner's having too
frequently considered the redness of the Blesois wine.

Anon the curses would arrive home to roost, and that promptly. For some
good royalist, crying "_Vive D'Epernon_," would bear down upon the
Guisard. Then dull smitings of combat would alternate with war-cries and
over-words of faction songs. Once came a single deadly scream, way for
which had evidently been opened by a knife, and then, after that, only
the dull pad-pad of running feet--and silence!

In the palace wall the postern door opened and someone looked out. It
was closed again immediately.

Jean's eyes strove in vain to see more clearly. But the windows above,
being brilliantly lighted, threw the postern into the darkest shadow.

A moment after, however, four persons came out--first two men, then a
slender figure wrapped in a cloak, which Jean knew in a moment for that
of his mistress.

"He is keeping his word, after all," muttered Jean; "it may be just as
well!"

He who stepped out last was tall and dark, and turned the key in