all men would have known--how stupid a man is the Fleming
who calls himself King of Spain. We should have avenged Pavia, you and
I, my Balafre, and Philip's ransom would have bought the children each a
gown!"

But Valentine la Nina knew well of what the Duke of Guise had been
thinking. She understood his words, but she gave him no chance of
private speech. Nor did she send him any further warning. Once at Paris
she had warned him fully, and he had chosen to disobey her. It was at
his peril. And now, in Blois itself, she treated the popular idol and
all-powerful captain with a chilling disdain that secretly stung him.

Only once did they exchange words. It was on the stairway, as Valentine
gathered her riding-skirt in her fingers in order to mount to the
Queen-Mother's room. The Duke was coming down slowly, a disappointed
look on his face, but he brightened at sight of her, and taking her
gloved hand quickly, he put it to his lips.

"Now I have lived to-day!" he said gently.

"If you do not get hence," she answered him with bitterness, "it is one
of the last days that you will!"

"Then I would spend these last here in Blois," he said, smiling at her.

"You would do better for the Cause you pretend to serve if you took my
grey alezan out there, and rode him at gallop through the North Gate. I
give him to you if you will!"

"I should only bring him back by the South Gate," he said, smiling.
"While you remain here, I am no better than a poor moth fluttering about
the candle!"

"But the Cause?" she cried, with an angry clap of her hands.

"That for the Cause!" said Guise, snapping his fingers lightly; "a man
has but one life to live, and few privileges therein. But surely he may
be allowed to lay that one at a fair lady's feet!"

Without answering, Valentine la Nina swept up the stairs of the Queen's
lodging, her heart within her like lead.

"After all," she murmured, as she shut herself in her room, "I have done
my best. I have warned him time and again. I cannot save a man against
his will. Paugh!" (she turned hastily from the window), "there he is
again on the other side of the way, pacing the street as if it were the
poop of an amiral!"

The little walled garden at Madame Granier's, with its trellised vines,
the wind-swept wintry shore of the Loire, and the bleached shell-pink of
the shingle, all went back to their ancient quiet. The whole world was
in, at, and about the Chateau. Men, women, and both sorts