ull level of the
undeveloped intellect when least expected. That he was small for his
age he knew, that he was weakly, ill-formed, and awkward. These things
were patent to the eye and common knowledge, but into the depths of the
lad's nature he had not ventured to probe lest Louis' suspicious
jealousy should be aroused. Now that he found himself between a
father's twilight and a son's dawn, with "The king is dead, long live
the king," an imminent proclamation, he blamed himself for his
cowardice as men always do who are wise after the event. With a little
more certain knowledge his star might rise with the dawn, instead of,
as he feared, setting with the twilight.

"Eh?" he said, rousing himself as La Mothe repeated the question. "The
Dauphin? I know little of him. He has lived at Amboise, I at Valmy or
Plessis with the King: it is long since the two have met. An ailing,
obstinate, dull boy, they say, with no more wit than can be put in him
with a spoon. If it were not that weak natures often turn vicious that
they may be thought strong I would say the King's fear of a plot was
baseless."

"But surely there is no plot--a son against a father: a father who
loves him," added La Mothe, remembering the contents of his saddle-bags.

"I wish the plot was as doubtful as the love; we might then have stayed
comfortably in Valmy," answered Commines cynically, and La Mothe's eyes
twinkled as he thought how much better he had read the King in his
single hour than Commines had in all his ten years of intimacy. "The
woman," he went on, "must be Ursula de Vesc, and if so you can spend
your hour or two's walk from Chateau-Renaud to Amboise adding a verse
to your love song."

"Why not a new song all for herself!" replied La Mothe, the twinkle
broadening to a laugh, "or had I better wait till I see her? She would
never forgive me if the adored dimple was in the right cheek instead of
the left, or the sweet eyes of my song grey instead of blue. Which are
they, Uncle?"

"I never knew the colour of any woman's eyes but one," answered
Commines; and La Mothe knew by the softened voice that he spoke of
Suzanne. "And when a woman has taught you the colour of her eyes may
you see that in them which will make black or blue or grey the one
colour in the world for you. As to Ursula de Vesc, she detests me much
as I detest that offscouring from the dregs of brazen Paris who will
meet you at the Chien Noir. But there is Chateau-R