rced from him by angry excitement.

"Very well," he finally said in his usual haughty tone; "I must have
been mistaken. I accept your explanation."

But the clown, hitherto so humble and silly-looking, seemed to take
offence at the word, and, assuming a defiant attitude, said:

"I have not made, nor do I intend making, any explanation."

"Monsieur," began De Clameran.

"Allow me to finish, if you please. If, unintentionally, I have offended
the wife of a man whom I highly esteem, it is his business to seek
redress, and not yours. Perhaps you will tell me he is too old to demand
satisfaction: if so, let him send one of his sons. I saw one of them in
the ball-room to-night; let him come. You asked me who I am; in return I
ask you who are you--you who undertake to act as Mme. Fauvel's champion?
Are you her relative, friend, or ally? What right have you to insult
her by pretending to discover an allusion to her in a play invented for
amusement?"

There was nothing to be said in reply to this. M. de Clameran sought a
means of escape.

"I am a friend of M. Fauvel," he said, "and this title gives me the
right to be as jealous of his reputation as if it were my own. If this
is not a sufficient reason for my interference, I must inform you that
his family will shortly be mine: I regard myself as his nephew."

"Ah!"

"Next week, monsieur, my marriage with Madeleine will be publicly
announced."

This news was so unexpected, so startling that for a moment the clown
was dumb; and now his surprise was genuine.

But he soon recovered himself, and, bowing with deference, said, with
covert irony:

"Permit me to offer my congratulations, monsieur. Besides being the
belle to-night, Mlle. Madeleine is worth, I hear, half a million."

Raoul de Lagors had anxiously been watching the people near them, to see
if they overheard this conversation.

"We have had enough of this gossip," he said, in a disdainful tone;
"I will only say one thing more, master clown, and that is, that your
tongue is too long."

"Perhaps it is, my pretty youth, perhaps it is; but my arm is still
longer."

De Clameran here interrupted them by saying:

"It is impossible for one to seek an explanation from a man who conceals
his identity under the guise of a fool."

"You are at liberty, my lord doge, to ask the master of the house who I
am--if you dare."

"You are," cried Clameran, "you are--"

A warning look from Raoul checked the forge-master