as been asking me if your majesty does not
intend to sleep at Melun."

"Sleep at Melun! What for?" exclaimed Louis XIV. "Sleep at Melun! Who,
in Heaven's name, can have thought of such a thing when M. Fouquet is
expecting us this evening?"

"It was simply," returned Colbert, quickly, "the fear of causing your
majesty any delay; for, according to established etiquette, you cannot
enter any place, with the exception of your own royal residences, until
the soldiers' quarters have been marked out by the quartermaster, and
the garrison properly distributed."

D'Artagnan listened with the greatest attention, biting his mustache to
conceal his vexation; and the queens listened attentively also. They
were fatigued, and would have liked to have gone to rest without
proceeding any farther; and, especially, in order to prevent the king
walking about in the evening with M. de Saint-Aignan and the ladies of
the court; for, if etiquette required the princesses to remain within
their own rooms, the ladies of honor, as soon as they had performed the
services required of them, had no restrictions placed upon them, but
were at liberty to walk about as they pleased. It will easily be
conjectured that all these rival interests, gathering together in
vapors, must necessarily produce clouds, and that the clouds would be
followed by a tempest. The king had no mustache to gnaw, and therefore
kept biting the handle of his whip instead, with ill-concealed
impatience. How could he get out of it? D'Artagnan looked as agreeable
as possible, and Colbert as sulky as he could. Whom was there he could
get in a passion with?

"We will consult the queen," said Louis XIV., bowing to the royal
ladies. And this kindness of consideration, which softened
Maria-Theresa's heart, who was of a kind and generous disposition, when
left to her own free will, replied:

"I shall be delighted to do whatever your majesty wishes."

"How long will it take us to get to Vaux?" inquired Anne of Austria, in
slow and measured accents, and placing her hand upon her bosom, where
the seat of her pain lay.

"An hour for your majesties' carriages," said D'Artagnan; "the roads are
tolerably good."

The king looked at him. "And a quarter of an hour for the king," he
hastened to add.

"We should arrive by daylight?" said Louis XIV.

"But the billetting of the king's military escort," objected Colbert,
softly, "will make his majesty lose all the advantage of his speed,
ho