-natured as
usual--and Saint-Aignan whom he had accompanied, and who still leaned
over the king's armchair with an expression of countenance equally full
of good feeling. He determined, therefore, to speak out. "Your majesty
is perfectly aware," he said, "that accidents are very frequent in
hunting."

"In hunting, do you say?"

"I mean, sire, when an animal is brought to bay."

"Ah! ah!" said the king, "it was when the animal was brought to bay,
then, that the accident happened."

"Alas! sire, unhappily, it was so."

The king paused for a moment before he said: "What animal was being
hunted?"

"A wild boar, sire."

"And what could possibly have possessed De Guiche to go to a wild-boar
hunt by himself; that is but a clownish idea of sport, and only fit for
that class of people who, unlike the Marechal de Grammont, have no dogs
and huntsmen to hunt as gentlemen should do."

Manicamp shrugged his shoulders. "Youth is very rash," he said
sententiously.

"Well, go on," said the king.

"At all events," continued Manicamp, not venturing to be too precipitate
and hasty, and letting his words fall very slowly, one by one, "at all
events, sire, poor De Guiche went hunting--quite alone."

"Quite alone, indeed! What a sportsman. And is not M. de Guiche aware
that the wild boar always stands at bay?"

"That is the very thing that really happened, sire."

"He had some idea, then, of the beast being there?"

"Yes, sire, some peasants had seen it among their potatoes."

"And what kind of animal was it?"

"A short, thick beast."

"You may as well tell me, monsieur, that Guiche had some idea of
committing suicide, for I have seen him hunt, and he is an active and
vigorous hunter. Whenever he fires at an animal brought to bay and held
in check by the dogs, he takes every possible precaution, and yet he
fires with a carbine, and on this occasion he seems to have faced the
boar with pistols only."

Manicamp started.

"A costly pair of pistols, excellent weapons to fight a duel with a man
and not with a wild boar. What absurdity."

"There are some things, sire, which are difficult of explanation."

"You are quite right, and the event which we are now discussing is one
of those things. Go on."

During the recital, Saint-Aignan, who had probably made a sign to
Manicamp to be careful what he was about, found that the king's glance
was constantly fixed upon himself, so that it was utterly impossible to
communicate