credited with--that,
indeed, women usually err on the side of knowing too much--knowing, in
a word, facts that do not exist.

So disgusted was I with the whole business that I turned my back on
the land of my birth and left the lawyers to fight over their details.
I appointed a London solicitor to watch my interests, who smiled at my
account of the affair, saying that things would be better settled
among members of the legal profession--that my ways were not theirs.
For which compliment I fervently thanked him, and shook the dust of
London from off my feet.

The Vicomte de Clericy had notified to me by letter that my post would
be held vacant and at my disposal for an indefinite period, but that
at the same time my presence would be an infinite relief to him. This
was no doubt the old gentleman's courteous way of putting it, for I
had done little enough to make my absence of any note.

Travelling all night, I arrived in the Rue des Palmiers at nine
o'clock one morning, and took coffee as usual in my study. At ten
o'clock Monsieur de Clericy came to me there, and was kind enough to
express both sympathy at my bereavement and pleasure at my return. In
reply I thanked him.

"But," I added, "I regret that I must resign my post."

"Resign," cried the old gentleman. "Mon Dieu! do not talk of it. Why
do you think of such a thing?"

"I am no secretary. I have never had the taste for such work nor a
chance of learning to do it."

The Vicomte looked at me thoughtfully.

"But you are what I want," he replied. "A man--a responsible man, and
not a machine."

"Bah," said I, shrugging my shoulders, "what are we doing--work that
any could do. What am I wanted for? I have done nothing but write a
few letters and frighten a handful of farmers in Provence."

The Vicomte de Clericy coughed confidentially.

"My dear Howard," he answered, looking at the door to make sure that
it was closed. "I am getting an old man. I am only fit to manage my
affairs while all is tranquil and in order. Tell me--as man to
man--will things remain tranquil and in order? You know as well as I
do that the Emperor has a malady from which there is no recovery. And
the Empress, ah! yes--she is a clever woman. She has spirit. It is not
every woman who would take this journey to Egypt to open the Suez
Canal and make that great enterprise a French undertaking. But has a
woman ever governed France successfully--from the boudoir or the
throne? Look back i