presume?"

"I should think not, indeed. You see he has a truly royal escort."

"Ay, there's no fear in the daytime; but at night?"

"We redouble our precautions."

"And what method of surveillance do you employ?"

"Eight men remain constantly in his room."

"The deuce, he is well guarded, then. But besides these eight men, you
doubtless place some guard outside?"

"Oh, no! Just think. What would you have two men without arms do against
eight armed men?"

"Two men--how do you mean?"

"Yes, the king and his lackey."

"Oh! then they allow the lackey to remain with him?"

"Yes; Stuart begged this favor and Harrison consented. Under pretense
that he's a king it appears he cannot dress or undress without
assistance."

"Really, captain," said D'Artagnan, determined to continue on the
laudatory tack on which he had commenced, "the more I listen to you the
more surprised I am at the easy and elegant manner in which you speak
French. You have lived three years in Paris? May I ask what you were
doing there?"

"My father, who is a merchant, placed me with his correspondent, who in
turn sent his son to join our house in London."

"Were you pleased with Paris, sir?"

"Yes, but you are much in want of a revolution like our own--not against
your king, who is a mere child, but against that lazar of an Italian,
the queen's favorite."

"Ah! I am quite of your opinion, sir, and we should soon make an end
of Mazarin if we had only a dozen officers like yourself, without
prejudices, vigilant and incorruptible."

"But," said the officer, "I thought you were in his service and that it
was he who sent you to General Cromwell."

"That is to say I am in the king's service, and that knowing he wanted
to send some one to England, I solicited the appointment, so great was
my desire to know the man of genius who now governs the three kingdoms.
So that when he proposed to us to draw our swords in honor of old
England you see how we snapped up the proposition."

"Yes, I know that you charged by the side of Mordaunt."

"On his right and left, sir. Ah! there's another brave and excellent
young man."

"Do you know him?" asked the officer.

"Yes, very well. Monsieur du Vallon and myself came from France with
him."

"It appears, too, you kept him waiting a long time at Boulogne."

"What would you have? I was like you, and had a king in keeping."

"Aha!" said Groslow; "what king?"

"Our own, to be sure, the little one--Loui