_dame de compagnie_ one able or desirous to cross her.

After an hour or two I was called to attend Count Saxe, and the
brothers were left alone. They seemed as affectionate as ever I saw
brothers. I heard their voices as they spent the hours in converse in
Gaston's room. Toward morning, in the ghostly half light which
precedes the dawn, they left the house together, taking a boat at the
foot of the garden. I watched them as they passed down the old garden
path to the river. Their arms were around each other's shoulders,
schoolboy fashion, and both of them wore long dark cloaks, for the
hour before the dawn was chill. Never were two figures more alike than
Gaston and Regnard Cheverny, and there was not the smallest difference
in their gait and bearing. I think the mother who bore them would
scarcely have known them apart, as I saw them walking away in the pale
hours of the morning. A boat awaited them at the foot of the garden.
The river rolled dark in the gray half light, half darkness, and a
ghostly mist lay upon its bosom. As the boat containing the two
brothers was pulled into midstream the creeping mist enveloped it for
a moment, then a wandering breeze driving the mist away, the boat
became again visible. Some singular interest fixed my eyes upon those
two figures in the boat, trying to distinguish one from the other.
But, to my chagrin, I could not do this. Presently the mist enveloped
them wholly.

Gaston returned within an hour. I told him of the effort I had made to
tell him and his brother apart at a distance. He said that Regnard and
himself had much sport with the boatman, and also with the sentry, by
merely changing cloaks, so that their uniforms could not be seen.

The next evening, as I was reposing myself on the balcony after a hard
day's work, Gaston Cheverny burst upon me. He looked like a
bridegroom, he was so radiant.

"I start for the Low Countries to-morrow," he cried, giving me a whack
on the back that nearly knocked me off my chair. "I have just met
Count Saxe coming from the Duke of Berwick. The marshal wishes to know
if the Austrians are observing the neutrality they engaged for in the
Low Countries. There have been some disturbances, especially the
burning of houses, like mine, for example, which excite the duke's
suspicions. He wants a trusty person, well acquainted with the
country, to find out the truth, and Count Saxe offered me. I ride
to-morrow. I may remain as long as I think nece