s start of the duke and the flush which rose to his brow
Catharine saw that the arrow aimed by her had hit the mark.

"He?" said he, "Henriot king? And of what kingdom, mother?"

"One of the most magnificent kingdoms in Christendom, my son."

"Oh! mother," said D'Alencon, growing pale, "what are you saying?"

"What a good mother ought to say to her son, and what you have thought
of more than once, Francois."

"I?" said the duke; "I have thought of nothing, madame, I swear to you."

"I can well believe you, for your friend, your brother Henry, as you
call him, is, under his apparent frankness, a very clever and wily
person, who keeps his secrets better than you keep yours, Francois. For
instance, did he ever tell you that De Mouy was his man of business?"

As she spoke, Catharine turned a glance upon Francois as though it were
a dagger aimed at his very soul.

But the latter had but one virtue, or rather vice,--the art of
dissimulation; and he bore her look unflinchingly.

"De Mouy!" said he in surprise, as if it were the first time he had
heard the name mentioned in that connection.

"Yes, the Huguenot De Mouy de Saint Phale; the one who nearly killed
Monsieur de Maurevel, and who, secretly and in various disguises, is
running all over France and the capital, intriguing and raising an army
to support your brother Henry against your family."

Catharine, ignorant that on this point her son Francois knew as much if
not more than she, rose at these words and started majestically to leave
the room, but Francois detained her.

"Mother," said he, "another word, if you please. Since you deign to
initiate me into your politics, tell me how, with his feeble resources,
and being so slightly known, Henry could succeed in carrying on a war
serious enough to disturb my family?"

"Child," said the queen, smiling, "he is supported by perhaps more than
thirty thousand men; he has but to say the word and these thirty
thousand men will appear as suddenly as if they sprang from the ground;
and these thirty thousand men are Huguenots, remember, that is, the
bravest soldiers in the world, and then he has a protector whom you
neither could nor would conciliate."

"Who is that?"

"He has the King, the King, who loves him and who urges him on; the
King, who from jealousy of your brother of Poland, and from spite
against you, is looking about for a successor. But, blind man that you
are if you do not see it, he seeks somewhere e