f some plot already in progress or
some trick to be presently played me. Yet I could not see that I had any
choice save to obey, and, following my leader with as much dignity as I
could compass, I presently found myself bowing before the lady who sat
nearest, and who seemed to be the leader of these nymphs.

'Nay, sir,' she said, eyeing me curiously, yet with a merry face, 'I do
not need you; I do not look so high!'

Turning in confusion to the next, I was surprised to see before me the
lady whose lodging I had invaded in my search for Mademoiselle de la
Vire--she, I mean, who, having picked up the velvet; knot, had dropped
it so providentially where Simon Fleix found it. She looked at me
blushing and laughing, and the young gentleman, who had done her errand,
presenting me by name, she asked me, while the others listened, whether
I had found my mistress.

Before I could answer, the lady to whom I had first addressed myself
interposed. 'Stop, sir!' she cried. What is this--a tale, a jest, a
game, or a forfeit?'

'An adventure, madam,' I answered, bowing low.

'Of gallantry, I'll be bound,' she exclaimed. 'Fie, Madame de Bruhl, and
you but six months married!'

Madame de Bruhl protested, laughing, that she had no more to do with it
than Mercury. 'At the worst,' she said, 'I carried the POULETS! But I
can assure you, duchess, this gentleman should be able to tell us a very
fine story, if he would.'

The duchess and all the other ladies clapping their hands at this, and
crying out that the story must and should be told, I found myself in
a prodigious quandary; and one wherein my wits derived as little
assistance as possible from the bright eyes and saucy looks which
environed me. Moreover, the commotion attracting other listeners, I
found my position, while I tried to extricate myself, growing each
moment worse, so that I began to fear that as I had little imagination
I should perforce have to tell the truth. The mere thought of this
threw me into a cold perspiration, lest I should let slip something of
consequence, and prove myself unworthy of the trust which M. de Rosny
had reposed in me.

At the moment when, despairing of extricating myself, I was stooping
over Madame de Bruhl begging her to assist me, I heard, amid the babel
of laughter and raillery which surrounded me--certain of the courtiers
having already formed hands in a circle and sworn I should not depart
without satisfying the ladies--a voice which s