cannot be ignorant
that it was to assail her Majesty with a base scandal that you were
placed beneath her window, and so discovered in the morning, at the very
moment of her finding you there. Are you not aware that no falsehood is
too gross nor too barefaced not to meet credence if she be its object?
Do not all they who plan the downfall of the monarchy despair of success
while her graceful virtues adorn her high station? Is not every effort
of the vile faction directed solely against her? Have you not witnessed
how, one by one, have been abandoned all the innocent pleasures to which
scandal attached a blame. The Trianon deserted--the graceful amusements
she loved so well--all given up. Unable to meet slander face to face,
she has tried to make it impossible, as if one yet could obliterate the
venomous poison of this rancorous hate!'

'And now,' said Gerald, drawing a long breath, 'and now for my part in
this infernal web of falsehood.'

'If you refused to state where you had passed the evening--why you wore
a disguise, how you came by your wound--you must allow you furnished
matter for whatever suspicion they desired to attach to you.'

'They are free to believe of me what they may.' 'Ay, but not to include
others in the imputation.'

'I never so much as dreamed of that!' said Gerald, with a weary sigh.

'Well, boy, it is just what has happened; not that there lives one base
enough to believe this slander, though ten thousand are ready to repeat
it. There, see how the _Gazette de Paris_ treats it, a journal that once
held a high place in public favour. Read that.'

Gerald bent over the paper, and read, half aloud, the following
paragraph:--

'The young officer of the Garde du Corps examined by the Special
Commission as to the extraordinary circumstances under which he was
lately discovered in the garden of her Majesty, having refused all
explanation either as to his disguise, his recent wound, or any reason
for his presence there, has been adjudged guilty under the following
heads: First, breach of military duty in absence from the Garde without
leave; secondly, infraction of discipline in exchanging his uniform.'

'Well, well!' cried Gerald, 'what is the end of all this?'

'You are dismissed the service, boy!' said Dillon sternly.

'Dismissed the service!' echoed he, in a broken voice.

'Your comrades bore you no goodwill, Gerald; even that last scene in the
Salle des Gardes had its unhappy influence on