the courtiers his
vindictive slyness; the monarch the disappointment of his failure to
worst the duke's fool, and all applauded the ludicrous figure,
shouting, waving his arms, struggling with inexorable destiny.
Finally, in despair, his hands fell to his side.

"Oh, resistless necessity!" he cried. But in his heart he said: "It is
well. I am as safe as on a wooden horse. Here I stand. Let others
have their heads split or their bodies broken. Triboulet, like the
gods, views the carnage from afar."

While this bit of unexpected comedy riveted the attention of the
spectators the duke and his followers had slowly ridden to their side
of the inclosure. Here hovered the squires, adjusting a stirrup,
giving a last turn to a strap, or testing a bridle or girth. Behind
stood the heralds, trumpeters and pursuivants in their bright garb of
office. At his own solicitation had the duke been assigned an active
part in the day's entertainment. The king, fearing for the safety of
his guest and the possible postponement of the marriage should any
injury befall him, had sought to dissuade him from his purpose, but the
other had laughed boisterously at the monarch's fears and sworn he
would break a lance for his lady love that day. Francis, too gallant a
knight himself to interpose further objection to an announcement so in
keeping with the traditions of the lists, thereupon had ordered the
best charger in his stables to be placed at the disposal of the
princess' betrothed, and again nodded his approbation upon the
appearance of the duke in the ring. But at least one person in that
vast assemblage was far from sharing the monarch's complaisant mood.

If the mind of the duke's fool had heretofore been filled with
bitterness upon witnessing festal honors to a mere presumptuous free
baron, what now were his emotions at the reception accorded him? From
king to churl was he a gallant noble; he, a swaggerer, ill-born, a
terrorist of mountain passes. Even as the irony of the demonstration
swept over the jester, from above fell a flower, white as the box from
whence it was wafted. Downward it fluttered, a messenger of amity,
like a dove to his gauntlet. And with the favor went a smile from the
Lady of the Lists. But while _Bon Vouloir_ stood there, the symbol in
his hand and the applause ringing in his ears, into the tenor of his
thoughts, the consciousness of partly gratified ambition, there crept
an insinuating warning of da