olish. But he has never yet seen a full-grown, raw-hide,
unwashen Catholic Leaguer. Let him come to Angouleme with me, and I will
warrant to improve his sword-play for him! Close up, gentlemen of my
guard! To Blois! Ride, accommodating your pace to mine, as I shall do
mine to that of the palfrey of the new lady companion of Marguerite of
Foix, whom I have the honour to love!"

He lifted his gloved hand, and from the fingers blew a kiss in the
direction of the north, daintily as a girl upon a high terrace to a
lover over the sea.

And so by the river-side, in the golden light of the afternoon, they
rode forward to Blois.

In the rear Jean-aux-Choux continued to mutter to himself, trudging
heavily along on his Flanders mare, laden with cloaks and provend, "'Tis
all very well--very well--but what does his golden dukeship propose to
do with me? I will not leave my little mistress alone in a strange city,
and with a man who, though ten times a professor at the Sorbonne, is no
more kin to her than I am to this fat-fetlocked Flemish brute."

He pondered a little, dropping gradually behind. But as soon as they had
passed the gates of the city, he guided his beast into the first little
alley, letting the cavalcade go on, amid much craning of necks from the
windows, towards the royal pavilion where D'Epernon was to lodge.

"I will seek out Anthony Arpajon, that good man of the Faith," he said.
"He has a stable down by the water-side, and being a lover of the
learned, he will give me bite and sup for teaching him some scraps of
Greek wherewith to puzzle the wandering Lutheran pastors. For a
Calvinist stark is Anthony, and only wants a head-piece like mine to be
a clever man. But he hath an arm and a purse. And for the rest, I will
load him up with the best of Greek, and also teach him to read the
_Institutions of John Calvin_, my first and greatest master!"

So through the narrow streets of Blois he made his great mare push
herself lumberingly, crying out whenever there was a crowd or a busy
street to cross, "Hoo! hoo! hoo! Make way for the King's fool--for
Jean-aux-Choux--for the fool--the King's fool!"

CHAPTER XI.

THE BEST-KNOWN FACE IN THE WORLD

Jean-aux-Choux dismounted from his Flanders mare at the entrance of a
wide courtyard, littered with coaches and carriages, the best of these
being backed under a sort of penthouse, but the commoner sort set out in
the yard to take the bitter weather with the sweet.