ng and the Dauphin,"
answered the boy with one of those sudden accessions of dignity which
were as characteristic as they were disconcerting. "Do you, sir, know
your place and keep it. Ursula, what is Saxe doing here at this time
of night?"

Though he addressed Mademoiselle de Vesc by name, Charles looked round
him as he spoke. The question was for the room at large. But no one
answered him. It was no part of Commines' plan to make a public charge
against the Dauphin. There was no need to make such a charge, it could
only provoke a scene of violence, of denial, of protest, of
recrimination, and raise a storm whose echoes might pass beyond the
walls of Amboise. Not that way would he earn the King's thanks, so he
held his peace. But the Dauphin was not to be cowed by silence.

"Ursula, what have they been saying to you? All these men against one
woman is cowardly. If I were a man like Monsieur La Mothe----"

"Hush, Charles; Monsieur La Mothe is our friend."

"I know. He saved us both to-day, me for the second time. Monsieur La
Mothe, when I am king, I won't forget. But why is Saxe here? Villon,
you are his friend, why is Saxe here?"

Villon had closed the door behind the Dauphin, resting his back against
it as before. His shrewd clear eyes had watched every phase of the
scene from its beginning. Twice he had spoken, twice or thrice he had
laughed his soft unctuous chuckle as if his thoughts pleased him. Now,
directly addressed, he came forward a step, and his bearing was that of
the actor who hears his cue.

"No friend, Monseigneur; the honour would be too great. Who am I to
call myself the friend of a prophet? Or perhaps it was Hugues who was
the prophet; Hugues who is dead and cannot speak for himself."

"Speak no evil of Hugues," said Charles, "he--he----" and the boy's
lips quivered, the tears starting afresh under his swollen lids as the
memory of his loss came home to him, "he loved me, he died for me, and
oh, Ursula! will they take you from me too?"

"No, Charles; surely not. But I think Monsieur Villon has something
more to say. Why do you call Hugues a prophet?"

"Because he foretold Guy de Molembrais' death three days before it
occurred--or was it four? You should know, Saxe?"

"I only know what he told me," answered Saxe doggedly, but the fresh
ruddiness of his face had faded, and he sucked at his lips as if they
had grown suddenly dry. He knew Villon and Villon's ways of old,