is I kept a lookout for
Jacques Haret. I had not forgotten my promise to give him a good
beating the next time I saw him, and felt conscientious scruples that
I had not done it when I had met him the spring before. But the news
he gave me on that occasion was so startling it put my duty out of my
head. I had not the slightest doubt that some time or other he would
drift back to Paris. Fellows of Jacques Haret's kidney can no more
keep away from Paris than cats can keep away from cream.

So I watched for him, and one evening, soon after the carnival, as I
was walking along the Rue St. Jacques, I came face to face with
Jacques Haret. It was dusk, but the lamps which hung across the street
had not yet been lighted. Jacques Haret was stepping debonairly along,
whistling cheerfully _Sur le pont d'Avignon_. I noticed, even in the
dim February evening, that he was shabbily dressed, but bore the marks
of good eating and drinking on his face. When we came face to face he
involuntarily halted. I stepped up to him and said:

"Where will you take it?"

The fellow knew I meant the beating I had promised. I continued:

"Here in the public street, where we shall be recognized, arrested,
and Count Saxe will see that I come to no harm, while you will cool
your heels in the Chatelet prison where you belong; or in the
Luxembourg gardens which are deserted now, and where I can beat you
more at my leisure, but not the less hard?"

"In the Luxembourg gardens," said the scoundrel, coolly, after a
pause.

I have ever admired Jacques Haret's courage and I admired it now. He
knew I meant to thrash him, that I had the strength to do it, and that
if he killed me Count Saxe would tear him limb from limb. He had lost
that nice honor of a gentleman, which would make a man accept death
rather than a blow, but reasoning philosophically, as a rogue often
does, concluded to take his punishment as best he might. Kings often
reason thus, but few private men do.

We marched along the dark street, Jacques Haret in front, I behind. He
resumed his whistling of _Sur le pont d'Avignon_.

There were no lanterns inside the Luxembourg gardens. When we reached
the spot light streamed from many of the windows of the palace, but it
did not penetrate the far recesses of the gardens, behind the tall
hedges and the summer houses. I motioned Jacques Haret to the farthest
corner, behind a grove of dwarf cedars. Once there I began stripping
off my coat, and told h