nce."

This raised a laugh among the tavern idlers, for I had been bragging a
bit of my prospects. I retorted:

"When I am, Maitre Jacques, look out for a rise in your taxes."

The laugh was turned on mine host, and I retired with the honours of
that encounter. And though the stairs were the steepest I ever climbed,
I had the breath and the spirit to whistle all the way up. What mattered
it that already I ached in every bone, that the stair was long and my
bed but a heap of straw in the garret of a mean inn in a poor quarter? I
was in Paris, the city of my dreams!

I am a Broux of St. Quentin. The great world has never heard of the
Broux? No matter; they have existed these hundreds of years, Masters of
the Forest, and faithful servants of the dukes of St. Quentin. The great
world has heard of the St. Quentins? I warrant you! As loudly as it has
of Sully and Villeroi, Tremouille and Biron. That is enough for the
Broux.

I was brought up to worship the saints and M. le Duc, and I loved and
revered them alike, by faith, for M. le Duc, at court, seemed as far
away from us as the saints in heaven. But the year after King Henry III
was murdered, Monsieur came to live on his estate, to make high and low
love him for himself.

In that bloody time, when the King of Navarre and the two Leagues were
tearing our poor France asunder, M. le Duc found himself between the
devil and the deep sea. He was no friend to the League; for years he had
stood between the king, his master, and the machinations of the Guises.
On the other hand, he was no friend to the Huguenots. "To seat a heretic
on the throne of France were to deny God," he said. Therefore he came
home to St. Quentin, where he abode in quiet for some three years, to
the great wonderment of all the world.

Had he been a cautious man, a man who looked a long way ahead, his
compeers would have understood readily enough that he was waiting to see
how the cat would jump, taking no part in the quarrel lest he should
mix with the losing side. But this theory jibed so ill with Monsieur's
character that not even his worst detractor could accept it. For he was
known to all as a hotspur--a man who acted quickly and seldom counted
the cost. Therefore his present conduct was a riddle, nor could any of
the emissaries from King or League, who came from time to time to enlist
his aid and went away without it, read the answer. The puzzle was too
deep for them. Yet it was only this: to Mo