artment. I hold no
reception this evening; I am suffering and ill at ease; I have lost my
appetite, and cannot sleep, which makes my life a sad, dreary one, and
which, you understand, I do not choose to inflict upon any one else.
By-the-by, you have heard the news?"

"No, monseigneur; what news?"

"Aurilly has been eaten up by the wolves--"

"Aurilly!" exclaimed Henri, with surprise.

"Yes, yes--devoured! It is singular how every one who comes near me dies
a violent death. Good-night, count; may you sleep well!"

And the prince hurried away rapidly.

CHAPTER LXXXVI.

DOUBT.

Henri descended the staircase, and as he passed through the
antechambers, observed many officers of his acquaintance, who ran
forward to meet him, and, with many marks of friendship, offered to show
him the way to his brother's apartments, which were situated at one of
the angles of the chateau. It was the library that the duke had given
Joyeuse to reside in during his residence at Chateau-Thierry.

Two salons, furnished in the style of Francois the First, communicated
with each other, and terminated in the library, the latter apartment
looking out on the gardens.

His bed had been put up in the library. Joyeuse was of an indolent, yet
of a cultivated turn of mind. If he stretched out his arm he laid his
hand on science; if he opened the windows he could enjoy the beauties of
nature. Finer and superior organizations require more satisfying
enjoyments; and the morning breeze, the song of birds, or the perfumes
of flowers, added fresh delight to the triplets of Clement Marot, or to
the odes of Rousard.

Henri determined to leave everything as it was, not because he was
influenced by the poetic sybaritism of his brother, but, on the
contrary, from indifference, and because it mattered little to him
whether he was there or elsewhere.

But as the count, in whatever frame of mind he might be, had been
brought up never to neglect his duty or respect toward the king or the
princes of the royal family of France, he inquired particularly in what
part of the chateau the prince had resided since his return.

By mere accident, in this respect, Henri met with an excellent cicerone
in the person of the young ensign, who, by some act of indiscretion or
another, had, in the little village in Flanders where we represented the
personages in this tale as having halted for a moment, communicated the
count's secret to the prince. This ensign had