er mine?"

"Yes."

"Let her wait behind the door. I will knock gently three times; she will
open the door, and you will have the proof that I have promised you."

Madame de Sauve kept silence for several seconds, and then, as if she
had looked around her to observe if she were overheard, she fastened her
gaze for a moment on the group clustering around the queen mother; brief
as the moment was, it was sufficient for Catharine and her
lady-in-waiting to exchange a look.

"Oh, if I were inclined," said Madame de Sauve, with a siren's accent
that would have melted the wax in Ulysses' ears, "if I were inclined to
make your majesty tell a falsehood"--

"_Ma mie_, try"--

"Ah, _ma foi_! I confess I am tempted to do so."

"Give in! Women are never so strong as after they are defeated."

"Sire, I hold you to your promise for Dariole when you shall be King of
France."

Henry uttered an exclamation of joy.

At the precise moment when this cry escaped the lips of the Bearnais,
the Queen of Navarre was replying to the Duc de Guise:

"_Noctu pro more_--to-night as usual."

Then Henry turned away from Madame de Sauve as happy as the Duc de Guise
had been when he left Marguerite de Valois.

An hour after the double scene we have just related, King Charles and
the queen mother retired to their apartments. Almost immediately the
rooms began to empty; the galleries exhibited the bases of their marble
columns. The admiral and the Prince de Conde were escorted home by four
hundred Huguenot gentlemen through the middle of the crowd, which hooted
as they passed. Then Henry de Guise, with the Lorraine gentlemen and the
Catholics, left in their turn, greeted by cries of joy and plaudits of
the people.

But Marguerite de Valois, Henry de Navarre, and Madame de Sauve lived in
the Louvre.

CHAPTER II.

THE QUEEN OF NAVARRE'S BEDCHAMBER.

The Duc de Guise escorted his sister-in-law, the Duchess de Nevers, to
her hotel in the Rue du Chaume, facing the Rue de Brac, and after he had
put her into the hands of her women, he went to his own apartment to
change his dress, put on a night cloak, and armed himself with one of
those short, keen poniards which are called "_foi de gentilhomme_," and
were worn without swords; but as he took it off the table on which it
lay, he perceived a small billet between the blade and the scabbard.

He opened it, and read as follows:

"_I hope M. de Guise will not return to the Louvre to-ni