as I cannot forget; and then she is wholly devoted to
our side, she and her husband. I have promised that her Camusot shall
have advancement, and I beg you above everything to help him on, for my
sake."

"You need no such recommendation," said the Duke to Madame Camusot. "The
Grandlieus always remember a service done them. The King's adherents
will ere long have a chance of distinguishing themselves; they will be
called upon to prove their devotion; your husband will be placed in the
front----"

Madame Camusot withdrew, proud, happy, puffed up to suffocation. She
reached home triumphant; she admired herself, she made light of the
public prosecutor's hostility. She said to herself:

"Supposing we were to send Monsieur de Granville flying----"

It was high time for Madame Camusot to vanish. The Duc de Chaulieu, one
of the King's prime favorites, met the bourgeoise on the outer steps.

"Henri," said the Duc de Grandlieu when he heard his friend announced,
"make haste, I beg of you, to get to the Chateau, try to see the
King--the business of this;" and he led the Duke into the window-recess,
where he had been talking to the airy and charming Diane.

Now and then the Duc de Chaulieu glanced in the direction of the flighty
Duchess, who, while talking to the pious Duchess and submitting to be
lectured, answered the Duc de Chaulieu's expressive looks.

"My dear child," said the Duc de Grandlieu to her at last, the _aside_
being ended, "do be good! Come, now," and he took Diane's hands,
"observe the proprieties of life, do not compromise yourself any more,
write no letters. Letters, my dear, have caused as much private woe as
public mischief. What might be excusable in a girl like Clotilde, in
love for the first time, had no excuse in----"

"An old soldier who has been under fire," said Diane with a pout.

This grimace and the Duchess' jest brought a smile to the face of the
two much-troubled Dukes, and of the pious Duchess herself.

"But for four years I have never written a billet-doux.--Are we saved?"
asked Diane, who hid her curiosity under this childishness.

"Not yet," said the Duc de Chaulieu. "You have no notion how difficult
it is to do an arbitrary thing. In a constitutional king it is what
infidelity is in a wife: it is adultery."

"The fascinating sin," said the Duc de Grandlieu.

"Forbidden fruit!" said Diane, smiling. "Oh! how I wish I were the
Government, for I have none of that fruit left--I have e