am
distressed not to count among our numbers."

"You mean the Duc de Richelieu?" replied Madame de Maine; "it is true he
promised to come; he must have been detained by some adventure; we must
do without him."

"Yes, certainly," replied the prince, "if he does not come we must do
without him; but I confess that I deeply regret his absence. The
regiment which he commands is at Bayonne, and for that reason might be
very useful to us. Give orders, I beg, madame, that if he should come he
should be admitted directly."

"Abbe," said Madame de Maine, turning to Brigaud, "you heard; tell
D'Avranches."

The abbe went out to execute this order.

"Pardon, monsieur," said D'Harmental to Malezieux, "but I thought six
weeks ago that the Duc de Richelieu positively refused to be one of us."

"Yes," answered Malezieux, "because he knew that he was intended to take
the cordon bleu to the Prince of the Asturias, and he would not quarrel
with the regent just when he expected the Golden Fleece as the reward of
his embassy; but now the regent has changed his mind and deferred
sending the order, so that the Duc de Richelieu, seeing his Golden
Fleece put off till the Greek kalends, has come back to us."

"I have given the order," said the Abbe Brigaud, returning.

"Well," said the duchess, "now let us go to business. Laval, you begin."

"I, madame," said Laval, "as you know, have been in Switzerland, where,
with the king of Spain's name and money, I raised a regiment in the
Grisons. This regiment is ready to enter France at any moment, armed and
equipped, and only waits the order to march."

"Very good, my dear count," said the duchess; "and if you do not think
it below a Montmorency to be colonel of a regiment while waiting for
something better, take the command of this one. It is a surer way of
getting the Golden Fleece than taking the Saint Esprit into Spain."

"Madame," said Laval, "it is for you to appoint each one his place, and
whatever you may appoint will be gratefully accepted by the most humble
of your servants."

"And you, Pompadour," said Madame de Maine, thanking Laval by a gesture
of the hand, "what have you done?"

"According to your highness's instructions," replied the marquis, "I
went to Normandy, where I got the protestatior signed by the nobility. I
bring you thirty-eight good signatures" (he drew a paper from his
pocket). "Here is the request to the king, and here the signatures."

The duchess snatched