het: it is a royal prerogative, only to
be used in matters of State."

"And matters of love, Bigot, which are matters of State in France!
Pshaw! as if I did not know that the King delegates his authority, and
gives lettres de cachet in blank to his trusted courtiers, and even
to the ladies of his Court. Did not the Marquise de Pompadour send
Mademoiselle Vaubernier to the Bastile for only smiling upon the King?
It is a small thing I ask of you, Bigot, to test your fidelity,--you
cannot refuse me, come!" added she, with a wondrous transformation of
look and manner from storm and gloom to warmth and sunshine.

"I cannot and will not do it. Hark you, Angelique, I dare not do it!
Powerful as I may seem, the family of that lady is too potent to risk
the experiment upon. I would fain oblige you in this matter, but it
would be the height of madness to do so."

"Well, then, Bigot, do this, if you will not do that! Place her in the
Convent of the Ursulines: it will suit her and me both,--no better place
in the world to tame an unruly spirit. She is one of the pious souls who
will be at home there, with plenty of prayers and penances, and plenty
of sins to pray for every day."

"But I cannot force her to enter the Convent, Angelique. She will think
herself not good enough to go there; besides, the nuns themselves would
have scruples to receive her."

"Not if YOU request her admission of Mere de la Nativite: the Lady
Superior will refuse no application of yours, Bigot."

"Won't she! but she will! The Mere de la Nativite considers me a sad
reprobate, and has already, when I visited her parlor, read me a couple
of sharpest homilies on my evil ways, as she called them. The venerable
Mere de la Nativite will not carry coals, I assure you, Angelique."

"As if I did not know her!" she replied impatiently. "Why, she screens
with all her authority that wild nephew of hers, the Sieur Varin!
Nothing irritates her like hearing a bad report of him, and although she
knows all that is said of him to be true as her breviary, she will not
admit it. The soeurs converses in the laundry were put on bread and
water with prayers for a week, only for repeating some gossip they had
heard concerning him."

"Ay! that is because the venerable Mere Superior is touchy on the point
of family,--but I am not her nephew, voila la differance!" as the song
says.

"Well! but you are her nephew's master and patron," replied Angelique,
"and the good Mere w