lf at the expense of my credulity," La Boulaye
complained.

"My good man, I am telling you facts," the other insisted.

"But how could such a thing be accomplished?" asked Caron, seating
himself at the table, and resting his chin upon his hand, his gaze so
full of admiration as to seem awestruck.

"How? I will tell you. I am from Artois."

"You'll be repeating that charming story once too often," Des Cadoux
cautioned him.

"Pish, you timorous one!" he laughed, and resumed his tale. "I am from
Artois, then. I have some property there, and it lately came to my ears
that this assembly of curs they call the Convention had determined to
make an end of me. But before they could carry out their design, those
sons of dogs, my tenants, incited by the choice examples set them
by other tenantry, made a descent on my Chateau one night, and did
themselves the pleasure of burning it to the ground. By a miracle I
escaped with my life and lay hidden for three weeks in the house of an
old peasant who had remained faithful. In that time I let my beard
grow, and trained my hair into a patriotic unkemptness. Then, in filthy
garments, like any true Republican, I set out to cross the frontier. As
I approached it, I was filled with fears that I might not win across,
and then, in the moment of my doubtings, I came upon that most opportune
of couriers. I had the notion to change places with him, and I did. He
was the bearer of a letter to the Deputy La Boulaye, of whom you may
have heard, and this letter I opened to discover that it charged him to
effect my arrest."

If La Boulaye was startled, his face never betrayed it, not by so much
as the quiver of an eyelid. He sat on, his jaw in his palm, his eyes
admiringly bent upon the speaker.

"You may judge of my honesty, and of how fully sensible I was of
the trust I had undertaken, when I tell you that with my own hand
I delivered the letter this morning to that animal La Boulaye at
Boisvert." He seemed to swell with pride in his achievement. "Diable!"
he continued. "Mine was a fine piece of acting. I would you could have
seen me play the part of the patriot. Think of the irony of it! I won
out of France with the very papers ordering my arrest. Ma foi! You
should have seen me befool that dirt of a deputy! It was a performance
worthy of Talma himself." And he looked from Cadoux to La Boulaye for
applause.

"I doubt not," said the Deputy coldly. "It must have been worth
witnessing. But d