all idle dreams--a hard, a
grim, a vile reality.

Ruin! 'T is an ugly word. A fitting one to carve upon the tombstone of a
reckless, godless, dissolute life such as mine had been.

Back, Gaston de Luynes! back, to the kennel whence the Cardinal's hand
did for a moment pluck you; back, from the morning of hope to the night
of despair; back, to choose between starvation and the earning of a
pauper's fee as a master of fence!

CHAPTER II. THE FRUIT OF INDISCRETION

Despite the dejection to which I had become a prey, I slept no less
soundly that night than was my wont, and indeed it was not until late
next morning when someone knocked at my door that I awakened.

I sat up in bed, and my first thought as I looked round the handsome
room--which I had rented a week ago upon receiving the lieutenancy in
the Cardinal's guards--was for the position that I had lost and of the
need that there would be ere long to seek a lodging more humble and
better suited to my straitened circumstances. It was not without regret
that such a thought came to me, for my tastes had never been modest, and
the house was a fine one, situated in the Rue St. Antoine at a hundred
paces or so from the Jesuit convent.

I had no time, however, to indulge the sorry mood that threatened to
beset me, for the knocking at my chamber door continued, until at length
I answered it with a command to enter.

It was my servant Michelot, a grizzled veteran of huge frame and
strength, who had fought beside me at Rocroi, and who had thereafter
become so enamoured of my person--for some trivial service he swore I
had rendered him--that he had attached himself to me and my luckless
fortunes.

He came to inform me that M. de Mancini was below and craved immediate
speech with me. He had scarce done speaking, however, when Andrea
himself, having doubtless grown tired of waiting, appeared in the
doorway. He wore a sickly look, the result of his last night's debauch;
but, more than that, there was stamped upon his face a look of latent
passion which made me think at first that he was come to upbraid me.

"Ah, still abed, Luynes?" was his greeting as he came forward.

His cloak was wet and his boots splashed, which told me both that he had
come afoot and that it rained.

"There are no duties that bid me rise," I answered sourly.

He frowned at that, then, divesting himself of his cloak, he gave it
to Michelot, who, at a sign from me, withdrew. No sooner was