is very near the ax," lowly.

"Eh? What's that?"

The poet glanced hastily about. There was no one within hearing. "I
asked Mazarin for this mission simply because I feared to remain in
Paris and dare not now return. Your poet put his name upon a piece of
paper which might have proved an epic but which has turned out to be
pretty poor stuff. This paper was in De Brissac's care; was, I say,
because it was missing the morning after his death. To-morrow, a week
or a month from now, Mazarin will have it. And . . ." Victor drew his
finger across his throat.

"A conspiracy? And you have put your name to it, you, who have never
been more serious than a sonnet? Were you mad, or drunk?"

"They call it madness. Madame's innocent eyes drew me into it. I've
only a vague idea what the conspiracy is about. Not that madame knew
what was going on. Politics was a large word to her, embracing all
those things which neither excited nor interested her. Lord love you,
there were a dozen besides myself, madame's beauty being the magnet."

"And the plot?"

"Mazarin's abduction and forced resignation, Conde's return from Spain
and Gaston's reinstatement at court."

"And your reward?"

"Hang me!" with a comical expression, "I had forgotten all about that
end of it. A captaincy of some sort. Devil take cabals! And madame,
finding out too late what had been going on, and having innocently
attached her name to the paper, is gone from Paris, leaving advice for
me to do the same. So here I am, ready to cross into Spain the moment
you set out for Paris. Mazarin has taken it into his head to imitate
Richelieu: off with the head rather than let the state feed the
stomach."

"So that is why De Beaufort, thinking me to be the guilty man, sought
me out and demanded the paper? My faith, this grows interesting. But
oh! wise poet, did you not hear me tell you never to sign your name to
anything save poetry?"

"It might have been a poem . . . I wonder whither madame has flown?
By the way, Mademoiselle de Longueville gave me a letter to give to
you. It is unaddressed. I promised to deliver it to you."

The Chevalier took the letter and opened it carelessly; but no sooner
did he recognize the almost illegible but wholly aristocratic pothooks
than a fit of trembling seized him. The faint odor of vervain filled
his nostrils, and he breathed quickly.

"_Forgive! How could I have doubled so gallant a gentleman! You have