e
knew that he had been tricked. The little musketeer had vanished. For
a moment he was disturbed. In vain he searched the gauntlet for some
distinguishing sign. But as reason told him that no harm could
possibly come from the prank, his fears subsided, and he laughed. On
being relieved from duty, later, he sought her, to return the gauntlet.
She was talking to Mademoiselle de Longueville. As she saw the
Chevalier, she moved away. The Chevalier, determined on seeing the
adventure to its end, followed her deliberately. She sat in a
window-seat. Without ceremony he sat down beside her.

"Monsieur," he said, smiling, and he was very handsome when he smiled,
"permit me to return this gauntlet."

She folded her arms, and this movement of her shoulders told him that
she was laughing silently.

"Are you madame or mademoiselle?" he asked, eagerly.

She raised her mask for an instant, and his subjugation was complete.
The conversation which ensued was so piquant and charming that
thereafter whatever warmth the gauntlet knew was gathered not from her
hand but from the Chevalier's heart.

The growing chill in the water brought the Chevalier out of his
reverie. He leaped from the tub and shone rosily in the firelight, as
elegantly proportioned a youth as ever was that fabulous Leander of the
Hellespont.

"Bring me those towels I purchased from the wandering Persian. I
regret that I did not have them blessed by his Holiness. For who knows
what spell the heretic Saracen may have cast over them?"

"Monsieur knows," said Breton piously, "that I have had them sprinkled
with the blessed water."

The Chevalier laughed. He was rather a godless youth, and whatever
religion he possessed was merely observance of forms. "Donkey, if the
devil himself had offered them for sale, I should have taken them, for
they pleased me; and besides, they have created a fashion. I shall
wear my new baldric--the red one. I report at the Palais Royal at
eight, and I've an empty stomach to attend to. Be lively, lad. Duty,
duty, always duty," snatching the towels. "I have been in the saddle
since morning; I am still dead with stiffness; yet duty calls. Bah! I
had rather be fighting the Spaniard with Turenne than idle away at the
Louvre. Never any fighting save in pothouses; nothing but ride, ride,
ride, here, there, everywhere, bearing despatches not worth the paper
written on, but worth a man's head if he lose them. And what ab