In a moment Lagardere enveloped himself in his gypsy’s cloak and flung himself on one of the benches of the Inn, where he lay as if wrapped in the heavy sleep which is the privilege of those that live in the open air and follow the stars with their feet. When the king, accompanied by Chavernay and followed by Bonnivet, crossed the bridge and paused before the Inn, nothing was to be noticed save the huddle of gray cloth which represented some tired wayfarer.

Louis of France looked about him curiously. "Is this the Inn of the Three Graces?" he asked.

He even allowed himself to laugh a small laugh.

The Marquis of Chavernay smiled a faint smile. "Yes, your majesty, and since I have been privileged to behold two of its three attendant graces in the flesh, and found them most commendable girls and goddesses, I think, without indiscretion, I could hazard a guess as to your reason for this visit."

The king looked at his impudent companion with the complaisant good-humor which, since his much-talked-of bereavement, he was prepared to extend to those most fortunate among his courtiers who could succeed in diverting his melancholy. He was familiar with Chavernay’s impertinences, for Chavernay had soon discovered that the witticisms which would have gained the frown of the cardinal earned the smiles of the king. "Truly," he said—"truly, I do come for an assignation, but it is with no woman. You boys think of nothing in the world but women."

Chavernay made the king a most sweeping reverence. "Your majesty would, if your majesty deigned to condescend so far, prove the most fatal rival of your most amorous subject."

Since the death of the cardinal, Louis liked it to be hinted that he was still the man of gallantry, irresistible when he pleased. So he smiled as he caught Chavernay’s ear and pinched it. "Imp, do you think you lads are the only gallants, and that we old soldiers must give way to you?"

Chavernay saluted him again. "You are our general, your majesty—we win our battles in your name."

Louis laughed and then looked grave, smiled again and then sighed. "My dear Chavernay, when you are my age you will think that one pretty woman is very like another pretty woman. But there is no pretty woman in this case."

Chavernay made a still more ironical bow. "Your majesty!" he said, with an air that implied: "Of course I must appear to believe you, but in reality I do not believe you at all." Chavernay was thinking to himself of the adorable creatures whom he had seen disappear within the walls of the Inn and the walls of the caravan, and he drew his conclusions accordingly, and drew them wrong. When the king answered him, he answered, gravely, as one who objects to have his word questioned even by a frivolous spirit like Chavernay.

"I come here," he said, "in reply to a letter I received two days ago—a letter which appeals to me by a name which compels me to consider the appeal. That is why I come here to-day. My correspondent makes it a condition that I come alone. Take Bonnivet with you. Keep within call, but out of sight."

Chavernay bowed very respectfully this time. The newest friends of Louis of France knew that they best pleased him by appearing to presume on his good-nature, but even the lightest and liveliest of them felt that there was a point beyond which he must not venture to presume. Chavernay felt instinctively that he had reached that point now, and his manner was a pattern to presentable courtiers.

"Yes, your majesty," he said, and turned to Bonnivet, and Bonnivet and he went over the bridge and out of sight among a little clump of trees on the roadside. From here they could see the king plainly enough, and hear him if he chose to raise his voice loud enough to call them, but here they were out of ear-shot of any private conversation. That their presence in the neighborhood was scarcely necessary they were both well aware, for there were few conspiracies against the king’s authority and no plots against the king’s life, and if Louis of France had chosen to go unattended his pompous, melancholy person would have been in no danger.

Louis walked slowly to the little table in the arbor, and, seating himself, took out a letter from his pocket and read it thoughtfully over. Then he drew a watch looped in diamonds from his pocket and looked at the hour. As he did so the huddled, seeming sleeping figure on the bench stiffened itself, sat up erect, and cast off its cloak.

Lagardere rose and advanced towards the king. "I am here," he said, in a firm, respectful voice.

Louis turned round and looked with curiosity but without apprehension at the man who addressed him, the man who was dressed like a gypsy, but who clearly was no gypsy. "Are you the writer of this letter?" he asked.

Lagardere saluted him with a graceful reverence. "Yes, your Majesty. I know that you are the King of France."

Louis slightly inclined his head. "I could not refuse a summons that promised to tell me of Louis de Nevers. Are you Lagardere?"

Lagardere made a gesture as of protest. "I am his ambassador. Have I the privilege of an ambassador?"

The king frowned slightly. "What privilege?"

"Immunity if my mission displeases you," Lagardere answered.

The king looked steadily at the seeming gypsy, who returned his glance as steadily. "You are bold, sir," he said.

Lagardere answered him, with composure. "I am bold because I address Louis of France, who never broke his word—Louis of France, who still holds dear the memory of Louis of Nevers."

The king signed to him to continue. "Speak freely. What do you know of Louis of Nevers?"

Lagardere went on: "Lagardere knows much. He knows who killed Nevers. He knows where Nevers’s child is. He can produce the child. He can denounce the murderer."

"When?" asked the king, eagerly.

"To-morrow," Lagardere answered. Then he hastened to add: "But he makes his conditions."

Louis frowned as Lagardere mentioned the word "conditions," and asked: "What reward does he want?"

Lagardere smiled at the question. "You do not know Lagardere. He asks for a safe-conduct for himself."

The king agreed. "He shall have it."

But Lagardere had more to ask. "He also wants four invitations for the ball your majesty gives at the Palais Royal to-morrow night."

Perhaps Lagardere showed himself something of a courtier in this speech. The great Richelieu had bequeathed to the little Louis his splendid dwelling-house, and Louis was indeed giving a stately entertainment there, avowedly in order to do honor to the memory of him who had made so munificent a gift, but in reality to prove to himself that he was master where he had been slave, and that he could, if he pleased, amuse himself to his heart’s content in the house that had been the dwelling of his tyrant. What Louis, always dissimulative, feigned to be an act of gracious homage to dead generosity was in truth an act of defiant and safe self-assertion. Perhaps Lagardere guessed as much. Certainly he played agreeably upon the king’s susceptibilities when he gave to Richelieu’s bequest the name of Palais Royal, which was still quite unfamiliar, instead of the name of Palais Cardinal, which it had worn so long and by which name almost every one still called it. Certainly the king’s pale cheeks reddened with satisfaction at the phrase; it assured him soothingly of what he was pleased to consider his triumph. But he allowed a slight expression of surprise to mingle with his air of complacency, and Lagardere hastened to give the reason for what was on the face of it a sufficiently strange request.

"There, before the flower of the nobility of France, Lagardere will denounce Nevers’s assassin and produce Nevers’s child."

The king agreed again. "He shall have his wish. Where shall the invitations be sent?"

Lagardere bowed low in acknowledgment of the promise. "Sire," he said, "an emissary from Lagardere will wait upon your secretary to-morrow morning He will say that he has come for four invitations promised by your majesty for to-morrow night, and he will back his demand with the password ’Nevers.’"

The king bowed his head. "It shall be done as you wish," he answered. "Is there anything more?" he asked, and Lagardere replied: "This much more: that your majesty speak nothing of this to any one till midnight to-morrow."

The king agreed a third time. "Lagardere has my word."

"Then," said Lagardere, "Lagardere will keep his word."

Louis rose to his feet, and signed that the interview was ended. "If he does, I am his friend for life. But if he fail, let him never enter France again, for on my word as a gentleman I will have his head."

He saluted Lagardere slightly, and turned and crossed the bridge. A few paces beyond it he was joined by Chavernay and Bonnivet. The three stood together for a few moments; then the king and Bonnivet continued their journey towards Neuilly, leaving Chavernay behind them, lingering in the shade of the trees.