She touched her father lightly, and he awoke with the exclamation of surprise attendant upon being suddenly disturbed from sleep.

‘Is it you, Marie?’ he asked. ‘What brings you here?’

‘I have brought your wine, mon père,’ she replied. ‘The servants were up early this morning at work, and are tired. I have sent them to rest.’

‘Thanks—thanks, my good girl,’ said the old man, as he raised himself up in bed, and took the cup from the Marchioness.

‘We want no taster,’ he continued, ‘to bear the attacks of hidden poison, with such a Hebe as yourself, Marie; and my old blood cannot spare a drop of this vitalising draught.’

A convulsive exclamation broke from the lips of the Marchioness, but it was not observed by her father. He drank off the contents of the cup, and then, once more bestowing a benediction upon his daughter, turned again to his pillow.

CHAPTER XV.
VERSAILLES—THE RIVAL ACTRESSES—THE DISCOVERY

Any one whom business or leisure had taken into the abode of Maître Picard one fine morning, a short time after his affair with the students, would have found the little chapelier in a wondrous state of flurry and importance; whilst his best costume was so covered with knots of ribbons and floating streamers, fixed to every available part, that he was a perfect marvel to look at as he paraded about his shop, and attracted a crowd of gamins to peep at him through the wares in the window. In fact, for once Maître Picard had completely eclipsed the glory of the large red tin hat, with the bright pendants that hung over his door, and had whilom formed the object of the students’ attack.

But Maître Picard was not the only person in the establishment thus finely arrayed, for his Gascon lodger, Jean Blacquart, appeared in a military costume of great effect, albeit it had been evidently made for one of larger proportions, and the long rapier pertaining to it somewhat interfered with the free progress of the wearer. But when the weapon got between his legs, and threatened to trip him up, Jean kicked it on one side with great disdain, and strode up and down the shop, with the blade clanking at his heels, as though he had just thrust it through the bodies of a score of stalwart antagonists, and was waiting to see who would be bold enough to come forward next.

The gossips of the Rue de la Harpe and Rue des Mathurins were well aware of the cause of this unwonted excitement. There were portières in those days as at present; and they were just as garrulous. The old woman who kept the gate of the Hôtel de Cluny had heard the news from Maître Picard’s housekeeper; and it was soon known in the Quartier Latin that the Garde Bourgeois of that division were to have the honour of waiting upon their monarch at Versailles that evening, where a fete was to be given upon an unusual scale of splendour; a large part of the gardens being covered in and richly decorated, to accommodate the number of guests that it was expected would not find room in the palace;[11] for the building as it then stood was comparatively small, being little more than the chateau built by the preceding monarch as his hunting-lodge, upon the site of the windmill purchased from Jean de Soissy.