"Who calls me?"
"I, Monsieur de Nancey," replied the captain of the guards, hurrying down the stairs.
"But I am in haste," said Orthon.
"By order of her majesty the queen mother," said Monsieur de Nancey, as he came up to him.
The youth wiped the perspiration from his brow and turned back.
The captain followed.
Catharine's first idea had been to stop the young man, have him searched, and take possession of the note which she knew he had. She had planned to accuse him of theft, and with this end in view she had removed from the toilet table a diamond clasp which she was going to say he had taken.
But on reflection she concluded that this would be dangerous, in that it would arouse the boy's suspicions and he would inform his master, who would then begin to mistrust something, and so her enemy would gain an advantage over her.
She could, no doubt, have the young man taken to some dungeon, but the rumor of the arrest, however secretly it might be done, would spread through the Louvre, and the slightest inkling of it would put Henry on his guard. However, she must have the note, for a note from Monsieur de Mouy to the King of Navarre, a note sent with such precautions, surely meant conspiracy.
She put back the clasp from where she had taken it.