"Do you know the country?"
"No, but I can learn all about it."
"There is something in your idea," said the general. "Come and breakfast with me some morning and we will discuss it."
"Here, General?"
"Certainly."
"Thanks, General.... And, at the same time, may I ask you to tell me something?"
"What?"
"Tell me ... I am going to ask you an odd question, I know, but the fall of the Bourbons deprives it of half its gravity ... tell me how it has come about that, after being mixed up—as I know through Dermoncourt you have been—in all the conspiracies of Béfort, Saumur and la Rochelle, you have never yet been arrested."
La Fayette began to laugh.