“Of the lover?” said Raoul.

“Have you not observed it, you who were formerly so keen-sighted?”

“Are you jealous of the Duke of Buckingham?”

“To the very death.”

“Again jealous?”

“This time the affair will be easy to arrange between us; I have taken the initiative, and have sent him a letter.”

“It was you, then, who wrote to him?”

“How do you know that?”

“I know it, because he told me so. Look at this;” and he handed De Guiche the letter he had received nearly at the same moment as his own. De Guiche read it eagerly, and said, “He is a brave man, and more than that, a gallant man.”

“Most certainly the duke is a gallant man; I need not ask if you wrote to him in a similar style.”