“Oh, son of Marquis Bouille, commander of Metz?” said the King, with a slight start not escaping the young man.
“The same, Sire,” he spoke up quickly.
“Excuse me not knowing you, but I have short sight. Have you been long in town?”
“I left Metz five days ago; and being here without official furlough but under special permission from my father, I solicited my kinsman the marquis for the honor of presentation to your Majesty.”
“You were very right, my lord, for nobody could so well present you at any hour, and from no one could the introduction come more agreeably.”
The words “at any hour” meant that Lafayette had the public and private entry to the King. The few words from the sovereign put the young count on his guard. The question about his coming signified that he wanted to know if Charny had seen his father.
Meanwhile Lafayette was looking round curiously where few penetrated; he admired the regularity with which the tools were laid out. He blew the bellows as the apprentice.
“So your Majesty has undertaken an important work, eh?” queried Lafayette, embarrassed how to talk to a King who was in a smutty apron, with tucked up sleeves and had a file in his hand.
“Yes, general, I have set to making our magnus opus a lock. I tell you just what I am doing or we shall have Surgeon Marat saying that I am forging the fetters of France. Tell him it is not so, if you lay hold of him. I suppose you are not a smith, Bouille?”
“At least I was bound apprentice, and to a locksmith, too.”