“No, madam, or I should have informed M. de’ Medici,” I answered, in a faint terror; but rallied immediately. “I know only that she is in communication with the Signor Carafa since his escape.”
“Ha!”
The red eyes of the ferret closed a moment, then reopened to an ineffable smile. She held out her hand to me to kiss.
“We find you an invaluable physician, Madame Lavasse. To have eased a poor queen—it is something; but to cure this land of its headache”—
“Ah, madam!” I said, “there I yield to the hangman.”
Both ladies burst out laughing as they moved away. The queen turned and waved her hand.
“You shall not be forgotten,” she cried; and I curtsied.
A few days later M. de’ Medici called upon me. He read out a little indictment he had prepared for my behoof—
“Eleonora de Fonseca Pimentel, wife to Pasquale Tria de Solis, Neapolitan officer, noble, now deceased: emotional; authoress of some panegyrical sonnets to royalty and the age of gold; since suspect of schemes for the education of the populace; shows a partiality for red; advocates an appropriation of the Punch and Judy shows to the lessons of national virtue; claims the liberty of the press to print her halting rhapsodies;” (Monstrous!) “imputed sympathiser with Ettore Carafa (son to the Duke of Andria, the king’s major-domo, and to the duchess, Her Majesty’s mistress of the robes) in said Ettore’s late conspiracy to print and distribute an Italian version of the ‘Rights of Man,’ which conspiracy resulted in the execution of some companion malignants, and the escape from Naples of said Ettore; finally, convicted of corresponding with said fugitive, to the end of His Majesty’s overthrow and the subversion of his government!”
“Not convicted, M. de’ Medici.”