"Then where dost thou find thy locked book, Margot?"

I was still more astonished at the answer.

"If my Damoiselle pleases,—the Lady Isabel."

"O Margot! I think she is quite easy to read."

"I am mistaken," said Marguerite with quiet persistence, "if my Damoiselle has yet read one page of that volume."

"Now I should have called the Regent a locked book," said I.

"Hardly, if my Damoiselle pleases. There is a loose leaf which peeps out."

"Well, that romance is not a pleasant one," said I.

"Pleasant? Ha!—no. But it is long, and one cannot see the end of the story before one comes to it."

At last, a letter has come from the Regent.