"'Nevertheless, M. le Duc,' I answered, watching him as he wrote his name, and as both his masked friend and Jacques Durand witnessed the signature—'nevertheless, M. le Duc, the wise man is he who is prepared for all emergencies.'
* * * * *
"'We saluted ceremoniously, and drove away, this time in separate carriages; and most of what remains of my story is in the history books. All the world knows that the revolution came, as I anticipated, bursting like a thunderclap in a clear sky. All the world knows that King Louis Phillipe drove away from the Tuileries in a cab, and travelled to England under the alias of 'Mr. Smith,' hoping, as he explained, to pass as the head of the English family of that name. But just one new thing I can tell you—a thing that I learnt afterwards from one of the royal servants, a maid who waited upon the Duchesse de Montpensier and became a good Republican after the dynasty had fallen.
"'Ah, that scene!' she said to me. 'That terrible scene! Never shall I forget it!'
"'What scene, Babette?' I asked her.
"'What scene?' she repeated, and then described it to me.
"'It was on that dreadful morning when the news came to us that Paris had, as we said, gone mad, and the people were on their way from Saint Antoine to batter down the palace gates. I was alone with the Duchess, who was crying. I was trying to console her, telling her that the police would soon take all the wicked rioters to prison; and as I did this the door opened, and who should enter, unannounced, but Queen Marie Amélie herself. Ah, she was a woman of spirit, though she was old, was Queen Marie Amélie!
"'"Where is Montpensier?" she asked, without a word of greeting.
"'It was no time for idle forms of etiquette, so the Duchess stepped to the other door of her boudoir and called down the passage, just as any common woman might.
"'A minute later M. le Duc entered. He was dressed as though for a journey, and his face was pale—I do not think I ever saw a paler face. Ignoring my presence, the Queen broke out into reproaches.