"I suppose," whispered Jacqueline to the duke's fool, when the attention of the company was thus withdrawn from the jester's end of the table, "you think yourself in fine favor now?"
"Yes," he answered, absently; "thanks to your suggestion."
"My suggestion!" she repeated, scornfully. "I gave you none."
"Well, then, your crossing Triboulet."
"Oh, that," she replied, picking at a bunch of grapes, "was to defend my sex, not you."
"But your warning for me to laugh?"
"Why," she returned, demurely, "'twas to see you go more gallantly to your execution. And"—eating a grape—"that is reasonably certain to be your fate. You've only made a few more enemies to-night—the duke—the—"
"Name them not, fair Jacqueline," he retorted, indifferent.
"True; you'll soon learn for yourself," she answered sharply. "I think I should prefer to be in Triboulet's place to yours at present."
"Why," he said, with a strange laugh, "there's a day for the duke and a day for the fool."