'That you would give me one of your garters to wear, as M. de Chatillon wears that of Mademoiselle de Guerchi round his sword-arm.'
'Yes; but, my poor boy, it would bring you to the wheel, perhaps.'
At that moment while my heart beat like lightning, and a flame seemed before my eyes, the thick arras was hastily drawn aside, and the visage of Antoine—the discreet Antoine—appeared, with the greatest alarm depicted thereon; his eyes were arched to the roots of his hair.
'O Madame la Comtesse,' he exclaimed; 'le Roi! place pour sa Majesté le Roi!'
We sprang from the fauteuil in consternation.
'Enter here,' said the Countess, opening the heavy-carved door of a dark Flemish cabinet; 'quick, quick, M. Arthur.'
'Ah, Countess, if the King becomes tender!' said I.
'Well, what then?'
'I may not be able to control my anger.'
'What! you will re-enact Ravaillac here, and make my old cabinet historical, like the house of M. Pontrain, the Notary, in the Ferronerie,' said she, laughing; 'bah! you silly boy: Louis XIII. tender! Mon Dieu, there is no danger of that. In, in; there are times, like this, when one's dearest friends become, like his Majesty, a decided bore!' and pushing me in with her pretty hands, she locked the door, at which, to my great alarm, her little devil of a dog continued to snuff and snort for a time.