How he his fancie might remoove."
Monsieur de Tricotrin was right. The King had been fascinated. That was clear. It was the talk of every breakfast-table in Oneiria. And Mlle de Tricotrin was right too. It made very little difference to the King, except to amuse him; but this was not so clear to the breakfast-tables.
Amused Kophetua certainly was. It was highly entertaining to see how clever the little woman was. He quite laughed to himself to think how great an impression she had made on him, and he looked forward with a fresh pleasure to playing with a toy of such exquisite ingenuity, without giving a thought to the danger of the pastime. The mere fact that he was charmed he considered quite a sufficient safeguard. It was only a proof that she was a deeper cheat than the rest, and therefore more contemptible. And yet, somehow, this morning the wiles of women did not appear quite so detestable; he found himself wondering if there were not something to be said for them, when they could produce so delightful a result. He was sitting in the library pretending to transact business with Turbo and Dolabella, when his train of thought brought him for the twentieth time that morning to this same point, and with a half-unconscious desire for protection against what he knew to be a dangerous heresy, he addressed himself to his friends.
"What a charming woman Mlle de Tricotrin would be," he said, "to any one who could not see through her!"
The general started. He happened to have a piece of business that morning, but he was absent, and had made little progress: and now Kophetua's voice suddenly awoke him to the mortifying fact that, with a view of ascertaining the value of a living which was under his consideration, he was unconsciously looking out "Tricotrin" in the army list. Turbo did not start at all. He had been watching the King, and expecting the remark for the last hour.
"Yes, she is certainly very pretty," said the General, with a confusion which was not bettered by his feeling immediately that he ought to have said something else.
"That is assuredly the case, sire," said Turbo, looking hard at the disconcerted General. "It is very fortunate we can all see through women so easily."
"But she is clever, isn't she, General?" said the King, with a smile of amusement.
"Well, your majesty," replied the General, regaining his composure, "she might deceive more than a tiro, but to us it was evident from the first."