Monsieur Dué left the box in advance of the rest of us, in order to arrange everything before the King's arrival. The King called to him, as he opened the door, "Don't forget the écrevisses à la Bordelaise; I have been looking forward to them for a long time."
After the performance, with which the King was delighted (especially with Hortense Schneider's song, "Dis-moi, Vénus, pourquoi," etc.), we drove to the Maison d'Or, where we found Monsieur Dué awaiting us. We asked at what time the carriages should come back. He said: "Not before two o'clock. His Majesty never retires before." We were then shown into a salon, where the Princess Metternich and I were asked by the King to take off our hats. "It is so much more cozy," he said. So off our hats came. We had not been seated ten minutes when we heard some very loud talking and much discussion in the corridor outside. Lord Lyons, who was nearest the door, jumped up to see what the matter was, opened the door, and peeped out.
"Oh!" said he. "It is the Duke of Brunswick making a row; he is half-seas over!" The King turned to Monsieur Dué (the King does not speak English) and said, "What did Lord Lyons say?" Monsieur Dué's English did not go very far, but he translated into Swedish what he had understood Lord Lyons to say.
The King seemed very puzzled and, addressing Lord Lyons, said:
"Was not the Duke of Brunswick obliged to leave England for fear of being arrested?" Lord Lyons coughed discreetly, and the King went on: "If I remember rightly, the Duke, who was in the royal box, shot at and killed a danseuse who was on the stage! And did he not leave England in a balloon? It always seemed such an extraordinary thing. Was it true?" Lord Lyons cautiously answered that people had said all that; but it was some time ago, and added, diplomatically, that he had forgotten all the details.
"And I understood," said his Majesty, "that he can never go back there again."
"You are right. He cannot go back to England, your Majesty."
"Oh! don't Majesty me. To-night I am a simple bourgeois," the King interrupted, smilingly shaking his finger. "But tell me, how can the Duke dare return there now?"
"He does not dare," repeated Lord Lyons. "He can never go back."
"But," insisted the King, "my good Monsieur Dué says that he is on his way there at this moment."