De Gêvres, as usual, delayed his entrance a full minute. Then he came in languidly, snuff-box in his right hand, hat under his arm, peruke immaculate, and eye-glass dangling at his waist. He bowed. Madame raised her hand. The Duke advanced, lifted it to his lips, and left upon its fair surface a faint red trace of his salute. Madame smiled.
"You have come to me early," she said.
"I arose," remarked the man, pensively, "to find the world in gray. I arrayed myself to match the sky, and came to seek the sun. When I leave you I shall don pale blue, for you will drive the clouds from my day."
Madame smiled again. "Thank you. But the gray is marvellously becoming. Pray do not attempt a second toilet this morning. One is singularly depressing."
"Surely, you are not depressed, Madame de Versailles?" he asked, idly, examining her negligée of India muslin with approval. "Why depressed? Louis was furious at your unaccountable absence from the salon last evening, and would play with no one. He stayed in a corner for two hours, railing at d'Orry and permitting not a soul to approach. Is it in pity for him, this morning, that you suffer?"
Madame shrugged. "I do not waste time in pity of his Majesty. At the request of Mme. d'Alincourt, I spent last evening in the apartments of the Queen."
"Good Heaven! Then, madame, allow me to express my deepest sympathy! I had no idea that you would play so recklessly with ennui. Why, your very gossip is a day old!"
"You, then, monsieur, I hail as my deliverer. Will you not act as my Nouvelles à la Main, that I may make no irretrievable blunder to-day?"
"Madame desires, the King is at her feet. Madame requests, and the gods obey. Where must one begin?"
"At the beginning."