"What changes? Do you want larger rooms? More servants? A cabriolet added to the berline? Your cook was always very good."
"Ta! Ta! Ta! Rooms!—coaches! It is people I mean, Sire."
"Oh!" Louis' face grew more grave. Madame lay perfectly still, watching him. He was obliged, after a moment or two of painful silence, to ask, sulkily, "What people do you want—dismissed?"
"Your Majesty might easily surmise that."
"I? How am I to surmise your rancors, Anne?"
"My dismissal from Metz—"
"It was against my wishes, I swear to you!" he put in, hastily.
"Then your—repentance for scandal," she murmured, quickly, smiling beneath her lids. As the King flushed she was wise enough to waive the point. "I am aware that you were so—generous as to wish me to remain there," she observed. "But the man who did cause my departure, my dis—"
"Was Chartres, madame. I am unable to dismiss a prince of the blood from Versailles even for you."
"I did not refer to Monseigneur. It is Maurepas that I want sent off."