The House of de Mailly

by Margaret Horton Potter

"M—M—Monsieur?"

"A cloak and hat! Diable! What has got you?"

The valet, stumbling with awkward haste, obeyed him. Richelieu wrapped himself in the cloak, took up the hat, and, before he left the room, tossed his man a louis d'or. "There. I am not mad, Grachet—except in giving you that, perhaps. But be silent about Mouthier. You understand?"

Gold quickens the understanding. Grachet's eyes grew bright again as he murmured quickly: "Mouthier was never here, Monsieur le Duc."

Richelieu laughed. "Very well. Have a good hunting-suit out when I return, and I will ride Graille to the meet."

Then Richelieu left his apartment and strode away through the dim, deserted corridors, carrying along with him a hollow, dreary echo. Descending the grand staircase where yesterday he had waited for d'Argenson's return, he passed the drowsy guards in the vestibule, and entered into the gray, chilly morning. It was very cold. In the night the rain had turned to snow, and the Great Cross Canal lay before him frozen to ice. The esplanade, the star, and the park were covered with soft white, still unbroken, for it was too early as yet for marring footprints. With blood quickening in his veins, and breath smoking in the frosty air, Richelieu hurried into the desolate park, emerging at length on the Avenue de Paris, on the edge of the town of Versailles. The little city was barely awake. The dwelling-streets were still. Nevertheless, two or three men whom Richelieu knew, and who took as much pains as he could have wished to avoid notice, were moving dismally, on foot or in chairs, to their respective rooms. Shutters of shops were being taken down, and a single church clock boomed a quarter to eight when the Duke halted before the house in the Rue d'Anjou.

Richelieu had some difficulty in rousing the concièrge. When the door was finally opened to him by a man in a red nightcap, he pulled his own hat so far over his face and his cloak so much about his ears as to be unrecognizable, and hastened up-stairs. At the door of the de Mailly apartment he stopped, hesitating. Was any one up within? He was, perhaps, ruining himself by coming so early; yet it was the only thing to be done. From an inner pocket he pulled the little bronze key to the cabinet in the salon so near at hand. The sight gave him courage, and he tapped at the door. There was a pause. His heart beat furiously now. Presently he tapped again. Thereupon, as much to his surprise as to his relief, the door was thrown open by a tired-looking lackey. Richelieu walked swiftly into the antechamber, passed through it, and paused in the salon, where the servant, astonished and mistrustful, came up with him. Here the Duke removed his hat.

"Your Grace! Pardon!" muttered the man. "Monsieur le Comte is risen," he added. "Shall I announce you?"

"By no means! I have simply come to ask Mme. de Mailly if this—which was found in my salon this morning—could have been dropped by her during supper last evening. It is somewhat valuable, I believe. Will you inquire of her maid?"

Richelieu held out to the man a pearl pin containing stones of some rarity, which, as a matter of fact, belonged to himself. The servant looked at it and slightly shook his head, but, catching a peremptory glance from the Duke, he went off, wondering why such a man as Richelieu had not sent a servant on his errand.