of the chamber, from which it was only separated by a thin
partition. It resulted that this partition, which was only
for the eye, permitted the ear the least indiscreet to hear
every word spoken in the chamber.

There was no doubt, then, that this lieutenant of musketeers
had heard all that passed in his majesty's apartment.

Warned by the last words of the young king, he came out just
in time to salute him on his passage, and to follow him with
his eyes till he had disappeared in the corridor.

Then as soon as he had disappeared, he shook his head after
a fashion peculiarly his own, and in a voice which forty
years' absence from Gascony had not deprived of its Gascon
accent, "A melancholy service," said he, "and a melancholy
master!"

These words pronounced, the lieutenant resumed his place in
his fauteuil, stretched his legs and closed his eyes, like a
man who either sleeps or meditates.

During this short monologue and the mise en scene that had
accompanied it, whilst the king, through the long corridors
of the old castle, proceeded to the apartment of M. de
Mazarin, a scene of another sort was being enacted in those
apartments.

Mazarin was in bed, suffering a little from the gout. But as
he was a man of order, who utilized even pain, he forced his