"Yes; bring him in," I said.

"But--he has gone!" he exclaimed.

"Gone?" I cried, scarcely able to believe my ears. "Gone,
sirrah! and I told you to detain him!"

"Until he had mended the clock, my lord," Maignan stammered,
quite out of countenance. "But he set it going half-an-hour ago;
and I let him go, according to your order."

It is in the face of such CONTRETEMPS as these that the low-bred
man betrays himself. Yet such was my chagrin on this occasion,
and so sudden the shock, that it was all I could do to maintain
my SANGFROID, and, dismissing Maignan with a look, be content to
punish M. de Perrot with a sneer. "I did not know that your son
was a tradesman," I said. He wrung his hands. "He has low
tastes," he cried. "He always had. He has amused himself that
way, And now by this time he is with Madame de Beaufort and we
are undone!"

"Not we," I answered curtly; "speak for yourself, M. de Perrot."

But though, having no mind to appear in his eyes dependent on
Madame's favour or caprice, I thus checked his familiarity, I am
free to confess that my calmness was partly assumed; and that,
though I knew my position to be unassailable--based as it was on
solid services rendered to the King, my master, and on the
familiar affection with which he honoured me through so many