"One may drink if one cannot eat," said the aristocratic stranger,
good-humoredly.

The innkeeper shuddered.

The guest rose to depart. The innkeeper came slowly forward with
his bill, to which he had covertly added the losses which he had
suffered from the previous strangers.

"Ah, the bill. Charge it."

"Charge it! to whom?"

"To the King," said the guest.

"What! his Majesty?"

"Certainly. Farewell, Perigord."

The innkeeper groaned. Then he went out and took down his sign.
Then remarked to his wife:--

"I am a plain man, and don't understand politics. It seems,
however, that the country is in a troubled state. Between his
Eminence the Cardinal, his Majesty the King, and her Majesty the
Queen, I am a ruined man."

"Stay," said Dame Perigord, "I have an idea."