the Lord Seneschal at once upon an affair of State.

Tressan's flesh trembled and his heart fainted. Then, suddenly,
desperately, he took his courage in both hands. He remembered who
he was and what he was the King's Lord Seneschal of the Province of
Dauphiny. Throughout that province, from the Rhone to the Alps,
his word was law, his name a terror to evildoers - and to some
others besides. Was he to blench and tremble at the mention of the
name of a Court lackey out of Paris, who brought him a message from
the Queen-Regent? Body of God! not he.

He heaved himself to his feet, warmed and heartened by the thought;
his eye sparkled, and there was a deeper flush than usual upon his
cheek.

"Admit this Monsieur de Garnache," said he with a fine loftiness,
and in his heart he pondered what he would say and how he should
say it; how he should stand, how move, and how look. His roving
eye caught sight of his secretary. He remembered something - the
cherished pose of being a man plunged fathoms-deep in business.
Sharply he uttered his secretary's name.

Babylas raised his pale face; he knew what was coming; it had come
so many times before. But there was no vestige of a smile on his
drooping lips, no gleam of amusement in his patient eye. He thrust
aside the papers on which he was at work, and drew towards him a
fresh sheet on which to pen the letter which, he knew by experience,
Tressan was about to indite to the Queen-mother. For these purposes
Her Majesty was Tressan's only correspondent.