Whose frown abases and whose smile exalts.
They shine like any rainbow - and, perchance,
Their colours are as transient.

Old Play



CHAPTER I

MONSIEUR THE SECRETARY


It was spring at Bellecour - the spring of 1789, a short three months
before the fall of the Bastille came to give the nobles pause, and
make them realise that these new philosophies, which so long they
have derided, were by no means the idle vapours they had deemed them.

By the brook, plashing its glittering course through the park of
Bellecour, wandered La Boulaye, his long, lean, figure clad with a
sombreness that was out of harmony in that sunlit, vernal landscape.
But the sad-hued coat belied that morning a heart that sang within
his breast as joyously as any linnet of the woods through which he
strayed. That he was garbed in black was but the outward indication
of his clerkly office, for he was secretary to the most noble the
Marquis de Fresnoy de Bellecour, and so clothed in the livery of
the ink by which he lived. His face was pale and lean and thoughtful,
but within his great, intelligent eyes there shone a light of
new-born happiness. Under his arm he carried a volume of the new
philosophies which Rousseau had lately given to the world, and which