There is a subtle poetry in the contemplation of ruin. With ruin itself,
howbeit, there comes a prosaic dispelling of all idle dreams--a hard, a
grim, a vile reality.

Ruin! 'T is an ugly word. A fitting one to carve upon the tombstone of a
reckless, godless, dissolute life such as mine had been.

Back, Gaston de Luynes! back, to the kennel whence the Cardinal's hand did
for a moment pluck you; back, from the morning of hope to the night of
despair; back, to choose between starvation and the earning of a pauper's
fee as a master of fence!




CHAPTER II

THE FRUIT OF INDISCRETION


Despite the dejection to which I had become a prey, I slept no less soundly
that night than was my wont, and indeed it was not until late next morning
when someone knocked at my door that I awakened.

I sat up in bed, and my first thought as I looked round the handsome room--
which I had rented a week ago upon receiving the lieutenancy in the
Cardinal's guards--was for the position that I had lost and of the need
that there would be ere long to seek a lodging more humble and better
suited to my straitened circumstances. It was not without regret that such