Benvenuto cast his eyes about and saw upon the quay an uprooted mile-stone which two ordinary men would have found difficulty in lifting. He walked to where it lay picked it up and put it on his shoulder as easily as a child could do the same with a pebble. He had taken but a step or two, however, when he reflected that, when the door was broken in, he should find the guard waiting for him, and the result would be that he should himself be imprisoned,--imprisoned when Ascanio's liberty was dependent upon his own. He therefore dropped the stone, which was driven some inches into the ground by its own weight. Doubtless the provost was watching him from some invisible loophole, for he heard a burst of laughter. Benvenuto hurried away at full speed, lest he should yield to the desire to dash his head against the accursed door. He went directly to the Hôtel d'Etampes. All was not lost, if, failing to see Ascanio, he could see Colombe. Perhaps Ascanio, in the overflowing of his heart, had confided to his beloved the secret he had refused to confide to his master. All went well at first. The gateway of the mansion was open; he crossed the courtyard and entered the reception-room, where stood a tall footman with lace on all the seams of his livery,--a sort of colossus four feet wide and six high. "Who are you?" he demanded, eying the goldsmith from head to foot. At another time Benvenuto would have answered his insolent stare by one of his customary violent outbursts, but it was essential that he should see Colombe. Ascanio's welfare was at stake: so he restrained himself. "I am Benvenuto Cellini, the Florentine goldsmith," he replied. "What do you wish?" "To see Mademoiselle Colombe." "Mademoiselle Colombe is not visible." "Why is she not visible?" "Because her father, Messire d'Estourville, Provost of Paris, gave her in charge to Madame d'Etampes, and requested her to keep an eye upon her." "But I am a friend." "An additional reason for suspecting you." "I tell you that I must see her," said Benvenuto, beginning to get warm. "And I tell you that you shall not see her," retorted the servant. "Is Madame d'Etampes visible?" "No more than Mademoiselle Colombe." "Not even to me, her jeweller?" "Less to you than to any other person." "Do you mean that orders have been given not to admit me?" "Just so," replied the servant; "you have put your finger on the spot." "Do you know that I am a strange man, my friend," said Benvenuto, with the terrible laugh which ordinarily preceded his outbursts of wrath; "and that the place I am forbidden to enter is the place I am accustomed to enter?" "How will you do it, eh? You amuse me." "When there is a door, and a blackguard like you in front of it, for instance--" "Well?" said the valet. "Well!" retorted Benvenuto, suiting the action to the word, "I overturn the blackguard, and break in the door."