"I was at the constable's hôtel in Paris, while he was living at his château of Bourbon-l'Archambault. One day the captain of his guards arrived with a letter from monseigneur. The letter bade me instantly hand to the messenger a small sealed package which I would find in the duke's bedroom in a small closet near the head of his bed. I went with the captain to the bedroom, opened the closet, found the package in the place described, and handed it to the messenger, who immediately took his leave. An hour later an officer with a squad of soldiers came from the Louvre, and bade me throw open the duke's bedroom and show them a small closet near the head of the bed. I obeyed: they opened the closet, but failed to find what they sought, which was nothing less than the package the duke's messenger had carried away." "The devil! the devil!" muttered Aubry, beginning to take a deep interest in the situation of his companion in misfortune. "The officer made some terrible threats, to which I made no other reply than that I knew nothing about what he asked me; for if I had said that I had just handed the package to the duke's messenger, they could have pursued him and taken it from him." "Peste!" Aubry interrupted; "that was clever of you, and you acted like a faithful and trusty retainer." "Thereupon the officer gave me in charge to two guards, and returned to the Louvre with the others. In half an hour he returned with orders to take me to the château of Pierre-Encise at Lyons. They put irons on my feet, bound my hands, and tossed me into a carriage with a soldier on either side. Five days later I was confined in a prison, which, I ought to say, was far from being as dark and severe as this. But what does that matter?" muttered the dying man; "a prison 's a prison, and I have ended by becoming accustomed to this, as to all the others." "Hum!" said Jacques Aubry; "that proves you to be a philosopher." "Three days and three nights passed," continued Etienne Raymond; "at last, during the fourth night, I was awakened by a slight noise. I opened my eyes; my door turned upon its hinges; a woman closely veiled entered with the jailer. The jailer placed a lamp upon the table, and, at a sign from my nocturnal visitor, left the cell; thereupon she drew near my bed and raised her veil. I cried aloud." "_Hein_? who was it, pray?" Aubry asked, edging closer to the narrator. "It was Louise of Savoy herself, the Duchesse d'Angoulême in person; it was the Regent of France, the king's mother." "Oho!" said Aubry; "and what was she doing with a poor devil like you?" "She was in quest of the same sealed package which I had delivered to the duke's messenger, and which contained love letters written by the imprudent princess to the man she was now persecuting." "Well, upon my word!" muttered Jacques between his teeth, "here's a story most devilishly like the story of the Duchesse d'Etampes and Ascanio."