Having taken care to lock the door of my chamber before I came down, and having the despatch from Barcelona about me, the moment we had done dinner I accompanied the complaisant soldier into the street, and then begged him to show me to the Palais Cardinal. The name seemed to startle him a little; but he bade me follow him, which I accordingly did. For about a quarter of an hour, he went up one street and down another, turning and returning, like a hare pursued by the dogs, till at length I began to perceive that the very last intention in my worthy guide's mind was to conduct me to the Palais Cardinal, which I well knew was not half a mile from the Quartier St. Eustache. As he went, my honest companion amused me with the detail of a great many adventures, in which he had proved himself a Hercules, and carried on the conversation with such spirit that he had it all to himself. What he intended to do with me, God knows; but getting rather tired of walking about the streets, I fixed upon a respectable-looking grocer's shop, which was not yet closed, and telling my companion that I wanted to buy some pepper, I walked in. "Pepper!" cried he, following me; "what can you want with pepper?" "I will tell you presently," I answered, "when I have asked this good gentleman (the grocer) a question.--Pray, sir," I continued, turning to the master of the house, "will you inform me if I am near the Palais Cardinal? This worthy person agreed to guide me thither from the Rue des Prouvaires, quartier St. Eustache, and we have walked near half an hour without finding it." "He has taken you quite to the other end of the town," replied the grocer. "You are now, sir, in the Rue des Prêtres St. Paul." "On my life!" cried the soldier, "I thought I was leading you right. By my honour, 'tis a strange mistake!" "So strange, sir," said I, "that if you do not instantly go to the right about, and march off, I may be tempted to cudgel you." "_Ventre St. Gris!_" cried the bully, laying his hand on his sword. But the grocer whispered a word or two to his shop-boy about fetching the Capitaine du Guêt; and the great soldier, finding that his honour was likely to suffer less by retreating than by maintaining his ground, took to his heels, and ran off with all speed. CHAPTER XXIX. "That, sir, is one of the most assured rogues in Paris," said the grocer; "he has once been at the galleys for seven years, and will very soon be there again. How you happened to fall in with such a fellow, I do not at all understand."