They walked up the steps together, between the trim borders, where spring flowers were already breaking into bud. On the terrace they found the Vicomtesse and the Baron Giraud. A servant was going towards the house carrying carelessly a small silver salver. The Baron was standing with an unopened envelope in his hand. "You will permit me, Madame," they heard him say with his strident little self-satisfied laugh. "A man of affairs is the slave of the moment. And the affairs of state are never still. A great country moves even in its sleep." Having the permission of Madame, he tore open the envelope, enjoying the importance of the moment. But his face changed as soon as his glance fell on the paper. "The government has fallen," he gasped, with white lips and a face wherefrom the colour faded in blotches. He seemed to forget the ladies, and looked only at his son. "It may mean--much. I must go to Paris at once. The place is in an uproar. Mon Dieu--where will it end!" He excused himself hurriedly, and in a few minutes his carriage rattled through the grey stone gateway. "An uproar in Paris," repeated Lucille, anxiously, when she was alone with her mother. "What does he mean? Is there any danger? Will papa be safe?" "Yes," answered the Vicomtesse quietly; "he will be safe, I think." Chapter VIII In Paris "Le plus grand art d'un habile homme est celui de savior cacher son habilete." It will be necessary to dwell to a certain extent on those events of the great world that left their mark on the obscure lives of which the present history treats. An old man may be excused for expressing his opinion--or rather his agreement with the opinions of greater minds--that our little existence here on earth is but part of a great scheme--that we are but pawns moved hither and thither on a vast chess-board, and that, while our vision is often obscured by some knight or bishop or king, whose neighbourhood overshadows us, yet our presence may affect the greater moves as certainly as we are affected by them. I first became aware of the fact that my existence was amenable to every political wind that might blow a week or so after Lucille went to La Pauline, without, indeed, vouchsafing an explanation of her sudden coldness. In my study I was one evening smoking, and, I admit it, thinking of Lucille--thinking very practically, however. For I was reflecting with satisfaction over some small improvements I had effected--with a Norfolk energy which, no doubt, gave offence to some--during the short time that the Vicomte and I had passed in the Provencal chateau. I had the pleasant conviction that Lucille's health could, at all events, come to no harm from a residence in one of the oldest castles in France. No very lover-like reflections, the high-flown will cry. So be it. Each must love in his own way. "Air and water--air and water!" the Vicomte had cried when he saw the men at work under my directions. "You Englishmen are mad on the subject."