Petit-Claud looked toward the door of the boudoir, and saw Cointet standing there. “Madame,” he said, “Lucien is here, in Angoulême.” “Well, sir?” asked the Countess, in tones that would have put an end to all power of speech in an ordinary man. “Mme. la Comtesse does not understand,” returned Petit-Claud, bringing out that most respectful formula again. “How does Mme. la Comtesse wish that the great man of her making should be received in Angoulême? There is no middle course; he must be received or despised here.” This was a dilemma to which Louise de Nègrepelisse had never given a thought; it touched her closely, yet rather for the sake of the past than of the future. And as for Petit-Claud, his plan for arresting David Séchard depended upon the lady’s actual feelings towards Lucien. He waited. “M. Petit-Claud,” said the Countess, with haughty dignity, “you mean to be on the side of the Government. Learn that the first principle of government is this--never to have been in the wrong, and that the instinct of power and the sense of dignity is even stronger in women than in governments.” “That is just what I thought, madame,” he answered quickly, observing the Countess meanwhile with attention the more profound because it was scarcely visible. “Lucien came here in the depths of misery. But if he must receive an ovation, I can compel him to leave Angoulême by the means of the ovation itself. His sister and brother-in-law, David Séchard, are hard pressed for debts.” In the Countess’ haughty face there was a swift, barely perceptible change; it was not satisfaction, but the repression of satisfaction. Surprised that Petit-Claud should have guessed her wishes, she gave him a glance as she opened her fan, and Françoise de la Haye’s entrance at that moment gave her time to find an answer. “It will not be long before you are public prosecutor, monsieur,” she said, with a significant smile. That speech did not commit her in any way, but it was explicit enough. Françoise had come in to thank the Countess. “Oh! madame, then I shall owe the happiness of my life to you,” she exclaimed, bending girlishly to add in the Countess’ ear, “To marry a petty provincial attorney would be like being burned by slow fires.” It was Francis, with his knowledge of officialdom, who had prompted Zéphirine to make this set upon Louise. “In the very earliest days after promotion,” so the ex-consul-general told his fair friend, “everybody, prefect, or monarch, or man of business, is burning to exert his influence for his friends; but a patron soon finds out the inconveniences of patronage, and then turns from fire to ice. Louise will do more now for Petit-Claud than she would do for her husband in three months’ time.” “Madame la Comtesse is thinking of all that our poet’s triumph entails?” continued Petit-Claud. “She should receive Lucien before there is an end of the nine-days’ wonder.”