"It needs no explanation, your Highness," replied the Marchioness, raising her head proudly. "I intended to have staid some days longer in this neighbourhood; but as she cannot come to me, I shall return at once to Paris." The Duke looked mortified, but still offered her his hand; and when he rejoined his own party in the apartments assigned to him, he was somewhat gloomy and abstracted. CHAP. IX. "His Highness, Sire," said one of the attendants to Henry III. on the following day, "His Highness of Guise is not to be found this morning. His servants say that he has gone forth on horseback, followed only by two grooms: but whither he has turned his steps, no one seems rightly to know." "Seek him with Madame de Noirmontier," said Villequier, who stood beside the King. But Henry, however, who was in no mood for jesting at that moment, replied sharply, "He is playing with me! He is playing with me! He mocks me! He will repent it some day! And I think you mock me too, Villequier, to talk of Madame de Noirmontier at this moment. Have you not heard this business of Savoy? He knew it last night, and said nothing of it; and I'll tell you what more he has done, Villequier, which you may like as little as I like the other. He has fixed the day for the marriage of his niece with that bold young Logères. But this business of Savoy is terrible, and these mutinous States will be the ruin of the realm." "Sire," replied Villequier, "your Majesty must remember that I am somewhat in darkness, in twilight at least. I have heard a rumour that the Savoyard is in arms in France. But what of the States?" "Why, they are even now discussing," exclaimed the King, "whether there shall be war or not, even to defend our invaded territory. There are the Clergy now arguing it at the Jacobins, the Nobles in the Palais de Justice, and the Third Estate in the Hôtel de Ville,--all, all showing a disposition to hesitate at such a moment; and Guise, the Generalissimo of my armies, and Grand Master of my household absent. Heaven knows where!" "The devil knows best, most likely," replied Villequier with a calm smile. "But, perhaps, the secret may be, that the Duke of Savoy is son-in-law of the King of Spain. Now, the King of Spain has been a good friend to the Duke of Guise, and the good Pope used always to say that a Guise never jumped higher than the King of Spain liked." "By my faith!" replied the King, "I sometimes think that this same gloomy Philip is more sovereign in France than the King thereof. But here come tidings from the Tiers Etats. Come, Monsieur Artau, how have gone the deliberations of the States? What say our good Commons to war with Savoy?"