Then came the tailor; and a tailor is always a relief, except when he makes garments too tight, or makes them too loose in one place for the purpose of making them too close in another. But this tailor was really a great man in his way; and he did succeed in amusing Edward's mind in a slight degree by the importance he attached to his calling and to every one of its accessories. He also estimated very highly his own station in that calling. He told Edward that although he had not the honor of clothing his Majesty,--because all the world knew he was very careless in his dress,--yet he made for all the handsomest young noblemen of the court. He himself, he assured his listener,--and he dropped his voice while he spoke,--had _composed_ the dress in which the poor Count de Chalais had been arrayed on the very day of his arrest. "Indeed!" said Edward. "Is he arrested? What are they going to do with him?" "They will cut off his head, to a certainty," said the tailor. "Though he was the king's greatest favorite, his Eminence was his greatest enemy; and the enemies of the cardinal never escape." This was such cold comfort to Edward Langdale that he brought the subject back to the matter of his own clothing. "I shall want one suit as soon to-morrow as possible," he said; "for I trust I shall have an early audience of his Eminence; and of course I cannot present myself before him in this garb." "Of course, of course, seigneur," said the tailor, with a look of horror: "that would be as good as a confession. Of what may your lordship have been guilty to assume such a dress?--high treason?" "I hope not," said the young man: "at least, if I have committed _lèse-majesté_, it must have been in my sleep. But what about the clothes, my good friend? Can I have them?" "Assuredly, seigneur; assuredly," answered the man. "I have a beautiful _haut-de-chausses_, and a _pourpoint_, which will fit you exactly: they are in the best taste,--philimot velvet, opened with blue, and silver points. They were made for poor Monsieur de Courmerin; but he never had the opportunity of wearing them, for he put off doing so for one single day, and that night he was arrested and his head cut off before the end of the week. They will suit you perfectly. But the cloak I must make myself. I will keep the workmen up all night, sooner than disappoint you, however. You had better trust the whole arrangement to me,--the boots, the collar, the hat; and then all will correspond." Edward readily agreed to the proposal; and, merely stipulating for a certain price, as his funds were running short, he dismissed the tailor, whose conversation had a certain ominous croak about it, which was all the more painful from the frivolities with which it was mixed.