The good marquise then proceeded to indoctrinate her young companion with all the forms of a court, which, though not so rigid as they afterward became,--for Louis XIV. was the father of etiquette,--were sufficiently numerous and arbitrary to puzzle a young man like Edward. He found that, although he had once by the force of circumstances won easy access to the cardinal prime minister, he had now various ceremonies to go through before he could hope for an audience. To call, to put down his name and address in a book, to see principal and secondary officers, and to give as it were an abstract of his business, were all proceedings absolutely necessary, Madame de Lagny thought, before he could see the cardinal; and Edward, with a faint smile, asked her if she did not think it would be better for him to commit a little treason as the shortest way to the minister's presence. "Heaven forbid!" cried the old lady. "But in the mean time you must go to an auberge near the chateau, where his Eminence can find you at any moment." And she proceeded to recommend the house of an excellent man, who had been cook to poor Monsieur de Lagny, and now, she assured Edward, kept the very best auberge in Nantes. At length the city was reached, and the coach drove straight to the castle, where Madame de Lagny took a really affectionate leave of Edward and retired to her own apartments. The young Englishman then proceeded to inquire for Richelieu, found he was absent at a small distance from the town, and, having written his name in a book, betook himself to the inn which his travelling-companion had mentioned. In the court of the castle he had seen no one but a guard or two and some servants at the door of the hall. In the great place there was hardly a human being to be seen,--no gay cavaliers on horseback or on foot, no heavy carrosse with its crowd of laquais. At the other side of the square, indeed, near the end of the little street which led toward the dwelling of Monsieur de Tronson, was a group of workmen; and another larger group just appeared beyond some buildings close by the river-side. But, altogether, the whole town had a melancholy and deserted look. A sort of ominous silence reigned around, too, which Edward felt to be very depressing to the spirits, especially in a country celebrated even then for the light hilarity of its population.