The Baron's servant was waiting to attend his master. He was a man who had been with de Cazalet in California, Mexico, and South America--who had lived with him in his bachelorhood and in his married life--knew all the details of his domestic career, had been faithful to him in wealth and in poverty, knew all that there was to be known about him--the best and the worst--and had made up his mind to hold by an employment which had been adventurous, profitable, and tolerably easy, not entirely free from danger, or from the prospect of adversity--yet always hopeful. So thorough a scamp as the Baron must always find some chance open to him--thus, at least, argued Henri le Mescam, his unscrupulous ally. The man was quick, clever--able to turn his hand to anything--valet, groom, cook, courier--as necessity demanded. "Is Salathiel pretty fresh?" asked the Baron. "Fit as a fiddle: he hasn't been out since you hunted him four days ago." "That's lucky. He will be able to go the pace to-morrow morning. Have him harnessed to that American buggy of Mr. Tregonell's at six o'clock." "I suppose you know that it's hardly light at six." "There will be quite enough light for me. Pack my smallest portmanteau with linen for a week, and a second suit--no dress-clothes--and have the trap ready in the stable-yard when the clock strikes six. I have to catch a train at Launceston at 7.45. You will follow in the afternoon with the luggage." "To your London rooms, Sir?" "Yes. If you don't find me there you will wait for further instructions. You may have to join me on the other side of the channel." "I hope so, Sir." "Sick of England already?" "Never cared much for it, Sir. I began to think I should die of the dulness of this place." "Rather more luxurious than our old quarters at St. Heliers ten years ago, when you were marker at Jewson's, while I was teaching drawing and French at the fashionable academies of the island." "That was bad, Sir; but luxury isn't everything in life. A man's mind goes to rust in a place of this kind." "Well, there will not be much rust for you in future, I believe. How would you like it if I were to take you back to the shores of the Pacific?" "That's just what I should like, Sir. You were a king there, and I was your prime minister." "And I may be a king again--perhaps this time with a queen--a proud and beautiful queen." Le Mescam smiled, and shrugged his shoulders. "The queenly element was not quite wanting in the past, Sir," he said. "Pshaw, Henri, the ephemeral fancy of the hour. Such chance entanglements as those do not rule a man's life." "Perhaps not, Sir; but I know one of those chance entanglements made Lima unpleasantly warm for us; and if, after you winged Don Silvio, there hadn't been a pair of good horses waiting for us, you might never have seen the outside of Peru." "And if a duel was dangerous in Lima, it would be ten times more dangerous in Cornwall, would it not, Henri?"