Madame de Montpensier, although she had in reality neither boon nor question to demand of her brother, lingered for a moment after St. Real was gone, looking archly in the grave face of the Duke of Mayenne. "Well, Charles," she exclaimed, "do you not thank me for my assistance? have I not got you nicely out of a scrape?" "After having wildly got me into one," replied the Duke. "But tell me, Kate, what is this business about Mademoiselle de Menancourt? I will not suffer you to trouble the course of events there." "Nor do I purpose to do so," replied Madame de Montpensier; "but I see farther than you do, Charles, and, at all events, for this day will have my own way. So, you look to your plans, and I will look to mine, and may come to help you again when you get into difficulty." Thus speaking, and without waiting for any farther questions, she turned away, leaving the Duke to pursue the military arrangements in which he had been previously occupied. CHAPTER XIV. St. Real, whose toilet at the convent of the Jacobins had been, from the circumstances in which he was placed, both hasty and unceremonious, now proceeded to change a dress suited alone to a journey, and both deranged and soiled by all that he had lately passed through. While thus occupied, a loud but well-known voice made itself heard in the ante-room, exclaiming, "Make way, make way! Paul Thiebaut and Pierre Langlois, if you do not get out of my way, I will break your pates with the hilt of my dagger! I will break your pates, though they may be as thick, and as hard, and as heavy as the leaden pummel of my old lord's double-handed sword! Out of the way, I say: do you think one can walk through your great hulking bodies?" "No," replied one of the attendants, in a gruff voice, "no! but you could walk between our legs, I suppose, little Master Bartholo." What was the dwarf's reply did not appear; but it would seem that it was somewhat of a manual nature, for a loud oath and stamp of the foot followed; and the door of the chamber opened so unceremoniously as to evince that Bartholo was in some haste to escape from the vengeance that his replication, whatever it had been, was likely to call down upon his head. Banging the door in the face of those behind, he instantly recovered his tranquillity when he found himself in the presence of his master; and advancing towards St. Real with graceful ease, bent his little knee to the ground, kissed his lord's hand, and gave him joy on his arrival in the great capital. St. Real replied something kind to his first salutation, and then added, "But how now, Bartholo! you claim no merit for the service you have rendered me this morning?"