"Rather a Cyclopean labour," remarked D'Aubin; "rather a Cyclopean labour I suspect! especially since Harry of Valois, to whom you deny the crown, has chosen to turn up his hat with a Huguenot button." "We shall see, we shall see!" replied the Duchess: "I know, sir Count, you laugh at all parties; so I understand not why you should cling so fondly to the rabble of accursed murderers and heretics, who lie out there at St. Cloud, like vipers in a garden." D'Aubin laughed outright at the Duchess's vehemence, and reminded her that some of her near relations were amongst the rabble she so qualified. "They are none the less vipers for that," she replied: and the conversation taking a turn neither very wise nor very decent, may as well be omitted in this place. It lingered on, however, from minute to minute, without the Duchess making any apparent effort to fulfil the promise she had made to D'Aubin, and send away the idlers by whom she was surrounded. Too long accustomed to the intriguing society of Paris, and too well acquainted with the character of the wily woman with whom he had now to deal, not to be armed at all points against every art and deception, D'Aubin began to suspect that the Duchess was trifling with him for some particular purpose, and was seeking to occupy him with other matters, till some moment of importance, to himself or his cousin, was irretrievably lost. "Hark!" he exclaimed, as this thought crossed his mind; "there is the clock of St. Gervais striking one, and I must really seek my lord the Duke." "I hear no clock," replied the Duchess--nor could she, for none had struck--"I hear no clock! But not yet, D'Aubin, not yet; I am not yet going to slip the jesses of my _faucon gentil_, after having just recovered him from so long a flight. Stay you with me, D'Aubin, and I will send and see if my brother be within. You go, Mont-Augier," she added, turning to one of the young cavaliers, who instantly sprang to obey her; but, ere he reached the door, the Duchess, by a sudden movement, placed herself near him; and, while D'Aubin was for a moment occupied by some other person present, she said, in a low voice, "Do not return, do not return: we must keep the Count away from Mayenne, or they will together spoil some of our best schemes."