is quite the right word. Other ladies annoyed with her, and show it by walking past and waggling their fingers in her face, which appears to depress _Louise_ considerably. Then they go out, after the Cavaliers, or the refreshments. Meanwhile _Louis the Fourteenth_ has entered at the back and overheard all. _He_ knows what the shake and shrugs meant, and smiles and nods knowingly to himself. "Oh, I _am_ an irresistible Monarch, _I_ am!" he seems to be saying. "I'll follow this up." So he struts down with a fixed smile on his face, like the impudent young dog he is, and pats his chest passionately at her. _Louise_ startled. "Don't go away," says _Louis_ in pantomime. "I say, there's an arbour in that shrubbery,--let's go and sit in it--_do_!" _Louise_ undecided; tries to excuse herself. "Earwiggy? not a bit of it!" _Louis_ assures her (he wouldn't be so confident about it if he had seen his Gardeners at work); "_come_ along!" _Louise_ still timid; suggests spiders. _Louis_ vows that no spider shall harm her while he lives to protect her, and draws her gently towards the shrubbery; he does this several times, but on each occasion her dread of insects returns, and she recoils shrinking. The King puts his arms round her to give her courage, and at this instant, _Raoul de Bragelonne_ returns, sees the back of someone embracing the maiden who was betrothed to him in childhood, draws his sword--and recognises his Sovereign. "Whew!" his expression says plainly enough. "Now I _have_ put my foot in it nicely!" He takes off his hat and apologises profusely; but _Louis_ is indignant. What's the use of being a _Roi Soleil_ if you can't ask a lady of your Court to sit in an arbour without being interrupted like this? He swells visibly, and intimates that he will pay _Raoul_ out for this in various highly unpleasant ways. _Louise_ kneels to him for pardon. _Louis_ subsides gradually, but still shows the whites of his eyes; finally he tells _Raoul_ to be off. _Raoul_ is submissive--only wants to know where he's to _go_ to. _Louis_ points to Heaven, evidently regal politeness forbids him to indicate any other place. _Raoul_ goes off perplexed, and no wonder. Then, as the Argument explains, "_a trumpet-call is heard_," and _Louise "bewildered_," perhaps because it is the signal to go and dress for dinner, escapes to the palace; and _Louis_, feeling that the arbour is only a question of time, follows. Then Musketeers come off duty and get up an assault-at-arms, until their careful captain, afraid that they will hurt themselves with those nasty swords, orders them to stop, and the First _Tableau_ is over. [Illustration: "He swells visibly."]