'Exactly so, and I owe you much for this. There is another favour I would ask.' 'And it is?' 'That you stop the man riding ahead of us until this evening.' 'As it will annoy Zamet, I shall do so with pleasure. I had half a mind to stop the shoemaker himself.' With this allusion to Zamet's ignoble origin he turned and gave a short order to his men. As we came up to the gate the man before us slackened pace so as to let us pass, with the obvious intention, so I thought, of following me at his convenience. He had hardly pulled rein when the two saints closed in, one on each side of him, and in a trice he was in their hands. He protested violently, as might have been expected, but in vain, and we waited until he was well out of sight on his way to the guard-room. At the gate we asked which way Zamet and his party had gone. 'By Tacoignieres, messieurs,' answered the sentinel. 'Then my way is by Septeuil,' I said. 'I owe you a long debt, M. d'Aubusson, and will repay. We shall meet again.' '_Pardieu!_ I hope so--and you dine with me at More's.' 'Or where you will--adieu.' 'A good journey.' And with a parting wave of my hand I turned Couronne's head, and galloped off, followed by Jacques. CHAPTER IX THE MASTER-GENERAL In the labyrinth of narrow streets, crooked roads, and blind alleys behind the Palais de Justice, where the houses are so crowded, that they seem to climb one over the other in their efforts to reach higher and higher in their search for air, is a small street called the Rue des Deux Mondes. It had this advantage--that it was wider than most of the other roads in that part of Paris, and opened out abruptly on to the river face, very nearly opposite the upper portion of the Pont Neuf, then under course of construction but not to be finished for some years later. At the corner of the street and overlooking the river, the Pont Neuf, the Passeur aux Vaches, with a glimpse of the Quai Malaquais and the mansions of the Faubourg St. Germain, was a house of moderate size kept and owned by a Maitre Pantin, who was engaged nominally, in some legal business in the courts of the city. I say nominally, because he was in reality an agent of the Huguenot party, who, having contributed so largely to help the King to his own, were in reward restricted from the public exercise of their religion to a radius of thirty miles beyond Paris. This restriction did not, however, apply to Madame Catherine, the King's sister, now the Duchess de Bar, and a few of the great nobles such as Bouillon, de Guiche, de Pangeas, and one or two others, who had declined to follow the King's example and see the error of their religious ways, and who when in the capital were allowed to attend the princess' daily _preche_ in the Louvre, a thing which exasperated all Paris, and induced Monseigneur the Archbishop de Gondy to make public protest to the King, and to