So Philippe d’Orléans also, thought Florian, had got what he wanted, only to find it a damnable nuisance. Probably all life was like that. Over-high and over-earnest desires were inadvisable. It was a sort of comfort to reflect that poor Philippe at least would soon be through with his worries. A bell rang; and Florian, rising, said: “I shall heed your advice, monseigneur—But that bell perhaps announces an arrival about which I should remain in polite ignorance?” “Yes, it is Madame de Phalaris. We are to try what Aretino and Romano can suggest for our amusement, before I go up to my hour’s work with the King. So be off with you through the private way, for it is a very modest little bitch.” Florian passed through the indicated door, but he did not quite close it. Instead, he waited there, and he saw the entrance of charming tiny Madame de Phalaris, whom Orléans greeted with tolerable ardor. “So you have come at last, you delicious rogue, to end my expounding of moral sentiments. And with what fairy tale, bright-eyed Sapphira, will you explain your lateness?” “Indeed, your highness,” said the lady, who had learned that in these encounters the Duke liked to be heartened with some gambit of free talk, “indeed, your question reminds me that only last night I heard the most diverting fairy tale. But it is somewhat—” “Yes?” said the Duke. “I mean, that it is rather—” “But I adore that especial sort of fairy story,” he announced. “So of course we must have it, and equally of course we must spare our mutual blushes.” Thus speaking, Orléans sat at her feet, and leaned back his head between her knees, so that neither could see the face of the other. Her lithe white fingers stroked his cheeks, caressing those great pendulous red jaws: and her sea-green skirts, flowered with a pattern of slender vines, were spread like billows to each side of him. “There was once,” the lady began, “a king and a queen—” “I know the tale,” Orléans said,—“they had three sons. And the two elder failed in preposterous quests, but the third prince succeeded in everything, and he was damnably bored by everything. I know the tale only too well—” He desisted from speaking. But he was making remarkable noises. “Highness—!” cried Madame de Phalaris. She had risen in alarm; and as she rose, the Duke’s head fell to the crimson-covered footstool at her feet. He did not move, but lay quite still, staring upward, and his foreshortened face, as Florian saw it, was of a remarkable shade of purple among the elaborate dark curls of Orléans’ peruke. There was for a moment utter silence. You heard only the gilded clock upon the red chimney-piece. Then Madame de Phalaris screamed.