"You will remain at Paris," said Démocharès, "and with the assistance of Lignières and Des Avenelles, keep a strict watch upon the two leading conspirators. I shall set out in an hour for Blois, to warn Messieurs de Guise. The cardinal will be somewhat alarmed at first, but Le Balafré is with him to encourage him; and when he comes to think it over, he will be in an ecstasy of delight. It is for those two to assemble in a fortnight around the king, without disturbance, all the forces they have available. Meanwhile, our Huguenots will have nothing to startle them; they will fall in a body, or one by one, into the trap we have laid, the blind fools, and they will be at our mercy. We shall have them, and then,--'General slaughter!'" The grand inquisitor stalked up and down the room rubbing his hands for joy. "May God grant," said Monsieur de Braguelonne, "that no unforeseen event shall reduce this splendid scheme to nought!" "Impossible!" Démocharès made haste to say. "General slaughter! We have them on the hip! Call Lignières back, if you will, so that he may finish with the information he has for us, which I am to report to the Cardinal de Lorraine. But I look upon the heresy as already extinct. General slaughter!" CHAPTER XX A CHILD KING AND QUEEN If in imagination we go forward two days, and traverse forty leagues of space, we may fancy ourselves on the 27th of February at the splendid Château de Blois, where the court was temporarily established. There had been a great celebration at the château the day before, with jousting and ballets and allegorical representations, all under the direction of Monsieur Antoine de Baïf the poet. So that on the morning in question the young king and his queen, for whose entertainment the fête had been given, had risen rather later than usual, and not fully rested from the fatigue of their holiday-making. Fortunately no reception was appointed for that day, so that they were at liberty to amuse themselves by chatting over at their leisure the things that had pleased their fancy. "For my own part," said Mary Stuart, "I thought all the entertainments the finest and rarest things imaginable." "Yes," replied François, "especially the ballets and the scenes that were acted. But I must confess that the sonnets and madrigals seemed to me a trifle tiresome." "What!" cried Mary; "why, they were very bright and clever, I assure you." "But too everlastingly eulogistic, you must agree, _mignonne_. You see, it's not especially amusing to hear one's self praised thus by the hour; and I could not help fancying last evening that the good God Himself must sometimes have His moments of being bored in His Paradise. Then you must remember, too, that these gentlemen, especially Messieurs de Baïf and de Maisonfleur, have a way of interlarding their discourse with numbers of Latin words, which I do not always understand."