At last he reached the Rue St. Honoré and stood before the great stone building, so long the peaceful retreat of the Dominican Monks, now given over to the strongest political society of the day,--the Jacobin Club. Men were passing through its well-guarded doorway, each separately interviewed for a moment by a crabbed, ill-disposed doorkeeper. Each as he passed this watchful sentinel, exhibited a card or murmured some magic password. Jean possessed neither a card nor the knowledge of the proper watchword, but he was not to be daunted by either lack. Boldly he marched up the steps, and would have walked straight into the hall, had not the doorkeeper seized him wrathfully by the collar. No one else was passing in at that moment. "Impudent! What is your business here?" he shouted. "I am a good citizen who loves liberty, and I demand to be admitted to this meeting!" replied Jean, hopefully. "Well, of all outrages!" gasped the astounded doorkeeper. "Begone, you young scamp! The Nation has little use for such as you!" He released the boy's collar, and pursued him down the steps with a thick cane he had snatched up. Jean, deeming flight his wisest course, took to his heels and was speedily beyond the premises. But so rapid was his retreat that before he was aware of it, he had butted plumply into someone who was coming in the opposite direction, and the concussion knocked the stranger flat on his back! "Oh, I beg your pardon!" entreated Jean, breathlessly, assisting his victim to rise. "You would make a splendid catapult on a field of artillery!" answered the stranger who proved to be a short and exceedingly thin young man. He was wrapped in an old grey great-coat, though the weather was May, and warm. A round, shabby black hat was pulled over his eyes. His hair was arranged in a slovenly manner, and hung about his ears. In the lamplight his face was sallow, with high cheek-bones and a very prominent chin. But he had, so Jean thought, the most extraordinary eyes in the world. They were deepset, grey and piercing, and fixed one with a look as sharp as a sword. Jean felt that, had the man's lips commanded him to throw himself into the fire, those eyes would have compelled him to obey! "Perhaps you will explain the cause for this unwarrantable attack on a peaceful citizen!" said the stranger as he brushed his coat. "Indeed I meant no harm, nor even knew what I was about, since I was occupied in being forcibly put out of the Jacobin Club!" laughed the boy. "And why should you want to be _in_ the Jacobin Club!" demanded the stranger. Jean was on his guard at once. "All good citizens must wish to be present at meetings so important," he replied airily. "I merely had a curiosity to know what was going on!" The young man fixed him with his brilliant eyes, and Jean felt the blood mount guiltily to his cheeks. "There's something deeper than that!" he remarked coolly. "I can see it! What are your _real_ reasons? Are you a royalist?"