"Your name, Monsieur, if you please," he said, scanning the list of
invited guests.

"I am one of those who pass without the interrogatory." The voice was
hoarse, affectedly so; and this roused the Chevalier's suspicions.

"I can not believe that," he laughed, "since Monsieur le Duc, his
Majesty's brother, was good enough to permit me to question him." He
leaned against the wall, smiling and twisting his mustache. What a
charming musketeer!

"What!" haughtily, "you parley with me?" A gauntleted hand flew to a
jeweled hilt.

"Monsieur will not be so rude?" mockingly.

"Monsieur!" with a stamp of the foot--a charming foot.

"Monsieur!" he mimicked, also stamping a foot which, though shapely,
was scarce charming.

Then through the curtain of the mask there came a low, rollicking
laugh. The hand fell away from the sword-hilt, and a grey gauntlet
slipped to the floor, discovering a hand as dazzling white and begemmed
as that on which Anne of Austria prided herself.

"Death of my life!" said a voice as soft and musical as the vibration
of a bell, "you make an admirable Cerberus. My gauntlet." The sweep
of the hand fascinated him. "Are your ears like the sailors' of