"For me? That is strange. The captain knew that I could not arrive
before to-night, which is the twentieth."

"I told the officer that. He laughed curiously and said that he
expected to find you absent."

"What the devil did he call for, then?"

Breton made a grimace which explained his inability to answer this
question.

The Chevalier stood still and twisted his mustache till the ends were
like needle-points. "Horns of Panurge! as Victor would say; is it
possible for any man save Homer to be in two places at once? Possibly
I am to race for some other end of France. I like it not. Mazarin
thinks because I am in her Majesty's Guards that I belong to him.
Plague take him, I say."

He snapped the buckles on his shoes, while Breton drew from its worn
scabbard the Chevalier's campaign rapier, long and flexile, dreaded by
many and respected by all, and thrust it into the new scabbard,

"Ah, Monsieur," said Breton, stirred by that philosophy which, one
gathers from a first reading of Plutarch, "a man is a deal like a
sword. If he be good and true, it matters not into what kind of
scabbard he is thrust."

"Aye, lad; but how much more confidence a handsome scabbard gives a
man! Even a sword, dressed well, attracts the eye; and, heart of mine,
what other aim have we poor mortals than to attract?"