"He knows my name?"

Mr. Chiffinch smiled.

"We are not so foolish as that, Mr. Mallock. He thinks you have some
place at Court; but we did not satisfy him as to your name."

I said nothing; for there was nothing to say.

"You had best be very careful, Mr. Mallock," went on the page, standing
up again. "You have been mixing a great deal with unpopular folks. You
will be of no service to His Majesty at all if you fall under suspicion.
You had best go back by water to the Temple Stairs."

He spoke a little coldly; and I perceived that he thought I had been
indiscreet.

"Well," he said, "we had best be going to His Majesty's lodgings."

I had flattered myself, up to the present, that I knew His Majesty's
capacities tolerably well. I thought him to be an easily read man, with
both virtues and vices uppermost, wearing his heart on his sleeve, as
the saying is--indolent, witty, lacking all self-control--yet not, as I
might say, a deep man. I was to learn the truth, or rather begin to
learn it, on this very night.

* * * * *

When I entered his private closet he was sitting not where I had seen