"What is thy name, faire maid? quoth he.
Penelophon, O king, quoth she."

Count Kora\'s rout did little to restore Mlle de Tricotrin\'s peace of mind. To be sure Kophetua was there. He was fond of society, and went freely amongst his rout-giving subjects. Kophetua talked with Mlle de Tricotrin, but somehow he did not seem so animated as usual. It is true they spoke in the same familiar tone as before, but for the first time the spice of growing intimacy was wanting.

It is the most intoxicating flavour that conversation can have, and nothing is more banal than the sense of staleness when it ceases. To-night was one of these occasions for these two. Their words seemed dead, and every effort which Mlle de Tricotrin made to restore their life was unavailing. In vain did she pose in her privileged r?le as his gentle philosopher. In vain did she tempt him to further confessions, and raise the deep questions which before had always made him speak so low and earnestly.

[Pg 160]

A damp and chilly pall seemed to overhang them, and she felt the familiar path which was once so gay and sweet with flowers was now worn bare, and had no longer any power to charm. All her noble sentiments and pretty fancies, for which he had been so greedy, were now like empty husks she was offering him. The grain was gone.

She knew that the King felt it too, and was not amused or even interested. She knew he was loyally making efforts not to fall back from the point they had reached together, but soon he changed the conversation to the lightest banter. He even began to pay her compliments. Then the bitter truth against which she was struggling seemed to gain a sudden strength. It framed itself in words upon her lips, and she said to herself, "He is getting tired of me."

Her sad conviction was only strengthened when at last, as with a forlorn hope of keeping up the tone of their talk to the pitch of confidential friendliness which it had previously attained, Kophetua broached a subject which was peculiar to themselves. Their secret, as he fondly thought it, was his last resource to recall the delight which he had been accustomed to find in her society. For in spite of all his certainty that she was playing a deep game with him, and using against his heart a whole battery of carefully prepared weapons, yet he was obliged to confess[Pg 161] that her society had been irresistibly delightful, and he was resolved not to let the sweet cup pass away from him without at least another draught.

"How is our Penelophon, mademoiselle?" he asked.

"In the best of health, sire," she answered, perhaps a little coldly.

"I can never thank you enough," he went on, "for being so kind to her."

"I do nothing for her, sire," she replied, with that little laugh that means everything but enjoyment. "At least, nothing that a mistress will not do for a faithful maid, and one whom she has so much reason to make a favourite."

"Oh, but you do," he answered; "I have seen, for instance, how you try to please the poor child with those gowns in which she looks so pretty."

"Had I known your majesty observed her so closely," she said, "I should hardly have dared to show my interest in her so plainly; but I ought to have guessed that you would feel a more than passing interest in a girl whom you had rescued so romantically."

"Then she has told you the whole story?" asked the King, with a shade of annoyance in his voice.

"Yes."

"Then you can understand the interest I must feel in her future."

"Perfectly," answered Mlle de Tricotrin.[Pg 162] "It must have such a charming flavour of the old ballad for you."

"I am not very fond of ballads," said the King, a little distantly.

"I am sorry, sire," she answered simply, "because they have for me such a delicious savour of nature. I was going to ask you to tell me the name of the beggar in the story. I had a fancy for calling my maid by it."

"Do you not know?" asked the King, looking at her fixedly.

"No," she answered, meeting his look with perfect frankness, for she was speaking the truth; "I have never heard or seen the ballad."

"She was called Penelophon," said the King, with an embarrassed laugh.

Mlle de Tricotrin gave a genuine start of surprise. "Is your majesty serious?" she said.

"Perfectly."

"What a strange coincidence!"

Their conversation had been getting colder and colder. By some evil influence Kophetua seemed to be choosing the worst things he could say, and Mlle de Tricotrin replying with everything that was best calculated to annoy the King. It had reached at last to a painful iciness, and the embarrassment which now fell upon them both froze it altogether. They sat in silence, each knowing perfectly that the other was thinking something it[Pg 163] would be a wide breach of manners to say, and that is almost worse than saying it.

Yet they need not have been so embarrassed, for, as it happened, it was no coincidence at all. The old tradition still grew green within the Liberties of St. Lazarus, and there were few families in which one of the women was not named Penelophon. Still the beggars kept so much to themselves that this very natural custom was not generally known, and certainly it had never come to the ears of the King or Mlle de Tricotrin. Hence their embarrassment was as great as if it had been well-founded, and was most happily relieved by the Count desiring to know if his majesty would take a dish of tea.

It was perhaps more than a coincidence which later in the evening caused Kophetua to ask M. de Tricotrin what he thought of the new American Republic. His interview with Mlle de Tricotrin seemed to put matrimony further from him than ever, and his abdication was staring him in the face. He began to see it was unavoidable, and his innate moral courage and conscientiousness made him cast about for a light in which the inevitable should appear a duty that he chose for himself to perform. More than ever he began to wonder whether his position were not a crime, and whether plain morality did not bid him resign and form a republic. The Marquis, with his [Pg 164]revolutionary ideas, was naturally the man to help him along the road by which alone his moral escape could be made. He determined to lose no time in getting the help he expected, seeing that M. de Tricotrin, like all Frenchmen of fashion, was ready to express a passionate admiration of the American Constitution.

"As a republic," said the Marquis, in answer to the King, "if I may so far express myself in your majesty\'s presence,—as a republic, I look upon it as one of the sublimest emanations of the human brain."

"Pray do not apologise for your opinions," replied the King; "they are entirely in accord with my own. I myself regard a republic as an institution so divine that I am tempted to look upon a king as amongst the worst of criminals."

"There," said the Marquis, with deferential positiveness, "your majesty, and I differ entirely. I look upon a king as the greatest of human benefactors."

"But, my dear Marquis," said the King, "your two positions are flatly contradictory."

"With submission," answered the Marquis, "it seems to me that one is the corollary of the other. It is because I so admire a republic that I also venerate the institution of hereditary monarchy."

"I must positively congratulate you, Marquis," said the King, "on your inimitable genius for paradox. It is most wittily[Pg 165] conceived; but, seriously, I want your opinion."

"And seriously I give it you, sire," sai............