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Charles then approached Marguerite, looked at her for a moment in silence, and then in a tone of which his harsh voice might have been thought incapable, said:

"Margot, my sister!"

The queen started, and turned round.

"Your majesty!" she said.

"Come, come, sister dear, rouse yourself."

Marguerite raised her eyes to heaven.

"Yes," said Charles; "I know all-but listen to me."

The queen made a sign that she listened.

“You promised me to come to the ball," said Charles. "I?" exclaimed Marguerite.

"Yes: and, after your promise, you are expected; and therefore, if you do not come, everybody will be surprised at not seeing you."

"Excuse me, brother," replied Marguerite; "you see how ill I am."

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"Exert yourself."

Marguerite endeavoured for a moment to summon courage, and then suddenly giving way again, sank on her sofa. "No, no, I cannot go," she said.

Charles took her hand, seated himself beside her on the sofa, and said:

"You have just lost a dear friend, Margot, I know full well. But look at me have not I lost all my friends, and, moreover, my mother? You have time to bewail as you now do; but I, at the moment of my severest griefs, am always forced to smile

-you suffer, but look at me! I am dying. Well, then, Margot, rouse thee; courage, girl! I ask thee, sister, for our name's honour. 'Tis an agony that we bear for the sake of our house: let us bear it, then, let us bear it, my beloved sister, courageously and resignedly.

"Oh, mon Dieu, mon Dieu !" exclaimed Marguerite.

"Yes," said Charles, following up the train of his reflections "yes, the sacrifice is severe, my dear sister: but every one has his trials-some, of their honour; others, of their life. Do you suppose that, at twenty-five, and the most splendid throne in the world, I do not regret dying? Well, then, look at me! My eyes, my complexion, my lips are those of a dying man; yet my smile-would not my smile make all

the world believe that I still hope? Yet in a week, a fortnight, a month at most, you will weep for me, my sister dear, as you do for him who died to-day."

"Dearest brother!" cried Marguerite, throwing her arms round Charles's neck.

"Come, dress yourself, dear Marguerite," said the king; "hide your paleness, and appear at the ball. I have desired that they should bring you some new jewels and ornaments worthy of your beauty."

"Oh, what are jewels and ornaments to me now!" exclaimed Marguerite.

"Life is long, Marguerite!" said Charles, with a smile, "at least, for you."

"No! no!"

"Sister, recollect one thing: it is sometimes by stifling, or rather dissimulating our suffering, that we show most honour to the dead."

"Well, sire," said Marguerite, shuddering, "I will attend the ball."

A tear, rapidly dried upon his parched eyelid, moistened Charles's eye for a moment. He kissed his sister's brow, paused a moment before Henriette, who had not seen or heard him, and then retired, saying, as he did so

"Poor girl!"

"Get everything ready to dress me, Gillonne," said Marguerite.

The lady-in-waiting looked at her mistress in astonishment. "Yes," said Marguerite, in a tone whose bitterness is indescribable "yes, I shall dress: I am going to the ballthey expect me. Make haste, then, the day will then be complete: the fête at the Grève in the morning-the fête at the Louvre in the evening."

"And the duchess?" asked Gillonne.

"Ah, she-she is quite happy! She may remain here-she may weep-suffer at her ease. She is not a king's daughter, a king's wife, a king's sister: she is not a queen.-Help me to dress, Gillonne."

The young lady obeyed. The new ornaments sent by the king were splendid, and the dresses gorgeous. Marguerite had never looked so magnificently beautiful.

She looked at herself in a glass, and said: "My brother is right—a human being is a miserable creature."

Gillonne entered at this moment.

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Madame," she said, "here is a man asking after you." "Who is he?""

"I do not know, but he is very horrid-looking; his very appearance made me tremble."

"Go and ask his name," said Marguerite, turning very pale.

Gillonne went out, and returning after a few minutes, said: "He would not tell his name, madame, but begged me to give you this."

And Gillonne handed to Marguerite the reliquary which she had given to la Mole the night previous.

"Oh, bring him hither-bring him hither!" said the queen, eagerly, and becoming even more pale and her features more rigid.

A heavy step was heard upon the floor, and then a man appeared on the threshold.

"You are?" said the queen.

"He whom you saw one day near Montfaucon, madame, and who conveyed in his tumbril two wounded gentlemen to the Louvre."

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Yes, yes, I recognise you-you are maître Caboche." "Executioner of the provostry of Paris, madame."

These were the only words which Henriette had heard of all those that had been spoken around her for the last hour. She then raised her pale face from her two hands, and looked at the headsman with her piercing eyes, which seemed to dart flames.

"And you come--?" said Marguerite, tremulously.

"To remind you of the promise made to the youngest of the two gentlemen, him who charged me to return this reliquary to you. Do you recollect, madame?"

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Yes, yes!" cried the queen, "and never shall more noble shade have nobler satisfaction-but where is it?"

"It is at my abode, with the body."

"Why did you not bring it?"

"I might have been stopped at the wicket of the Louvre, and compelled to open my cloak; what would have been said, if a head had been discovered underneath?"

"True, true; keep it at your house, and I will come for it to-morrow."

"To-morrow, madame-to-morrow?" said maître Caboche, "it may be too late!"

And wherefore?"

"Because the queen-mother desired me to keep for her magic experiments the heads of the first two criminals I should execute."

“Oh, profanation! the heads of our beloved!-Henriette," exclaimed Marguerite, running towards her friend, whom she found standing up as if a spring had placed her on her feet"Henriette, my darling friend, do you hear what this man says?"

"Yes, and what are we to do?" "We must accompany him;" velvet cloak over her shoulders. 66 we shall see them once more."

and Marguerite threw a Come, come," she said,

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Marguerite took Henriette by the arm, and, going down the secret staircase, made a sign to Caboche to follow. At the door was her litter, and at the wicket they found Caboche's servant with a lantern.

Marguerite's bearers were trustworthy men, deaf and dumb, and worthier of confidence than beasts of burthen.

They entered the litter, and were conveyed onwards, until, suddenly stopping, the headsman opened the door.

Marguerite alighted, and aided the duchess de Nevers.

In their excessive grief, which thus tried them both, it was the nervous temperament that now gained the ascendant over the more powerfully organized frame.

"You may enter, ladies," said Caboche; "everybody is asleep in the tower."

At the same moment the light in the two windows was extinguished, and the two ladies, clinging to each other, passed under the gothic door, and went along in darkness over a rugged and slippery pavement.

Caboche, with a torch in his hand, led them into a chamber, low, and blackened with smoke.

In a conspicuous place was nailed to the wall a parchment sealed with the king's seal: it was the headsman's brevet. In a corner was a large sword, with a long handle: it was the flaming sword of justice.

Here and there were seen several large images, representing saints under different kinds of martyrdom.

Having arrived here, Caboche made a low bow.

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"Your majesty will pardon me," he said, "if I have dared to penetrate to the Louvre and conduct you hither; but it was the last and earnest wish of the gentleman; so"You have done well, maître," said Marguerite, this will recompense your zealous service.”

"and

Caboche eyed sorrowfully the purse well filled with gold, which Marguerite placed on the table.

"Gold! gold! always gold!" he muttered. "Alas, madame, why cannot I redeem at the price of gold the blood I have been compelled to shed to-day!"

"Maître," replied Marguerite, with painful hesitation, "I do not see-—”

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Caboche took the flambeau, opened an outer door, which, opening on to the staircase, led by a few steps into a cellar. At the same moment a current of air passed, which drove several sparks out of the torch, and brought up with it the nauseous smell of damp and blood.

Henriette, white as a marble statue, leaned on the arm of her friend, who moved with a more assured step; but at the first stair she staggered.

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"I shall never be able-" she exclaimed.

"When one loves well, Henriette," replied the queen, we love even beyond death itself."

It was a horrid and touching sight to see those two women, resplendent in youth, beauty, and attire, bending under this sordid and chalky vault, the weaker leaning on the stronger, and the stronger clinging to the headsman's arm.

They reached the lowest step.

On the floor of this cellar lay two human forms, covered with a large cloth of black serge.

Caboche raised a corner of this mort-cloth, and lowering his torch, said

"Look, your majesty!"

In their black attire, the two young men lay side by side, in the fearful symmetry of death. Their heads placed close on their bodies, seemed only divided from them by a red circle round the neck. Death had not separated their hands, for either by accident, or the pious attention of the heads

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