“Well, Chicot, I take you now under my protection, and I wish that you should be resuscitated and appear openly.”

“What folly!”

“I will protect you, on my royal word.”

“Bah!  I have better than that.”

“What?”

“My hole, where I remain.”

“I forbid it,” cried the king, jumping out of bed.

“Henri, you will catch cold; go back to bed, I pray.”

“You are right, but you exasperated me.  How, when I have enough guards, Swiss, Scotch, and French, for my own defense, should I not have enough for yours?”

“Let us see:  you have the Swiss—­”

“Yes, commanded by Tocquenot.”

“Good! then you have the Scotch—­”

“Commanded by Larchant.”

“Very well! and you have the French guards—­”

“Commanded by Crillon.  And then—­but I do not know if I ought to tell you—­”

“I did not ask you.”

“A novelty, Chicot!”

“A novelty?”

“Yes; imagine forty-five brave gentlemen.”

“Forty-five?  What do you mean?”

“Forty-five gentlemen.”

“Where did you find them?  Not in Paris, I suppose?”

“No, but they arrived here yesterday.”

“Oh!” cried Chicot, with a sudden illumination, “I know these gentlemen.”

“Really!”

“Forty-five beggars, who only want the wallet; figures to make one die with laughter.”

“Chicot, there are splendid men among them.”

“Gascons, like your colonel-general of infantry.”

“And like you, Chicot.  However, I have forty-five formidable swords at command.”

“Commanded by the 46th, whom they call D’Epernon.”

“Not exactly.”

“By whom, then?”

“De Loignac.”

“And it is with them you think to defend yourself?”

“Yes, mordieu! yes.”

“Well, I have more troops than you.”

“You have troops?”

“Why not?”

“What are they?”

“You shall hear.  First, all the army that mm. de Guise are raising in Lorraine.”

“Are you mad?”

“No; a real army—­at least six thousand men.”

“But how can you, who fear M. de Mayenne so much, be defended by the soldiers of M. de Guise?”

“Because I am dead.”

“Again this joke!”

“No; I have changed my name and position.”

“What are you, then?”

“I am Robert Briquet, merchant and leaguer.”

“You a leaguer?”

“A devoted one, so that I keep away from M. de Mayenne.  I have, then, for me, first, the army of Lorraine—­six thousand men; remember that number.”

“I listen.”

“Then, at least one hundred thousand Parisians.”

“Famous soldiers!”

“Sufficiently so to annoy you much:  6,000 and 100,000 are 106,000; then there is the pope, the Spaniards, M. de Bourbon, the Flemings, Henry of Navarre, the Duc d’Anjou—­”