“By Jove, I’d better go!  By Jove, I had!”

A wishing-cap, or rather a hoping-cap—­for if a man who is no philosopher may have an opinion, we do not always wish and hope for the same thing—­could have done no more for me than the chance of Fate; for at the moment the duke’s voice called “Sampson!” loudly from the house.  I ran in obedience to his summons.  He stood in the porch with the little stranger by him; and the stranger wore a deferential, but extremely well-satisfied smile.

“Here, you,” said the duke to me, “you can make yourself scarce as soon as you like.  I’ve got a better servant, aye, and a sober one.  There’s ten francs for you.  Now be off!”

I felt it incumbent on me to appear a little aggrieved: 

“Am I to go to-night?” I asked.  “Where can I get to to-night, my lord?”

“What’s that to me?  I dare say if you stand old Jean a franc, he’ll give you a lift to the nearest inn.  Tell him he may take a farm-horse.”

Really the duke was treating me with quite as much civility as I have seen many of my friends extend to their servants.  I had nothing to complain of.  I bowed, and was about to turn away, when the duchess appeared in the porch.

“What is it, Armand?” she asked.  “You are sending Sampson away after all?”

“I could not deny your request,” said he in mockery.  “Moreover, I have found a better servant.”

The stranger almost swept the ground in obeisance before the lady of the house.

“You are very changeable,” said the duchess.

I saw vexation in her face.

“My dearest, your sex cannot have a monopoly of change.  I change a bad servant—­as you yourself think him—­for a good one.  Is that remarkable?”

The duchess said not another word, but turned into the house and disappeared.  The duke followed her.  The stranger, with a bow to me, followed him.  I was left alone.

“Certainly I am not wanted,” said I to myself; and, having arrived at this conclusion, I sought out old Jean.  The old fellow was only too ready to drive me to Avranches or anywhere else for five francs, and was soon busy putting his horse in the shafts.  I sought out Suzanne, got her to smuggle my luggage downstairs, gave her a parting present, took off my livery and put on the groom’s old suit, and was ready to leave the house of M. de Saint-Maclou.

At nine o’clock my short servitude ended.  As soon as a bend in the road hid us from the house I opened my portmanteau, got out my own clothes, and, sub æthere, changed my raiment, putting on a quiet suit of blue, and presenting George Sampson’s rather obtrusive garments (which I took the liberty of regarding as a perquisite) to Jean, who received them gladly.  I felt at once a different being—­so true it is that the tailor makes the man.

“You are well out of that,” grunted old Jean.  “If he’d discovered you, he’d have had you out and shot you!”