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Rh 320 LOUISE DE LA VALLIERE. night; it could not be doubted any longer La Valliere had been informed of his intended return, and that was the reason for her delight at having to remain behind at the Palais Koyal. It was a plan settled and arranged before- hand. "I will not be their dupe, though," said madame, and she took a decisive step. "Mademoiselle de Montalais," she said, "will you have the goodness to inform your friend. Mademoiselle de la Valliere, that I am exceedingly sorry to disarrange her projects of solitude, but that instead of be- coming ennuyee by remaining behind alone, as she wished, she will be good enough to accompany us to St. Germain and get ennuyee there?" "Ah, poor La Valliere," said Montalais compassionately, but with her heart throbbing with delight. "Oh, madame, could there not be some meaus " "Enough," said madame; "I desire it. I prefer Made- moiselle la Baume le Blanc's society to that of any one else. Go, and send her to me, and take care of your foot." Montalais did not wait for the order to be repeated; she returned to her room, wrote an answer to Malicorne, and slipped it under the carpet. The answer simply said: "She is going." A Spartan could not have written more laconically. "By this means," thought madame, "I will look nar- rowly after all on the road; she shall sleep near me during the night, and his majesty must be very clever if he can exchange a single word with Mademoiselle de la Valliere." La Valliere received the order to set ofE with the same indillerent gentleness with which she had received the order to remain. But inwardly her delight was extreme, and she looked upon this change in the princess' resolution as a consolation which Providence had sent her. With less penetration than madame possessed, she attributed all to chance. While every one, with the exception of those in disgrace, of those who were ill, and those who were suffer- ing from sprains, were proceeding toward St. Germain, Malicorne smuggled his workman into the palace in one of M. de St. Aignan's carriages, and led him into the room corresponding to La Valliere's room. The man set to work tempted by the splendid reward which had been promised him. As the very best tools and implements had been selected from the reserve stock belonging to the engineers