when I am dealing with my patient, I do not so much as say ' Sir ' to him. So now, Sir, give the nag a rest, and quick about it. Now the thing is settled, we have still an hour and a half left for sleep, Sire; so let us get to sleep."
So saying the Surgeon buried himself again under his blanket, and five minutes afterwards was snoring in so plebeian a fashion, that the rafters of the Blue Room positively quivered with indignation.
CHAPTER V
THE KING RISES
THE King thus left to himself, made no attempt to interrupt the self-willed doctor, whose snores went on, as regular as clockwork, for the full time he had mentioned. Half-past six struck. As the valet de chambre was about to enter, Lamartinière got up and slipped away into a neighbouring closet, while they removed his bed. Then he wrote a paper of directions for the assistant doctors, and took his departure.
The King ordered his personal attendants to come in first, and then to admit those privileged to enjoy the grande entreé. He bowed without speaking and then stretched out his legs for the valets to put on his stockings, fasten his garters and throw his dressing-gown about his shoulders. This done, he knelt down at his prie-Dicu, sighing audibly several times in the midst of the general silence. Every one had followed the King's example, and all were engaged in prayer,—though it must be admitted with an attention that was apt to wander. The King meantime kept turning round from time to time to gaze at the balustrade behind which usually gathered the most favoured and most cherished of his courtiers.
"What is the King looking for? " the Duo de Richelieu and the Duc d'Ayen asked each other in a whisper.
"He is not looking for us anyway; he could find us readily enough" said the Duc d'Ayen; "but stay, the King is getting up!"
In fact Louis XV. had finished his prayers, or rather had been so much preoccupied in mind that he had said none.
"I do not see my Master of the Wardrobe," said the King, looking about him.
"Monsieur de Chauvelin? " asked the Due de Richelieu.
"The same."
"But, Sire, he is here."
"Where, pray?"
"Yonder! " declared the Duke, turning round. Then suddenly he ejaculated an " Ah " of great surprise.
"What now? " demanded the King.
"Monsieur de Chauvelin is still at his prayers!"
It was true; the Marquis de Chauvelin, that amiable Pagan, that gay companion of the Monarch's little impieties, that witty enemy of the gods in general and of God in particular, had remained on his knees, not only against his habit, but also against etiquette, now that the King had finished his prayers.
"Well, well, Marquis," the King asked him with a laugh, "are you asleep?"
The Marquis rose slowly from his knees, made the sign of the cross and bowed to the King with deep respect.
Everybody was accustomed to laugh whenever Monsieur de Chauvelin was in a laughing mood; they thought now he was making fun and laughed as usual, the King amongst the number.
But almost immediately recovering his seriousness,
"Come, come. Marquis," said Louis XV., "you know I do not like jesting with sacred subjects. However, as you wish, I presume, to divert me, I must forgive you for the wish's sake; only I give you fair warning you have your work before you," he added with a sigh; " for indeed I am as dismal as a death's head."
"You dismal, Sire?" exclaimed the Duc d'Ayen, "and pray, what can it be saddens your Majesty?"
"My health, Duke! my health which is failing! I have Lamartinière to sleep in my chamber to give me confidence; but the maniac makes it his business to frighten me instead. Happily you seem in a laughing mood here,—eh, Chauvelin?'
But the King's challenge fell flat. The Marquis de Chauvelin himself, whose keen, mocking face was generally so ready to reflect the King's merry mood, the Marquis, so finished a courtier that
