At the sound of the voice, for she had not seen him coming, Marie Antoinette started and rejoined with studied rudeness:
"I should have been astonished if that speech had come from any but your lordship, for it contains a foreboding."
Andrea saw her husband blanch, but he bowed without retort. He noticed her surprise that he bore it so patiently, for he quickly said:
"I am most unhappy that I can no longer speak to the Queen without offense."
"The 'No longer' was spoken with a fine actor's due stress on the important words in a line.
"Speech is only bad when the intention is so," snapped the Queen, through her teeth, locked with anger.
"The ear hears hostilely when the mind is hostile," was the repartie of Charny, more aptly than politely.
"I shall wait to reply till the Count of Charny is happier in his attacks," went on the Queen.
"And I shall wait to attack till the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty is more happy in servitors than lately."
Andrea grasped her husband's hand hastily and prepared to go out of the gallery with him, when a glance from her mistress retained her.
"In short, what does _your husband_ have to say to me?" she inquired.
"Sent to Paris yesterday by the King, I found it in great turmoil."
"Yes, the Parisians are going to pull down the Bastile! The Dutch have taken Holland! Anything fresher, my lord?"
"It is true that they are pulling down the prison, but that affords them nothing but stones and they want for bread."
"Let them be hungry," said the Queen. "What are we to do in the matter since others rule the roost?"
"There was a day when the Queen was the first to be compassionate in times of general distress," said the count; "when she went up into the garrets and the prayers of those she helped rose from the garrets unto God."
"Yes, and I have been nicely repaid for this pity for others," returned the lady bitterly. "One of my worst miseries came from my going into a garret."
She alluded, of course, to the incident of the "Queen's Necklace," already described in this series.
"Because your Majesty was once deceived, is all humanity to be measured by that bushel? Oh, how our gracious lady was loved at that period!"
"To be brief," she said, "what is happening in the capital? Only tell me what you have actually seen, for I want to depend on the accuracy of your words."