"Where do you live, sir, and what is your name?" asked the cobbler, with glowing curiosity.
"I live in the stable of the Count d'Artois, and my name is Jean Paul Marat."
"In the stable!" cried the cobbler. "My faith, I had not supposed you were a hostler or a coachman. It must be a funny sight, M.
Marat, to see you mounted upon a horse."
"You think that such a big toad as I does not belong there exactly.
Well, there you are right, brother Simon. My real business is not at all with the horses, but with the men in the stable. I am the horse-doctor, brother Simon, horse-doctor of the Count d'Artois; and I can assure you that I am a tolerably skilful doctor, for I have yoked together many a hostler and jockey whom the stable-keepers of the dear Artois have favored with a liberal dispensation of their lash.
So, come this evening to me, not only that I may introduce you to good society, but come if you are sick. I will restore you, and it shall cost you nothing. I cure my brothers of the people without any pay, for it is not the right thing for brothers to take money one of another. So, brother Simon, I shall look for you this evening at the stable; but now I must leave you, for my sick folks are expecting me. Just one more word. If you come about seven o'clock to visit me, the old witch that keeps the door will certainly tell you that I am not at home. I will, therefore, give you the pass-word, which will allow you to go in. It is 'Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.' Good-by."
He nodded to the cobbler with a fearful grimace, and strode away quickly, in spite of not being able to lift his left foot over the broad square of the Hotel de Ville.
Master Simon looked after him at first with a derisive smile, and this diminutive figure, with his great head, on which a high, black felt hat just kept its position, seemed to amuse him excessively.
All at once a thought struck him, and, like an arrow impelled from the bow, he dashed forward and ran after Jean Paul Marat.
"Doctor Marat, Doctor Marat!" he shouted, breathless, from a distance.
Marat stood still and looked around with a malicious glance.
"Well, what is it?" snarled he, "and who is calling my name so loud?"
"It is I, brother Marat," answered the cobbler, panting. "I have been running after you because you have forgotten something."
"What is it?" asked Marat, feeling in his pockets with his long fingers." I have my handkerchief and the piece of black bread that makes my breakfast. I have not forgotten anything."
"Yes, Jean Paul Marat, you have forgotten something," answered Master Simon. "You were going to tell me the names of the three chief paramours of the queen, and you have given only two--the Duke de Coigny and Lord Adhemar. You see I have a good memory, and retain all that you told me. So give me the name of the third one, for I will confess to you that I should like to have something to say about this matter in my club this afternoon, and it will make quite a sensation to come primed with this story about the Austrian woman."
"Well, I like that, I like that," said Marat, laughing so as to show his mouth from one ear to the other. "Now, that is a fine thing to have a club, where you can tell all these little stories about the queen and the court, and it will be a real pleasure to me to tell you any such matters as these to communicate to your club, for it is always a good thing to have any thing that takes place at Versailles and St. Cloud get talked over here at Paris among the dear good people."
"In St. Cloud?" asked the cobbler. "What is it that can happen there? That is nothing at all but a tiresome, old-forgotten pleasure palace of the king."
"It is lively enough there now, depend upon it," replied Marat, with his sardonic laugh. "King Louis the well beloved has given this palace to his wife, in order that she may establish there a larger harem than Trianon; that miserable, worthless little mouse-nest, where virtue, honor, and worth get hectored to death, is not large enough for her. Yes, yes, that fine, great palace of the French kings, the noble St. Cloud, is now the heritage and possession of this fine Austrian. And do you know what she has done? Close by the railing which separates the park from St. Cloud, and near the entrance, she has had a tablet put up, on which are written the conditions on which the public are allowed to enter the park."
"Well, that is nothing new," said the cobbler, impatiently." They have such a board put up at all the royal gardens, and everywhere the public is ordered, in the name of the king, not to do any injury, and not to wander from the regular paths."
"Well, that is just; it is ordered in the name of the king; but in St. Cloud, it runs in the name of the queen. Yes, yes, there you may see in great letters upon the board; 'In the name of the queen.'