"And now, Chatellerault having failed in his purpose, the King
chooses a more dangerous person for the gratifying of his desires.
He sends the Marquis, Marcel de Bardelys to Lavedan on the same
business. No doubt he attributes Chatellerault's failure to
clumsiness, and he has decided this time to choose a man famed for
courtly address and gifted with such arts of dalliance that he
cannot fail but enmesh my daughter in them. It is a great compliment
that he pays us in sending hither the handsomest and most
accomplished gentleman of all his Court - so fame has it - yet it is
a compliment of whose flattery I am not sensible. Bardelys goes
hence as empty-handed as went Chatellerault. Let him but show his
face, and my daughter journeys to Auch again. Am I not well advised,
Monsieur de Lesperon?"

"Why, yes," I answered slowly, after the manner of one who
deliberates, "if you are persuaded that your conclusions touching
Bardelys are correct."

"I am more than persuaded. What other business could bring him to
Lavedan?"

It was a question that I did not attempt to answer. Haply he did
not expect me to answer it. He left me free to ponder another
issue of this same business of which my mind was become very full.
Chatellerault had not dealt fairly with me. Often, since I had
left Paris, had I marvelled that he came to be so rash as to risk
his fortune upon a matter that turned upon a woman's whim. That I
possessed undeniable advantages of person, of birth, and of wealth,
Chatellerault could not have disregarded. Yet these, and the
possibility that they might suffice to engage this lady's affections,