have them to a _petit souper_, and come back and tell me their
entire history. I have, this moment, seen one of them who knows nothing,
and has communicated it. The other, whose name I forget, is the unknown
nobleman's valet, and knows everything. Him you must pump. It is, of
course, the venerable peer, and not the young lady who accompanies him,
that interests me--you understand? Begone! fly! and return with all the
details I sigh for, and every circumstance that can possibly interest
me."

It was a commission which admirably suited the tastes and spirits of my
worthy St. Clair, to whom, you will have observed, I had accustomed
myself to talk with the peculiar familiarity which the old French comedy
establishes between master and valet.

I am sure he laughed at me in secret; but nothing could be more polite
and deferential.

With several wise looks, nods and shrugs, he withdrew; and looking down
from my window, I saw him with incredible quickness enter the yard,
where I soon lost sight of him among the carriages.




Chapter III

DEATH AND LOVE TOGETHER MATED


When the day drags, when a man is solitary, and in a fever of impatience