'We need no introduction, cousin,' she said, giving a hand to be
saluted. 'I knew you instantly. It is the old face of Chateau
Leurre, only gone up so high and become so handsome.'
'Cousins,' thought he. 'Well, it makes things easier! but what
audacity to be so much at her ease, when Lucy would have sunk into
the earth with shame.' His bow had saved him the necessity of
answering in words, and the lady continued:
'And Madame votre mere. Is she well? She was very good to me.'
Berenger did not think that kindness to Eustacie had been her chief
perfection, but he answered that she was well and sent her
commendations, which the young lady acknowledged by a magnificent
curtsey.
'And as beautiful as ever?' she asked.
'Quite as beautiful,' he said, 'only somewhat more embonpoint.'
'Ah!' she said, smiling graciously, and raising her splendid eyes
to his face, 'I understand better what that famous beauty was now,
and the fairness that caused her to be called the Swan.'
It was so personal that the colour rushed again into his cheek. No
one had ever so presumed to admire him; and with a degree gratified
and surprised, and sensible more and more of the extreme beauty of
the lady, there was a sort of alarm about him as if this were the
very fascination he had been warned against, and as if she were
casting a net about him, which, wife as she was, it would be
impossible to him to break.
'Nay, Monsieur,' she laughed, 'is a word from one so near too much
for your modesty? Is it possible that no one has yet told you of
your good mien? Or do they not appreciate Greek noses and blue
eyes in the land of fat Englishmen? How have you ever lived en
province? Our princes are ready to hang themselves at the
thought of being in such banishment, even at court--indeed,
Monsieur has contrived to transfer the noose to M. d'Alengon. Have
you been at court, cousin?'
'I have been presented to the Queen.'
She then proceeded to ask questions about the chief personages with
a rapid intelligence that surprised him as well as alarmed him, for
he felt more and more in the power of a very clever as well as
beautiful woman, and the attraction she exercised made him long the
more to escape; but she smiled and signed away several cavaliers
who would have gained her attention. She spoke of Queen Mary of
Scotland, then in the fifth years of her captivity, and asked if he
did not feel bound to her service by having been once her partner.
Did not he remember that dance?