One other was present at that meal, of whom I shall have more to say hereafter. This was a young man of good presence, save, perhaps, a too obtrusive foppishness, whom Monsieur de Lavedan presented to me as a distant kinsman of theirs, one Chevalier de Saint-Eustache. He was very tall--of fully my own height--and of an excellent shape, although extremely young. But his head if anything was too small for his body, and his good-natured mouth was of a weakness that was confirmed by the significance of his chin, whilst his eyes were too closely set to augur frankness.
He was a pleasant fellow, seemingly of that negative pleasantness that lies in inoffensiveness, but otherwise dull and of an untutored mind--rustic, as might be expected in one the greater part of whose life had been spent in his native province, and of a rusticity rendered all the more flagrant by the very efforts he exerted to dissemble it.
It was after madame had related that unsavoury anecdote touching the Cardinal that he turned to ask me whether I was well acquainted with the Court. I was near to committing the egregious blunder of laughing in his face, but, recollecting myself betimes, I answered vaguely that I had some knowledge of it, whereupon he all but caused me to bound from my chair by asking me had I ever met the Magnificent Bardelys.
"I--I am acquainted with him," I answered warily. "Why do you ask?"
"I was reminded of him by the fact that his servants have been here for two days. You were expecting the Marquis himself, were you not, Monsieur le Vicomte?"
Lavedan raised his head suddenly, after the manner of a man who has received an affront.
"I was not, Chevalier," he answered, with emphasis. "His intendant, an insolent knave of the name of Rodenard, informed me that this Bardelys projected visiting me. He has not come, and I devoutly hope that he may not come. Trouble enough had I to rid myself of his servants, and but for Monsieur de Lesperon's well-conceived suggestion they might still be here."
"You have never met him, monsieur?" inquired the Chevalier.
"Never," replied our host in such a way that any but a fool must have understood that he desired nothing less than such a meeting.
"A delightful fellow," murmured Saint-Eustache--"a brilliant, dazzling personality."
"You--you are acquainted with him?" I asked.
"Acquainted?" echoed that boastful liar. "We were as brothers."
"How you interest me! And why have you never told us?" quoth madame, her eyes turned enviously upon the young man--as enviously as were Lavedan's turned in disgust. "It is a thousand pities that Monsieur de Bardelys has altered his plans and is no longer coming to us. To meet such a man is to breathe again the air of the grand monde. You remember, Monsieur de Lesperon, that affair with the Duchess de Bourgogne?" And she smiled wickedly in my direction.