And so back to my room I went, my task accomplished, and so pleased was I with what had passed that as I drew on my boots--preparing to set out to Canaples--I laughed softly to myself.
St. Auban I would dispose of in the morning. As for the other members of the cabal, I deemed neither Vilmorin nor Malpertuis sufficiently formidable to inspire uneasiness. St. Auban gone, they too would vanish. There remained then Eugène de Canaples. Him, however, methought no great evil was to be feared from. In Paris he might be as loud-voiced as he pleased, but in his father's château--from what I had learned--'t was unlikely he would so much as show himself. Moreover, he was wounded, and before he had sufficiently recovered to offer interference it was more than probable that Andrea would have married one or the other of Mesdemoiselles de Canaples--though I had a shrewd suspicion that it would be the wrong one, and there again I feared trouble.
As I stood up, booted and ready to descend, there came a gentle tap at my door, and, in answer to my "Enter," there stood before me a very dainty and foppish figure. I stared hard at the effeminate face and the long fair locks of my visitor, thinking that I had become the dupe of my eyes.
"M. de Vilmorin!" I murmured in astonishment, as he came forward, having closed the door. "You here?"
In answer, he bowed and greeted me with cold ceremoniousness.
"I have been in Blois since yesterday, Monsieur."
"In truth I might have guessed it, Vicomte. Your visit flatters me, for, of course, I take it, you are come to pay me your respects," I said ironically. "A glass of wine, Vicomte?"
"A thousand thanks, Monsieur--no," he answered coldly in his mincing tones. "It is concerning your affair with M. le Marquis de St. Auban that I am come." And drawing forth a dainty kerchief, which filled the room with the scent of ambregris, he tapped his lips with it affectedly.
"Do you come as friend or--in some other capacity?"
"I come as mediator."
"Mediator!" I echoed, and my brow grew dark. "Sdeath! Has St. Auban's courage lasted just so long as the sting of my whip?"
He raised his eyebrows after a supercilious fashion that made me thirst to strike the chair from under him.
"You misapprehend me; M. de St. Auban has no desire to avert the duel. On the contrary, he will not rest until the affront you have put upon him be washed out--"
"It will be, I'll answer for it."
"Your answer, sir, is characteristic of a fanfarron. He who promises most does not always fulfil most."