Page:Braddon--The Trail of the Serpent.djvu/104

100 The lounger seems to have as little to do this morning as he had last night; for he leans against the gateway, his cane in his hand, and a half-smoked cigar in his mouth, looking up at the house of the marquis with lazy indifference.

The porter, conciliated by the five-franc piece, is inclined to gossip.

"A fine old building," says the lounger, still looking up at the house, every window of which is shrouded by ponderous Venetian shutters.

"Yes, a fine old building. It has been in the family of the marquis for two hundred years, but was sadly mutilated in the first revolution; monsieur may see the work of the cannon amongst the stone decorations."

"And that pavillion to the left, with the painted windows and Gothic decorations—a most extraordinary little edifice," says the lounger.

Yes, monsieur has observed it? It is a great deal more modern than the house; was built so lately as the reign of Louis the Fifteenth, by a dissipated old marquis who gave supper-parties at which the guests used to pour champagne out of the windows, and pelt the servants in the courtyard with the empty bottles. It is certainly a curious little place; but would monsieur believe something more curious?

Monsieur declares that he is quite willing to believe anything the porter may be good enough to tell him. He says this with a well-bred indifference, as he lights a fresh cigar, which is quite aristocratic, and which might stamp him a scion of the noble house of De Cevennes itself.

"Then," replies the porter, "monsieur must know that Mademoiselle Valerie, the proud, the high-born, the beautiful, has lately taken it into her aristocratic head to occupy that pavilion, attended only by her maid Finette, in preference to her magnificent apartments, which monsieur may see yonder on the first floor of the mansion—a range of ten windows. Does not monsieur think this very extraordinary?"

Scarcely. Young ladies have strange whims. Monsieur never allows himself to be surprised by a woman's conduct, or he might pass his life in a state of continual astonishment.

The porter perfectly agrees with monsieur. The porter is a married man, "and, monsieur?" the porter ventures to ask with a shrug of interrogation.

Monseiur says he is not married yet.

Something in monsieur's manner emboldens the porter to say

"But monsieur is perhaps contemplating a marriage?"

Monsieur takes his cigar from his mouth, raises his blue eyes to the level of the range of ten windows, indicated just now by