Page:Ten Years Later.djvu/42

32 "How So?"

"The twenty I have won."

"In what way?"

"By laying that you would have the letter from the Comte de Guiche in eight hours."

"Ah! that's fair;" and he gave him the twenty pistoles.

Manicamp began to take up his gold by handfuls, and pour it down in cascades upon his bed.

"This second place," murmured Malicorne, while drying his paper, "which, at the first glance, appears to cost me more than the first, but "

He stopped, took up the pen in his turn, and wrote to Montalais:

": Announce to your friend that her commission will not be long before it arrives; I am setting out to get it signed; that will be twenty-eight leagues I shall have gone for the love of you."

Then, with his demon's smile, taking up the interrupted sentence:

"This place," said he, "at the first glance, appears to cost more than the first; but the benefit will be, I hope, in proportion with the expense, and Mademoiselle de la Val- liere will bring me back more than Mademoiselle de Mon- talais, or else — or else my name is not Malicorne. Fare- well, Manicamp," and he left the room.

CHAPTER VI.

THE COURTYARD OF THE HOTEL GRAMMONT.

On Malicorne's arrival at Orleans he was informed that the Comte de Guiche had just set out for Paris. Malicorne rested himself for a couple of hours, and then prepared to continue his journey. He reached Paris during the night, and alighted at a small hotel, where, in his previous journeys to the capital, he had been accustomed to put up, and at eight o'clock the next morning he presented himself at the Hotel Grammont. Malicorne arrived just in time, for the Count de Guiche was on the point of taking leave of Monsieur before setting out for Havre, where the principal members of the French nobility had gone to await madame's arrival from England. Malicorne pronounced the name of