“I should have taken you to your mother and not thrown you into the Rhone.”
“Well, instead of accompanying me dead, take me living. You will be all the better received.”
“Oh!”
“We will remain a fortnight at Bourg. It is my natal city, and one of the dullest towns in France; but as your compatriots are pre-eminent for originality, perhaps you will find amusement where others are bored. Are we agreed?”
“I should like nothing better,” exclaimed the Englishman; “but it seems to me that it is hardly proper on my part.”
“Oh! we are not in England, my lord, where etiquette holds absolute sway. We have no longer king nor queen. We didn’t cut off that poor creature’s head whom they called Marie Antoinette to install Her Majesty, Etiquette, in her stead.”
“I should like to go,” said Sir John.
“You’ll see, my mother is an excellent woman, and very distinguished besides. My sister was sixteen when I left; she must be eighteen now. She was pretty, and she ought to be beautiful. Then there is my brother Edouard, a delightful youngster of twelve, who will let off fireworks between your legs and chatter a gibberish of English with you. At the end of the fortnight we will go to Paris together.”
“I have just come from Paris,” said the Englishman.
“But listen. You were willing to go to Egypt to see General Bonaparte. Paris is not so far from here as Cairo. I’ll present you, and, introduced by me, you may rest assured that you will be well received. You were speaking of Shakespeare just now—”