“By Jove, you are right, there is a resemblance,” he said.
“You know to whom, and how impossible it is to risk the rise of my house on some ugly trick of chance. Is it the thing that this little down-at-the-heel hussy Nicole should look like the highest head in France?”
“Pish!” exclaimed Nicole, tartly, as she disengaged herself to reply more easily to her master, “is it a fact that the hussy does so closely resemble the illustrious lady? Has she the low shoulder, quick eye, round leg and dimpled arm of the hussy? In any case, my lord, if you run me down, it is not because you can have any hope to catch me!” She finished in anger which made her red and consequently splendid in beauty.
The duke caught her again and said as he gave her a look full of caresses and promises:
“Baron, to my idea, Nicole has not her like at court. As for the touch of likeness, we will manage about that. Pretty Nicole has admirable light hair and nose and eyebrows quite imperial—but in a quarter of an hour before a toilet glass these blemishes will disappear, as the baron reckons them such. Nicole, my dear, do you want to go to the palace?”
“Oh, don’t I though!” cried the girl with all her greedy soul in the words.
“You shall go, my pet: and make a fortune there, without doing any harm to the advancement of others. Trot away, little one; the rest does not concern you. A word with you, my lord.”
“I venture to urge you to send some one to wait upon your daughter,” said the duke when alone with his friend, “because she must make a brave show and the King is not afraid of beauty-guards with knowing phizzes. Besides, I know how the wind blows.”
“Let Nicole go to the Trianon, since you think it will please the King,” replied Taverney with his pimp’s smile.
“Write to your daughter that a maid named Nicole is coming. Another than Nicole would not fill the place so well. On my honor, I believe so.”