“To-morrow it will be serious, my lord.”
CHAPTER XVI.
THE ENDLESS LAW SUIT.
IT is not hard to guess what the dainty duke suffered in passing through the dirty and nauseating Paris of his era to reach the foul hole among ill-kempt houses which was called a street.
Before Flageot’s door the way for the ducal coach was stopped by another vehicle. He perceived a female’s headdress coming out of it, and as his seventy-five years had not rebuffed him in his reputation as a lover of the ladies, he hastened to wade through the mud to offer his arm to the lady who was stepping out unassisted.
He was not in luck: for the foot was the bony one of an old dame. Wrinkled face, the tan showing under a thick layer of rouge, proved that she was not merely old but decrepit.
But the marshal could not draw back: besides he was no chicken himself. The client—she must have been a client to be at this door—did not hesitate like he did: she put her paw with a horrible grin in the duke’s hand.
“I have seen this Gorgon’s head somewhere before,” he thought.
“Going to call on Flageot?” he inquired.
“Yes, your grace.”
“Oh, have I the honor of being known to you?” he exclaimed, disagreeably surprised as he stopped at the opening of the park passage.