“‘M. de Saint-Fare treated him politely, pleaded indisposition, and made great protestations.
“‘On Coiron presenting himself a second time, he was received very coldly, and simply told that nothing had been yet done.
“‘Moved by his own zeal and without my authority, he made a third attempt. Then the abbé told him plainly that he might discontinue his visits; that the lady knew nothing at all, and that he himself did not want to have anything to do with this fuss.
“‘Still, the first impression his visit made on me could not be effaced. I procured a ticket, and went with my friends to the Palais Royal. What was my surprise on seeing in some of the portraits their extreme resemblance either to me or to my children. My astonishment increased when my young Edward, catching sight of a picture I had not yet noticed, exclaimed: “Dieu! Maman, how much that face is like old Chiappini’s and his son’s!”
“‘We discovered that it was actually the portrait of the present Duke.…
“‘Thinking seriously over this, I realized that I owed to him in fact the important service of being the first to tear the impenetrable veil by deputing that Abbé de Saint-Fare, who, I was told, was not only his great friend, but his natural uncle, to see me.
“‘It will be believed that, from that moment, all my researches went in the direction so clearly pointed out.…’
“The proofs Lady Newborough goes on heaping up in her startling Memoirs ought to be quoted as a whole,” ended my guide, as he tied up the heap of papers. “But that will need another sitting, longer than the first. Here is the sun beginning to set, and the custodian of the Archives of the Vatican inviting us to go. Will this historical puzzle awake your curiosity? In that case you will have to endeavour to reconcile these undeniable yet contradictory documents, since they repose in the shadow of these protecting walls, where you may read on the face of the Archivio which Leo XIII set open for the truth of History, the proud device that bold and beneficent Pontiff had cut upon it when he invited the whole civilized world to enter its doors.
“‘The first law of History is not to dare to lie; the second, not to fear to tell the truth; further, the historian must not lay himself open to a suspicion of either flattery or animosity.’