“For gossip?”
“For port wine, madame.”
La chevalière broke out into a sudden violent laugh. For the first time her voice seemed to contradict her sex.
“Oh, mon Dieu! c’est une fine mouche!” she cried. “She think to make catspaw of our tipsy monseigneur! I undurestand. Mon Dieu, it is excellent! This contained, this inscrutable, this Machiavel, that but wash his head in the bottle as it were to cool it, to yield his confidence to a paillard, a toss-the-pot, an old, old p’tit-maître that have nevaire earn in his life one title to respect! Say no more. It is a penetration the most admirable that you reveal. Oh, mon Dieu! avec tant de finesse on nous crédit!”
Ned waited till her merriment had jangled itself into silence.
“Not to constitute my lord a spy,” said he quietly, “but to equip him with one.”
“Comment?” said madame. “I do not undurestand.”
“I don’t say you do. It is a hypothetical case I put. I assume, for instance, that the chevalier is perfectly aware of my lord’s propensities, and is even willing to act the part of his conciliatrice.”
Madame jumped to her feet, breathing heavily.
“Why did I not keel you!” she muttered. Her eyes were awake with fury. Little coal-black imps seemed to battle in them as in pools of gall. Ned sat up on his bed.