"I heard Mar's name; yet you are not M. de Mar, I think."
He spoke with a languid but none the less teasing derision. In truth, I must have resembled a little brown hare suddenly turned out of a bag in the midst of that gorgeous company.
"No," I stammered; "I am his servant. I seek Mlle. de Montluc."
"I have wondered what has become of Étienne de Mar this last month," spoke a second young gentleman, advancing from his place behind a fair one's chair. He was neither so pretty nor so fine as the other, but in his short, stocky figure and square face there was a force which his comrade lacked. He regarded me with a far keener glance as he asked:
"Peste! he must be in low water if this is the best he can do for a lackey."
"Perhaps the fellow's errand is to beg an advance from Mlle. de Montluc," suggested the pink youth.
"Who speaks my name?" a clear voice called; and a lady, laying down her hand at cards, rose and came toward me.
She was clad in amber satin. She was tall, and she carried herself with stately grace. Her black hair shadowed a cheek as purely white and pink as that of any yellow-locked Frisian girl, while her eyes, under their sooty lashes, shone blue as corn-flowers.
I began to understand M. Étienne.
"Who is it wants me?" she repeated, and catching sight of me stood regarding me in some surprise, not unfriendly, waiting for me to explain myself. But before I could find my tongue the man in pink answered her with his soft drawl: