‘Where to?’ asked the driver.
‘The city.’
‘What part?’
‘Never mind; near the Bank.’
Alighting from the cab, Tancred hurried to Sequin Court and sent in his card to Sidonia, who in a few moments received him. As he entered the great financier’s room, there came out of it the man called in Brook Street the Baron.
‘Well, how did your dinner go off?’ said Sidonia, looking with some surprise at the disturbed countenance of Tancred.
‘It seems very ridiculous, very impertinent I fear you will think it,’ said Tancred, in a hesitating confused manner, ‘but that person, that person who has just left the room; I have a particular reason, I have the greatest desire, to know who that person is.’
‘That is a French capitalist,’ replied Sidonia, with a slight smile, ‘an eminent French capitalist, the Baron Villebecque de Château Neuf. He wants me to support him in a great railroad enterprise in his country: a new line to Strasbourg, and looks to a great traffic, I suppose, in pasties. But this cannot much interest you. What do you want really to know about him? I can tell you everything. I have been acquainted with him for years. He was the intendant of Lord Monmouth, who left him thirty thousand pounds, and he set up upon this at Paris as a millionaire. He is in the way of becoming one, has bought lands, is a deputy and a baron. He is rather a favourite of mine,’ added Sidonia, ‘and I have been able, perhaps, to assist him, for I knew him long before Lord Monmouth did, in a very different position from that which he now fills, though not one for which I have less respect. He was a fine comic actor in the courtly parts, and the most celebrated manager in Europe; always a fearful speculator, but he is an honest fellow, and has a good heart.’
‘He is a great friend of Lady Bertie and Bellair,’ said Tancred, rather hesitatingly.
‘Naturally,’ said Sidonia.