"And what became of the good old syndic Tournon?" asked the first stranger.
"He is alive and well," answered Edward.
"Ah! but he would have been dead and buried," exclaimed Pierrot, who could refrain no longer, "if it had not been for you, sir."
"Indeed?" said the stranger. "Let me inquire how that happened."
"It matters not, sir," replied Edward, making a sign to Pierrot to hold his tongue. "What the man says may be partly true, partly mistaken; but, although I am willing to give any one interested general news, I must decline referring to matters entirely personal when conversing with strangers."
"Well, then, let us talk of other subjects," said the first stranger. "I cannot consent to part with a gentleman lately from my own land, so soon as that movement of your plate seems to imply. Supper I shall take none; for the news that has flowed in upon me for the last fortnight, has not tended to strengthen my appetite. Wine, however,—the resource of the sad and the sorry,—I must have. They tell me it is good here. Will you allow me to try some of that which stands at your right hand?"
Edward ordered Pierrot to bring some fresh glasses, and put the bottle over to his self-invited guest. The stranger drank some, and, saying, "It is very fair," immediately ordered more to be brought, while Pierrot, bending over Edward's chair as if to remove the dish before him, whispered in his ear, "It is the Prince de Soubise."
With all his habitual self-command, Edward could not refrain from a slight start. The color, too, mounted in his cheek with some feelings of anger; but he was glad of the warning, and did not suffer what was passing in his heart to appear. The conversation turned in a different course from that which it had before assumed, Soubise referring no more to the subject of Rochelle, though his companion, who seemed a friend of inferior rank, often turned toward that topic. Whenever he did so, the prince immediately asked some question as to Edward's knowledge of France and its inhabitants; and the young gentleman, to say the truth, took some pleasure, after the first effects of surprise were over, in puzzling him by his answers. He had passed over so much of France that his intimate acquaintance with the country excited Soubise's astonishment; and from localities his questions turned to persons. "As you have been in Lorraine," he said, "you have probably seen the beautiful and witty Duchesse de Chevreuse."
"I have the honor of knowing her well," replied Edward.
"Do you know the Duc de Montbazon?" asked the prince.