Thérèse’s pretty maid came to tell me that my carriage was at the door.
“Will you allow me,” said I to her, “to have my footman in?”
“Rascal,” said I, as soon as he came in, “who told you to come here with my carriage?”
“Nobody, sir, but I know my duty.”
“Who told you that I was here?”
“I guessed as much.”
“Go and fetch Le Duc, and come back with him.”
When they arrived I told Le Duc to pay the impertinent fellow three days’ wages, to strip him of his livery, and to ask Dr. Vannini to get me a servant of the same build, not gifted with the faculty of divination, but who knew how to obey his master’s orders. The rascal was much perturbed at the result of his officiousness, and asked Thérèse to plead for him; but, like a sensible woman, she told him that his master was the best judge of the value of his services.
At ten o’clock all the actors and actresses arrived, bringing with them a mob of amateurs who crowded the hall. Thérèse received their greetings graciously, and I could see she enjoyed a great reputation. The rehearsal lasted three hours, and wearied me extremely. To relieve my boredom I talked to Palesi, whom I liked for not asking me any particulars of my acquaintance with his wife. I saw that he knew how to behave in the position in which he was placed.
A girl from Parma, named Redegonde, who played a man’s part and sang very well, stayed to dinner. Thérèse had also asked a young Bolognese, named Corticelli. I was struck with the budding charms of this pretty dancer, but as I was just then full of Thérèse, I did not pay much attention to her. Soon after we sat down I saw a plump abbé coming in with measured steps. He looked to me a regular Tartuffe, after nothing but Thérèse. He came up to her as soon as he saw her, and going on one knee in the Portuguese fashion, kissed her hand tenderly and respectfully. Thérèse received him with smiling courtesy and put him at her right hand; I was at their left. His voice, manner, and all about him told me that I had known him, and in fact I soon recognized him as the Abbé Gama, whom I had left at Rome seventeen years before with Cardinal Acquaviva; but I pretended not to recognize him, and indeed he had aged greatly. This gallant priest had eyes for no one but Thérèse, and he was too busy with saying a thousand soft nothings to her to take notice of anybody else in the company. I hoped that in his turn he would either not recognize me or pretend not to do so, so I was continuing my trifling talk with the Corticelli, when Thérèse told me that the abbé wanted to know whether I did not recollect him. I looked at his face attentively, and with the air of a man who is trying to recollect something, and then I rose and asked if he were not the Abbé Gama, with whose acquaintance I was honoured.