“I am growing short-sighted, madame,” replied de Sartines, as she took his arm, “and had it not been for the keen sight of Monsieur de Rochefort, I might altogether have missed you.”
They passed away in the crowd that now thronged the room, leaving Rochefort and Mademoiselle Fontrailles together.
She was very beautiful. Graceful as the fleur d’amour of her native land, dark, yet without a trace of the creole, and with eyes that had been compared to black pansies. Those same eyes when seen by daylight discovered themselves not as pansies, but as two wells of the deepest blue.
The Flower of Martinique looked at Rochefort, and Rochefort looked at the Flower of Martinique.
“Monsieur,” said the Flower, “I have met many surprising things in Paris; but nothing has surprised me more than your impertinence.”
“Not my impertinence, dear Mademoiselle Fontrailles,” replied Rochefort, “but my philosophy. Have you not noticed that when two people get to know each other they generally bore each other? Now in Paris society two people cannot possibly know each other without being introduced; and, since we have never been introduced, it follows logically that we can never bore each other.”
“I am not so sure of that,” replied the lady, looking at her companion critically. “Many people to whom I have never been introduced bore me by the expression of their faces and the tone of their voices. I was noticing that fact even whilst I was watching you talking to Monsieur de Sartines a moment ago.”
“Ah,” said Rochefort, “you noticed that about him! It is true he is a bit heavy.”
She laughed. In her Paris experience she had met no one like Rochefort. Impudence she had met, and daring, laughter, raillery, good looks and ugliness. Yet she had never met them all combined, as in the case of Rochefort. For it seemed to her that he was now almost ugly, now almost good-looking, and she set herself for a moment to try and read this man whose face had so many expressions, and whose mind had, seemingly, so many facets.
She was a keen reader of character, yet Rochefort baffled her. The salient points were easy enough to discern. Courage, daring and sharp intelligence were there; but the retreating angles, what did they contain? She could not tell, but she determined, whatever his character might be, it would be improved by a check.