“What proposal?” asked Corentin, entering the kitchen.
“What proposal?” asked Mademoiselle de Verneuil, returning to it.
“What proposal?” asked a fourth individual on the lower step of the staircase, who now sprang lightly into the kitchen.
“Why, the breakfast with your persons of distinction,” replied Francine, impatiently.
“Distinction!” said the ringing and ironical voice of the person who had just come down the stairway. “My good fellow, that strikes me as a very poor inn joke; but if it’s the company of this young female citizen that you want to give us, we should be fools to refuse it. In my mother’s absence, I accept,” he added, striking the astonished innkeeper on the shoulder.
The charming heedlessness of youth disguised the haughty insolence of the words, which drew the attention of every one present to the new-comer. The landlord at once assumed the countenance of Pilate washing his hands of the blood of that just man; he slid back two steps to reach his wife’s ear, and whispered, “You are witness, if any harm comes of it, that it is not my fault. But, anyhow,” he added, in a voice that was lower still, “go and tell Monsieur Marche-a-Terre what has happened.”
The traveller, who was a young man of medium height, wore a dark blue coat and high black gaiters coming above the knee and over the breeches, which were also of blue cloth. This simple uniform, without epaulets, was that of the pupils of the Ecole Polytechnique. Beneath this plain attire Mademoiselle de Verneuil could distinguish at a glance the elegant shape and nameless something that tells of natural nobility. The face of the young man, which was rather ordinary at first sight, soon attracted the eye by the conformation of certain features which revealed a soul capable of great things. A bronzed skin, curly fair hair, sparkling blue eyes, a delicate nose, motions full of ease, all disclosed a life guided by noble sentiments and trained to the habit of command. But the most characteristic signs of his nature were in the chin, which was dented like that of Bonaparte, and in the lower lip, which joined the upper one with a graceful curve, like that of an acanthus leaf on the capital of a Corinthian column. Nature had given to these two features of his face an irresistible charm.
“This young man has singular distinction if he is really a republican,” thought Mademoiselle de Verneuil.
To see all this at a glance, to brighten at the thought of pleasing, to bend her head softly and smile coquettishly and cast a soft look able to revive a heart that was dead to love, to veil her long black eyes with lids whose curving lashes made shadows on her cheeks, to choose the melodious tones of her voice and give a penetrating charm to the formal words, “Monsieur, we are very much obliged to you,”—all this charming by-play took less time than it has taken to describe it. After this, Mademoiselle de Verneuil, addressing the landlord, asked to be shown to a room, saw the staircase, and disappeared with Francine, leaving the stranger to discover whether her reply was intended as an acceptance or a refusal.
“Who is that woman?” asked the Polytechnique student, in an airy manner, of the landlord, who still stood motionless and bewildered.