"Solicits, madame?" said the minister with an eagerness which seemed already to answer her prayer affirmatively.
"I hope your Excellency will consent to honor with your presence a reunion of friends at my house—a reunion somewhat trivial, for this occasion, but clever enough."
"A reunion?" replied Vaudrey, still smiling.
"Monsieur de Lissac has not told you then, what my hopes are?"
"We are too old friends, Lissac and I, for him not to allow me the pleasure of hearing from your own lips, madame, in what way I may be of service to you, or to any of your friends."
Sabine smiled at this well-turned phrase uttered in the most gallant tone.
Who then, could have told her that Vaudrey was a provincial? An intimate enemy or an intimate friend. But he was not at all provincial. On the contrary, Vaudrey was quite charming.
"Monsieur de Rosas has had the kindness, your Excellency, to promise to come to my house next Saturday and give a chatty account of his travels. He will be, I am quite sure, most proud to know that in his audience—"
Sulpice neatly and half modestly turned aside the compliment that was approaching.
He knew Monsieur de Rosas. He had read and greatly admired some translations of the Persian poets by that lettered nobleman, which had been printed for circulation only amongst the author's most intimate friends. Vaudrey had first met Monsieur de Rosas at a meeting of a scientific society. Rosas was an eminent man as well as a poet, and one whom he would be greatly pleased to meet again. A hero of romance as erudite as a Benedictine. Charming, too, and clever! Something like a Cid who has become a boulevard lounger on returning from Central Asia.