M. de Connal’s manner was infinitely more agreeable toward Ormond now than in former days.
There was perhaps still at the bottom of his mind the same fund of self-conceit, but he did not take the same arrogant tone. It was the tone not of a superior to an inferior, but of a friend, in a new society, and a country to which he is a stranger. There was as little of the protector in his manner as possible, considering his natural presumption and acquired habits: considering that he had made his own way in Paris, and that he thought that to be the first man in a certain circle there, was to be nearly the first man in the universe. The next morning, the little Abbé called to pay his compliments, and to offer his services.
M. de Connal being obliged to go to Versailles, in his absence the Abbé would be very happy, he said, to attend Mr. Ormond, and to show him Paris: he believed, he humbly said, that he had the means of showing him every thing that was worth his attention.
Away they drove.
“Gare! gare!” cried the coachman, chasing away the droves of walkers before him. There being no footpaths in the streets of Paris, they were continually driven up close to the walls.
Ormond at first shrunk at the sight of their peril and narrow escapes.
“Monsieur apparemment is nervous after his voyage?” said the Abbé.
“No, but I am afraid the people will be run over. I will make the coachman drive more quietly.”
“Du tout!—not at all,” said the little Abbé, who was of a noble family, and had all the airs of it. “Leave him to settle it with the people—they are used to it. And, after all, what have they to think of, but to take care of themselves—la canaille?”
“La canaille,” synonymous with the swinish multitude, an expression of contempt for which the Parisian nobility have since paid terribly dear.