“God judge them—I think they have.”
He interested Luc intensely, by reason of his great beauty, his tragic melancholy, and something indefinable in his manner that Luc could not place. He was obviously a noble—possibly a great noble—but his air was the air of some class Luc had never met. He was as much puzzled by it as if he had suddenly found himself talking to some shopkeeper of the Rue St. Honoré in disguise as a gentleman, or some foreigner passing as a Frenchman; yet he could not have named what this man did or said that was out of the ordinary.
“Monsieur,” he said, “you seem to me very melancholy, and yet, methinks, you appear one of fortune’s favourites.”
“In what way?” was the almost wondering answer.
Luc was near moved to laughter again, then to a great pity.
“You have youth and health, I know, Monsieur, and, I think, money and leisure—probably a great name and power. Am I right?”
“I have all those,” answered the other wearily. “But what have those things to do with content?”
“There are men,” smiled Luc, “who have neither money nor health nor power, only great ambitions—unsatisfied.”
“Ambitions!” The blue eyes widened.
“If you have power you can gratify your ambitions, doubtless, Monsieur,” remarked the Marquis dryly; “but you seem to me one who hath known nothing but ease.”