Chaudoreille walked among the groups formed around these games and looked with a hungry eye at the pastry exposed before the booths. He stopped near the eating places trying to breathe at least the odor of the cooking, but such delights have no power to fill an empty stomach.
"By jingo!" said Chaudoreille all of a sudden, pulling his hat down over his eyes and pulling his ruff up about his neck. "It shall not be said that I did not dine. A man of genius always has resources, and his wit should furnish him that which his purse refuses."
Immediately the chevalier, walking with a determined step, threaded the crowd and turned towards the neighborhood where some young provincials were playing skittles and drinking white wine. Chaudoreille looked at them out of the corner of his eye then, seizing his moment, he crossed the place where they were playing, in such a manner as to receive a blow upon the legs from a ball which one of the players was rolling.
"Look out! look out!" cried the young man who had hurled the ball; but Chaudoreille pretended not to hear and stopped only when he was struck. He made a horrible grimace on receiving the blow, and fell, murmuring,—
"Zounds! my dinner will cost me dearly."
The two players came up to him and picked him up, offering their excuses although they were not in the wrong. But Chaudoreille was so pale and appeared to suffer so deeply and made such pitiful contortions that the two young men were much moved; first they offered him a glass of wine to restore him. The wounded man accepted and drank three glasses, one after the other; he could not yet walk and they proposed to him to go into the wine merchant's, who would give him something to eat. He did not allow them to repeat the invitation; the two provincials ordered dinner and invited Chaudoreille to be of their party. Our man was therefore installed at a table with them, ate and drank for four, gave them some lessons in skittles, and perceiving that they were novices of an obliging humor, and not quarrelsome, he rose at the conclusion of the dessert and demanded a pistole from them to indemnify him for the stroke of the ball which they had given him.
The young men looked at him in surprise, perceiving that they had been duped and that they had entered into conversation with a gentleman of very little delicacy. Chaudoreille held himself very upright, his left hand on his hip and his right hand caressing the handle of his sword, rolling his eyes like the damned, while passing the end of his tongue over his mustaches. The poor provincials, not caring to have a duel with a man who appeared to have decided to split everyone in two if they did not satisfy him, hastened to present the sum demanded by their amiable guest. The latter received it with a gracious smile, then, with the tone of a man delighted with himself, he bowed to them, saying,—
"Good-by, my young friends, try to remember the strokes which I have taught you."
While saying these words the chevalier quickly departed, no longer remembering the blow which he had received. With a full stomach and a pistole in his belt, Chaudoreille was very well pleased with his day's work. The white wine which he had drunk had aroused his enterprise and inclined him to undertake some adventures. He felt especially carried towards love, but if it is the custom of Bacchus to render one enterprising, the odor of wine and the speech of a tipsy man are not auxiliaries favorable to love. It had been dark for some time when Chaudoreille left the fair, ogling all the women whom he met and murmuring between his teeth,—
"By jingo! I must make a conquest this evening. I am beginning to get tired of my portress, who is forty-five years old and has one leg shorter than the other; it is true that she overwhelms me with kindnesses. She bleaches my linen and repairs my ruff; but what does a little infidelity by the way matter, my Venus will know nothing about it."