“He has but left me, Monseigneur.”
“Then you know, sir, of the harvest which he has already reaped from the indiscretion into which you led him last night?”
“If Monseigneur alludes to the affront put upon M. de Mancini touching his last night's indiscretion, by a bully of the Court, I am informed of it.”
“Pish, Monsieur! I do not follow your fine distinctions—possibly this is due to my imperfect knowledge of the language of France, possibly to your own imperfect acquaintance with the language of truth.”
“Monseigneur!”
“Faugh!” he cried, half scornfully, half peevishly. “I came not here to talk of you, but of my nephew. Why did he visit you?”
“To do me the honour of asking me to second him at St. Germain this evening.”
“And so you think that this duel is to be fought?—that my nephew is to be murdered?”
“We will endeavour to prevent his being—as your Eminence daintily puts it—murdered. But for the rest, the duel, methinks, cannot be avoided.”
“Cannot!” he blazed. “Do you say cannot, M. de Luynes? Mark me well, sir: I will use no dissimulation with you. My position in France is already a sufficiently difficult one. Already we are threatened with a second Fronde. It needs but such events as these to bring my family into prominence and make it the butt for the ridicule that malcontents but wait an opportunity to slur it with. This affair of Andrea's will lend itself to a score or so of lampoons and pasquinades, all of which will cast an injurious reflection upon my person and position. That, Monsieur, is, methinks, sufficient evil to suffer at your hands. The late Cardinal would have had you broken on the wheel for less. I have gone no farther than to dismiss you from my service—a clemency for which you should be grateful. But I shall not suffer that, in addition to the harm already done, Andrea shall be murdered by Canaples.”