“You are not polite.”
“You are not opportune.”
He smiled dangerously.
“I learn, Monsieur, that you are a daily visitor at the Château de Canaples.”
“Well, sir, what of it?”
“This. I have been to Canaples this morning and, knowing that you will learn anon, from that old dotard, what passed between us, I prefer that you shall hear it first from me.”
I bowed to conceal a smile.
“Thanks to you, M. de Luynes, I was ordered from the house. I—César de St. Auban—have been ordered from the house of a provincial upstart! Thanks to the calumnies which you poured into his ears.”
“Calumnies! Was that the word?”
“I choose the word that suits me best,” he answered, and the rage that was in him at the affront he had suffered at the hands of the Chevalier de Canaples was fast rising to the surface. “I warned you at Choisy of what would befall. Your opposition and your alliance with M. de Mancini are futile. You think to have gained a victory by winning over to your side an old fool who will sacrifice his honour to see his daughter a duchess, but I tell you, sir—”