XI.—JONQUIL.
Blassemare, meanwhile, made his toilet elaborately, and by ten o'clock was in Paris. He stopped at the Hotel Secqville.
"Is the marquis yet risen?" he asked.
"No;" he was in his bed; he had not retired until very late, and must not be disturbed.
"But I must see him, my good friend; his happiness, indeed his safety, depends upon my seeing him immediately."
Blassemare was so very urgent, that at length the servant consented to deliver a note to his master.
Rubbing his eyes, and more asleep than awake, the marquis took the billet, and read—
"The Sieur de Blassemare, who had the honor of meeting the Marquis de Secqville last night at the Chateau des Anges, implores a few minutes conversation without one moment's delay; by granting which the marquis may possibly avert consequences the most deplorable."
Certain shocks are strong enough to restore a drunken man to sobriety in an instant, and, a fortiori, to dispel in a moment the fumes of sleep. In a few seconds the marquis, in slippers, and morning-gown, received Blassemare, with many apologies, in his dressing-room.
"A very slight acquaintance will justify a friendly interposition," said Blassemare, after a few little speeches of ceremony at each side; "and my visit is inspired by a friendly and charitable motive. The fact is—the fact is—my dear friend, that—your coat is torn."