The letter of Quinson St. Ours (No. 8) read: "Sir and dear relative,—I should deem myself lacking in what I owe both to you and to myself were I to neglect to destroy the suspicion you have formed of my conduct in the affair of Monsieur, your son, against Lecour. I can give you my word of honour that I always refused to give my signature to his different petitions. My brother informs me that you say 'that several of your friends, and even of your relations at Montreal, certified that Monsieur Lecour was a gentleman.' I am not of their number, and I do not know that family."
The Marquis eagerly read the packet through, digested its contents, blessed his ally Panet for his professional methodicality, and placed the papers in order in the Record.
After the flight of more than a century, this Record, yellow and faded and a little worm-eaten, but complete even to its wax seals, its wire-headed pins, and the thin gilt edges of the correspondence paper, lies before the writer of these pages, a vivid fragment of the old régime, a witness to the hatred, the activity, the very thoughts, as it were, of the enemies of Lecour, and revealing his perils from their inner side.
[CHAPTER XXXIX]
THE MARQUIS'S VISITOR
On the very day after the Panet documents were added to the Record a visitor called upon the Marquis.
"The 25th of January," records the latter in his journal, "there entered my apartments, about half-past ten in the morning, a young man, wearing a sword and a hat with a white plume, his suit entirely of black knitcloth with trimmings to match, of middle height, firmly built and well-looking, skin fine with plenty of colour, eye nearly black, soft and somewhat large, surmounted by a black eyebrow."
"My name is Monsieur de la Louvière, Gendarme of the Guard," he said. "I come on the part of the Chevalier de Bailleul respecting the matter of Monsieur LeCour."
"Be seated, sir," replied the Marquis with interest, indicating a chair near his writing-desk, at which he himself sat down. "Is this Lecour known to yourself?"
"I am a friend of his," replied M. de la Louvière.