“From Paris, your grace.”
“Will you sell me your Joan of Arc?” was the furious demand. “I will cover it with pounds sterling twice over.”
“Le Comte de Barbebiche—”
“You have promised it to him?”
“Yes!” gasped Herr Wechsel, catching at the idea.
“Enough!” cried the English nobleman; and he strode into the street. With one impassioned glance at the figure of La Pucelle, he threw himself into his fiaker, and drove rapidly out of sight.
On reaching his hotel, he chose two pairs of boxing gloves, a set of rapiers, and a case of duelling pistols; and, thus loaded, descended to his fiaker, tossed them in, and started off in the direction of the nearest hotel. “Le Comte de Barbebiche”—that was the pass-word; but everywhere it failed to elicit the desired reply. He passed from street to street—from gasthaus to gasthaus—everywhere the same dreary negative; and the day waned, and his search was still unsuccessful. But he never relaxed; the morning found him still pursuing his inquiries; and midday saw him at the porte cochére of the Hotel of the Holy Ghost, in the Rothenthurm Strasse, with his case of duelling pistols in his hand, his set of rapiers under his arm, and his two pairs of boxing-gloves slung round his neck.
“Deliver my card immediately to the Comte,” said he to the
attendant; “and tell him I am waiting.” He had found him out. Luckily, the Comte de Barbebiche happened to be in the best possible humour when this message was conveyed to him, having just succeeded in dyeing his moustache to his entire satisfaction. He glanced at the card—smiled at himself complacently in the mirror before him, and answered in a gracious voice, “Let Milor Mountpleasant come up.”
Milor was soon heard upon the stairs; and, as he strode into the room, he flung his set of rapiers with a clatter on the floor, dashed his case of duelling pistols on the table, and with a dexterous twist sent one pair of boxing-gloves rolling at the feet of the Comte, while, pulling on the other, he stood in an attitude of defence before the astonished Frenchman.