"Yes, Master," said I; but I could only think of the one that came into my Byronic little head on the occasion of my first meeting with Joanna, "Bien heureux qui rien n'y a," which in the present circumstances was clearly not applicable. The romantic lover does not base his conduct on the formula that blessed is he who has nothing to do with women.
"What is it, Master?" I asked.
"'En ceste foy je veuil vivre et mourir.'"
I did not understand. "In which faith do you wish to live and die?" I asked.
He made a gesture of disappointment. He too was a child in many respects.
"You must go back to Paris to sharpen your wits, my son. I thought I had trained you to catch allusion, one of the most delicate and satisfying arts of life. Did I not preface my remarks by saying that Madame de Verneuil was infallible? By which I mean that she is the mouthpiece of all the sweeter kinds of angels. That is the faith, my little Asticot," and he repeated to himself the rascal poet's refrain to his most perfect poem: "En ceste foy je veuil vivre et mourir."
"But that," said I, wishing to prove that I had not forgotten my scholarship, "is a prayer to Our Lady made by Villon at the request of his mother."
"You are as hopeless as mine host of the Black Boar," said my master, and being wound up to talk—it was during the after-dinner interval before joining the ladies—he launched into a half hour's disquisition on the philosophic value of allusiveness, addressing me as if I had been his audience at the Lotus Club or a choice band of disciples at the Café Delphine.
In the drawing-room I played my piquet with Mrs. Rushworth, while Paragot sat with Joanna in a far corner. I could not help noticing how little they spoke. Paragot's torrent of words had dried up, and the talk seemed to flow in unsatisfying driblets. Why did he not entertain her with his newly adopted romantical motto from Villon? Why did he not express, in terms of which he was such a master, his fantastic adoration? Why even did he not continue his disquisition on the philosophic value of allusiveness? Anything, thought I, as I declared a quinzième and fourteen kings, rather than this staccato exchange of commonplaces which I was sure neither Joanna nor himself in the least enjoyed. In fact, my dear Joanna yawned.
Presently Major Walters was announced. He had come, he explained apologetically, on trustee business and required Joanna's signature to an important document. She flew to him with a pretty air of delight, drew him by the arm to an escritoire in a corner of the room, and laughed girlishly as she inked her fingers and confessed her powerlessness to comprehend the deed she was signing. Paragot, after a very cold exchange of greetings with Major Walters, sat down by our card-table, and watched the game with the funereal expression he always wore when he desired to exhibit his entire correctness of demeanour. To Mrs. Rushworth's placid remarks during the deals he made the politest of monosyllabic replies. Meanwhile his dingy white tie, which he never could arrange properly (he dressed for dinner each night without a murmur) had worked up beyond his collar, and encircling his lean neck like a pussy-cat's ribbon, gave him a peculiarly unheroic appearance.