At the first word our student uttered, Marmagne knew that it was the voice of one who wished him no ill, and at the name of Benvenuto he remembered and recognized the garrulous law student, who had on a previous occasion given him so much useful information concerning the interior of the Grand-Nesle. He at once halted, and waited for master Jacques Aubry to come up, for his society would be of advantage to him in two ways. In the first place, he would serve as a sort of body guard, and might in the mean while give him some fresh information concerning his enemy, which his hatred would enable him to turn to advantage. He therefore welcomed the student with his most agreeable manner.
"Good evening, my young friend," he said, in reply to the familiar harangue addressed to him by Jacques Aubry in the darkness. "What were you saying of our good Benvenuto, whom I hoped to meet at the Louvre, but who has remained at Fontainebleau, like the fox that he is!"
"Well, by my soul, here's luck!" cried Jacques Aubry. "What, is it you, my dear vicomte—de—You forgot to tell me your name, or I forgot to remember it. You come from the Louvre? Was it very lovely, very lively, with love-making galore? We are in good luck, my gentleman, aren't we? O you heart-breaker!"
"Faith!" said Marmagne with a simper, "you're a sorcerer, my dear fellow; yes, I come from the Louvre, where the king said some very gracious things to me, and where I should still he if a certain fascinating little countess had not signified to me that she preferred a solitude à deux to all that crush. But whence come you?"
"Whence come I?" rejoined Aubry, with a hearty laugh. "Faith! you remind me! Poor Benvenuto! On my word, he doesn't deserve it!"
"Pray what has happened to our dear friend?"
"In the first place, you must know that I come from the Grand-Nesle, where I have passed two hours clinging to the branch of a tree like any parrot."
"The devil! that was no very comfortable position!"
"Never mind, never mind! I don't regret the cramp I got there, for I saw things, my friend, I saw things—Why, simply in thinking of them I suffocate with laughter."
As he spoke Jacques Aubry did laugh, so joyously and frankly that, although Marmagne had as yet no idea what he was laughing at, he could not forbear joining in the chorus. But his ignorance of the cause of the student's amusement naturally made him the first to cease.