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In a moment Chauvelin was on his feet and with eyes dilated, lips parted in awed bewilderment, he was gazing towards the open window, where astride upon the sill, one leg inside the room, the other out, and with the moon shining full on his suit of delicate-coloured cloth, his wide caped coat and elegant chapeau-bras, sat the imperturbably Sir Percy.
The long, many-pillared room, with its mirrors and chandeliers, was crowded with full- blooded, loud-voiced men-about-town, all in the same dark evening dress with white silk stockings, cambric shirt-fronts, and little, flat chapeau-bras under their arms. "The acid-faced old gentleman with the thin legs is the Marquis of Queensberry," said my uncle.
He stood in the rear of the chair, a little on one side, covered with a splendid diplomatic dress, decorated with orders, and carrying under his arm an immense chapeau-bras, edged with white ostrich-feathers. He was a man totally different in his air and manner from all around him, and the very antipode especially of the man on whom all eyes but his seemed fixed as by a spell.
On the levee road, bridles and saddles, whips, gigs, and carriages, what a merry coming and going! We look, perforce, toward the old bench where, six months ago, sat Joseph Frowenfeld. There is somebody there a small, thin, weary-looking man, who leans his bared head slightly back against the tree, his thin fingers knit together in his lap, and his chapeau-bras pressed under his arm.
When Pere Lenegre opened the narrow door, the entire framework of it was filled by the broad, magnificent figure of a man in heavy caped coat and high leather boots, with dainty frills of lace at throat and wrist, and elegant chapeau-bras held in the hand. Pere Lenegre at sight of him, put a quick finger to his own quivering lips. "Anything wrong, vieux papa?" asked the newcomer lightly.
But Sir Percy had evidently not heard the question, for he seemed quite absorbed in the task of removing a speck of dust from his immaculate chapeau-bras. "These hats are all the rage in England just now," he said airily, "but they have had their day, do you not think so, Monsieur? When I return to town, I shall have to devote my whole mind to the invention of a new headgear..."
The Prince of Wales, dressed in a magnificent court suit of salmon-coloured velvet richly embroidered with gold, entered with Marguerite Blakeney on his arm; and on his left Sir Percy, in gorgeous shimmering cream satin, cut in the extravagant "Incroyable" style, his fair hair free from powder, priceless lace at his neck and wrists, and the flat CHAPEAU-BRAS under his arm.
My once dear lord, my kind friend, when your two years' reign was over, did not you jump for joy and fling your chapeau-bras out of window: and hasn't that hat cost you a pretty bit of money? There, in a splendid travelling chariot, in the sweetest bonnet, all trimmed with orange-blossoms and Chantilly lace, sits my Lady Rosa, with old Lord Snowden by her side.
Fernando was in the uniform of a captain of infantry of 1812, the handsomest uniform ever adopted by the American army. His dark blue coat, buttoned to his chin, his sash, his belt and gilt sword, his chapeau-bras with flowing plume, set off his manly form. Fernando, as he ascended the path to the house, did not dream that he was heroic or fine-looking.
She wrapped her cloak round her and without looking at her husband: "I am ready to go," she said, taking his arm. At the door of the box she turned and looked straight at Chauvelin, who, with his CHAPEAU-BRAS under his arm, and a curious smile round his thin lips, was preparing to follow the strangely ill-assorted couple.
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