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As the fighting ended and manoeuvring became the game, of course Mazarin came uppermost, Mazarin, that super-Italian, finessing and fascinating, so deadly sweet, l'homme plus agréable du monde, as Madame de Motteville and Bussy-Rabutin call him, flattering that he might win, avaricious that he might be magnificent, winning kings by jewelry and princesses by lapdogs, too cowardly for any avoidable collision, too cool and economical in his hatred to waste an antagonist by killing him, but always luring and cajoling him into an unwilling tool, too serenely careless of popular emotion even to hate the mob of Paris, any more than a surgeon hates his own lancet when it cuts him; he only changes his grasp and holds it more cautiously.
The correspondence shows that the vast Last Supper painted for the Refectory of the Escorial, and still to be found there, was finished in October 1564, and that there was much haggling and finessing on the part of the artist before it was despatched to Spain, the object being to secure payment of the arrears of pension still withheld by the Milanese officials.
'Then I see there are stratagems in law as well as war. Well, and how do you like their line of battle? 'Ingenious, said Mr. Pleydell, 'but I think desperate; they are finessing too much, a common fault on such occasions.
Tresler, watching him, could not quite make up his mind whether he was playing the winning hand, or whether his opponent was finessing for the odd trick. Jake suddenly became expansive. "I'd like to know how we're standin' before we go further," he said; "though, mind you, I ain't asking.
There was much negotiation, correspondence; Louis XIV. and the Kaiser stepping in again to produce settlement. To no purpose. Louis, gallant old Bankrupt, tried hard to take Charles's part with effect. But he had, himself, no money now; could only try finessing by ambassadors, try a little menacing by them; neither of which profited.
This took such a long time to say that the unflagging attention of the Assistant Commissioner seemed a wonderful feat of endurance. His retort came without delay. “No reason whatever that I know of. Come, Chief Inspector, this finessing with me is highly improper on your part—highly improper. And it’s also unfair, you know. You shouldn’t leave me to puzzle things out for myself like this.
'Then I see there are stratagems in law as well as war. Well, and how do you like their line of battle? 'Ingenious, said Mr. Pleydell, 'but I think desperate; they are finessing too much, a common fault on such occasions.
"'Then is the Count actually dying? I asked. "'That is possible, said Gobseck; 'the winding up of his estate will be a juicy bit of business for you. "I looked at my man, and said, by way of sounding him: "'Just explain to me how it is that we, the Count and I, are the only men in whom you take an interest? "'Because you are the only two who have trusted me without finessing, he said.
She laughed triumphantly. "Of course you think so! And that shows that you are only a man after all; in spite of your finessing. But I am going to have the credit of it. I knew that you were holding back because you were too proud, or thought you hadn't the right, or something. Weren't you?"
Both were adepts at it, and I could not help admiring the consummate nerve of men who, with such a secret at their hearts, could devote their minds to the manipulating of a long suit or the finessing of a queen. Money changed hands rapidly; but the run of luck seemed to be all against the taller of the two players. At last he threw down his cards on the table with an oath, and refused to go on.
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