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The marquis's widowed sister Chiara Gonzaga, Duchess of Montpensier, also kept up an active correspondence with the Moro at this time, and warned him repeatedly of the intrigues against him that were going on at the French court, and of the dangers he had to fear from Trivulzio and the Venetians.
It was the Marquis de Prie, with a Chevalier de St. Louis and two charming ladies, of whom one, as the Zeroli hastened to inform me, was the Marquis's mistress. Four places were laid, and while the newcomers were waiting to be served, they were told the story of my bet with the Englishman.
If all these obstacles had been overcome, and the prisoner had found egress to the park, she was met by four watchmen, whom neither promises nor bribery had power to conciliate. These were four bloodhounds who were loosed at night by the marquis's own hands, and on whose fidelity he knew that he might count.
The heads of her household, the major-domo, the confidential maid, the chef de cuisine, did venture to drop a hint or two as to the possibility of an accident or of foul play, and the desirability of consulting the police; but Madame would not hear a word of it; she became very angry at the suggestion, and declared that she was perfectly well aware of M. le Marquis's whereabouts, that he was well and would return home almost immediately.
Loath as he might be to give over, that sense of good manners which was supreme in every highlander of the old time, interdicted the fingering of a note after the marquis's gun had called aloud. When Malcolm meant to go fishing, he always loaded the swivel the night before, and about sunset the same evening he set out for that purpose.
As he had bethought himself, so he put his thought into execution; for, having sent forward all his power, he set out, attended only by some few gentlemen, and coming within a day's journey of the marquis's domains, despatched a vauntcourier to bid the lady expect him the following morning to dinner.
It had been lent to him by Dorothee, who had formerly picked it up in an obscure corner of the Marquis's library, and who, having opened it and perceived some of the marvels it related, had carefully preserved it for her own entertainment, its condition giving her some excuse for detaining it from its proper station.
"When the Marquis's letter arrived, all the little family in the Pastor Claude's house were full of grief. "'You must go, my dear child, said the Pastor; 'you must go, my beloved Henri, for the Marquis is your father, and you must obey him; but oh! my heart aches when I think of the hard trials and temptations to which you will be exposed in the wicked world.
With two impatient strides he overtook the man in the Marquis's straw hat, the man whom he had come to address as Ratcliffe. In a voice exaggeratively loud and cheerful, he broke the bottomless silence and made conversation. "May I ask," he said, "where on earth we are all going to?"
In the meanwhile, since I was here and since M. le Marquis was unconscious, I proceeded then and there to take the precaution which prudence had dictated, and without which, seeing this man's treachery and Theodore's villainy, I should undoubtedly have ended my days as a convict. What I did was to search M. le Marquis's pockets for anything that might subsequently prove useful to me.
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