The Conscience of Malpertuis

And so back to my room I went, my task accomplished, and so pleased was I with what had passed that as I drew on my boots--preparing to set out to Canaples--I laughed softly to myself.

St. Auban I would dispose of in the morning. As for the other members of the cabal, I deemed neither Vilmorin nor Malpertuis sufficiently formidable to inspire uneasiness. St. Auban gone, they too would vanish. There remained then Eugène de Canaples. Him, however, methought no great evil was to be feared from. In Paris he might be as loud-voiced as he pleased, but in his father's château--from what I had learned--'t was unlikely he would so much as show himself. Moreover, he was wounded, and before he had sufficiently recovered to offer interference it was more than probable that Andrea would have married one or the other of Mesdemoiselles de Canaples--though I had a shrewd suspicion that it would be the wrong one, and there again I feared trouble.

As I stood up, booted and ready to descend, there came a gentle tap at my door, and, in answer to my "Enter," there stood before me a very dainty and foppish figure. I stared hard at the effeminate face and the long fair locks of my visitor, thinking that I had become the dupe of my eyes.

"M. de Vilmorin!" I murmured in astonishment, as he came forward, having closed the door. "You here?"