_Giovellino took the hand that the marquis held out to him over the table, and kissed it with the eloquent warmth which took the place of speech with him._] Giovellino took the hand that the marquis held out to him over the table, and kissed it with the eloquent warmth which took the place of speech with him. At the same time, he made him understand, by pantomime and by his expression, that he was happy with him, that he did not regret glory and the tumult of the world, and that he was altogether disposed to be prudent, lest he should compromise his protector. "As to the young gentleman whom I brought home with me and have done my best to entertain," continued Bois-Doré, "you must know that I know nothing about him except that he is a friend of Messire Guillaume d'Ars, that he is threatened with some danger, and that he is to be concealed and defended at need. But do you not think it odd that this stranger did not once take me aside to confide his story to me, or that he did not do it when we were naturally left together on our return hither?" Lucilio, who always had a pencil and paper beside him on the table, wrote to Bois-Doré: "Spanish pride." "Yes," rejoined the marquis, reading, so to speak, before he had written, so accustomed had he become, in two years, to divine his words from the first letters; "'Castilian pride,' that is what I said to myself. I have known a goodly number of these hidalgos, and I know that they do not consider it discourteous to show lack of confidence. So I must needs exercise hospitality here in the old-fashioned way, respect my guest's secrets and treat him courteously, as an old friend whom one believes to be the most honorable man on earth. But that does not compel me to accord him the confidence that he denies me, and that is why, as you saw, I left you in a corner, like a poor, paid musician, when he was here. And hereupon, my dear friend, I ask you to forgive me, once for all, for any apparent lack of affection or courtesy to which I am forced by regard for your safety, just as I clothe you in these common, ill-fitting clothes." Poor Giovellino, who had never been so well dressed and so tenderly cared for in his whole life, interrupted the marquis by pressing his hands, and Bois-Doré was deeply moved to see tears of gratitude fall upon his friend's long, black moustache. "Nay," he said, "you overpay me by loving me so dearly! I must reward you now by speaking to you of the sweet Lauriane. But must I repeat what she said to me about you? You will not be too puffed-up by it? No?--Well then, here goes. In the first place: "'How is your druid?' "I replied that the said druid was hers much more than mine, and that she ought to remember that Climante, in _Astrée_, was only a false druid, as deep in love as every other lover in that beautiful story.