“He had one day been speaking with Madame Champion upon the subject, and in his perplexity was enumerating the relations whose affection could be likely thus to render them vigilant and clear-sighted; she had called over successively every degree of relationship—aunt, uncle, cousin, brother. But to every new suggestion, M. de Talleyrand discovered some well-founded objection, until, at last, Madame Champion cried, laughingly, ‘Well, it is evident, then, you have, as in the good old fairy tales, some wise and powerful _Marraine_.’ M. de Talleyrand shook his head. ‘Alas, Madame, neither _Marraine_ nor _Filleul_,’ returned he, quoting from Beaumarchais’s ‘Figaro,’ and the subject dropped. “It was soon after this that the unknown friend advised his return to Paris, and, as he had hitherto found benefit in following the counsels thus conveyed, he hesitated not in this instance. Upon his arrival in the capital, he found everything in the state in which he had been led to expect it, and his greeting was such as to make him rejoice that he had not lingered in the execution of the step suggested by his well-wisher. After this, he was indefatigable in his researches. He kept the adventure no secret, but told it in every circle he frequented; hoping thereby to obtain some clue to the discovery of his benefactor. He felt sure that the letters were written by a female, not from the handwriting, nor from any peculiar refinement of style, but from the singular mixture of boldness and timidity which was evident in every line. The deep interest expressed for his safety, and yet the kind of awkward fear lest this interest should be exaggerated in the mind of the reader; in short, whether it was that the conviction of M. de Talleyrand led him to believe that such disinterested sentiment could emanate from none but a woman, I know not, but it is certain that never did his suspicion light on an individual of the other sex, while, from the very moment of his return to Paris, did he begin to look around among the women of his acquaintance, and to fix suspicion upon each, until further research displayed the futility of his surmises. “He had already been for some time at Paris without being able to obtain a clue whereby to form any probable conjectures upon the subject, when, one evening, being by chance at a _soirée_ given by Barras, his attention was attracted to a young lady whom he had at first observed with that languid indifference with which one is too apt to survey a stranger, where there is nothing in particular to arrest the attention. M. de Talleyrand had been standing, half hid by a curtain, in a recess of one of the windows, talking to Count Réal, and the lady had left her seat at the further end of the room, to take one close beside him. He had paid but slight attention to this circumstance, and after the departure of Réal, went to join the group of talkers assembled in the doorway.