Hector--thus reproved, coloured a yet more violent crimson to the very roots of his hair. He made a great effort to recover his pomposity and actually took up the correct attitude which a well-trained servant assumes when he shows a great lady out of a room. But even then--despite the well-merited reproof--he took it upon himself to insist: "M. le préfet is here, M. le Comte," he said, "and begs to be received at once." "Well, then, you may show him up when Mme. la Duchesse has retired," said the Comte with quiet dignity. "By your leave, my brother," quoth the Duchesse decisively, "I'll wait and hear what M. le préfet has to say. The news--if news there be--is too interesting to be kept waiting for me." And accustomed as she was to get her own way in everything, Mme. la Duchesse calmly sailed back into the room, and once more sat down in the chair beside her brother's bureau, whilst Hector with as much grandeur of mien as he could assume under the circumstances was still waiting for orders. M. le Comte would undoubtedly have preferred that his sister should leave the room before the préfet was shown in: he did not approve of women taking part in political conversations, and his manner now plainly showed to Mme. la Duchesse that he would like to receive M. le préfet alone. But he said nothing--probably because he knew that words would be useless if Madame had made up her mind to remain, which she evidently had, so, after a brief pause, he said curtly to Hector: "Show M. le préfet in." He took up his favourite position, in his throne-shaped chair--one leg bent, the other stretched out, displaying to advantage the shapely calf and well-shod foot. M. le préfet Fourier, mathematician of great renown, and member of the Institut was one of those converted Bonapartists to whom it behoved at all times to teach a lesson of decorum and dignity. And certainly when, presently Hector showed M. Fourier in, the two men--the aristocrat of the old regime and the bureaucrat of the new--presented a marked and curious contrast. M. le Comte de Cambray calm, unperturbed, slightly supercilious, in a studied attitude and moving with pompous deliberation to greet his guest, and Jacques Fourier, man of science and préfet of the Isère department, short of stature, scant of breath, flurried and florid! Both men were conscious of the contrast, and M. Fourier did his very best to approach Mme. la Duchesse with a semblance of dignity, and to kiss her hand in something of the approved courtly manner. When he had finally sat down, and mopped his streaming forehead, M. le Comte said with kindly condescension: "You are perturbed, my good M. Fourier!" "Alas, M. le Comte," replied the worthy préfet, still somewhat out of breath, "how can I help being agitated . . . this awful news! . . ." "What news?" queried the Comte with a lifting of the brows, which was meant to convey complete detachment and indifference to the subject matter.