"Madame la Duchesse de Lucenay is the daughter of M. the Prince de Noirmont. The father of M. le Vicomte was bosom friend of the prince. Madame la Duchesse was then very young, and M. de Saint-Remy, senior, who was very fond of her, treated her as if she were his own child. I learnt these details from Simon, the prince's man of business; and I may speak unhesitatingly, for the adventure I am about to narrate to you was, at the time, the talk of all Paris. In spite of his sixty years, the father of M. le Vicomte is a man of iron disposition, with the courage of a lion, of probity which I call almost fabulous. He had scarcely any property of his own, and had married the vicomte's mother for love. She was a young person of good fortune, possessing about a million of francs, at the melting of which we have had the honour to be present." And M. Boyer bowed. Edwards imitated him. "The marriage was a very happy one, until the moment when the father of M. le Vicomte found--accidentally, as they say--some letters, which proved that, during one of his absences three or four years after his marriage, his wife had had an attachment for a certain Polish count." "That often happens to these Poles. When I was at the Marquis de Senneval's, the marquise, a regular she-devil--" "My dear Edwards," interrupted M. Boyer, "you should learn the alliances of our great families before you speak, or you will sadly blunder." "How?" "Madame la Marquise de Senneval is sister of M. le Duc de Montbrison, into whose establishment you wish to enter." "Ah, the devil!" "Judge of the effect if you had spoken thus of her before tattling people! You would not have remained in the house twenty-four hours." "True, Boyer; I must endeavour to 'get up' my peerage." "I resume. The father of M. le Vicomte discovered, after twelve or fifteen years of a marriage very happy until then, that he had this Polish count to complain of. Fortunately, or unfortunately, M. le Vicomte was born nine months after his father, or rather M. le Comte de Saint-Remy, had returned from this unpropitious journey, so that he could not be certain, in spite of the greatest probabilities, whether or not M. le Vicomte could fairly charge him with paternity. However, the comte separated instantly from his wife, would not touch a stiver of the fortune she had brought him, and returned into the country with about eighty thousand francs which he possessed of his own. But you have yet to learn the rancour of this diabolical character. Although the outrage had been perpetrated fifteen years when he detected it, the father of M. le Vicomte, accompanied by M. de Fermont, one of his relatives, sought out this Polonese seducer, and found him at Venice, after having sought for him during eighteen months in every city in Europe." "What determination!"