She returned his caress gently, and tasted
the wine with her pale lips. Ethel's head bent in silence over her glass;
and, as for Laura, need I say what happened to her! When the ladies went
away my heart was opened to my friend Florac, and I told him where and
how I had left my dear Clive's father.
The Frenchman's emotion on hearing this tale was such that I have loved
him ever since. Clive in want! Why had he not sent to his friend? Grands
Dieux! Clive who had helped him in his greatest distress! Clive's father,
ce preux chevalier, ce parfait gentilhomme! In a hundred rapid
exclamations Florac exhibited his sympathy, asking of Fate, why such men
as he and I were sitting surrounded by splendours--before golden vases
crowned with flowers--with valets to kiss our feet--(those were merely
figures of speech in which Paul expressed his prosperity)--whilst our
friend the Colonel, so much better than we, spent his last days in
poverty, and alone.
I liked Florac none the less, I own, because that one of the conditions
of the Colonel's present life, which appeared the hardest to most people,
affected Florac but little.
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