u think that a good shot can miss a man when
he is firing in his very face, unless he does it purposely?"

"It seems difficult; but at all events it is certain that the horse is
dead, and you must pay for it."

"No, sir, not even if the horse belonged to you, for the postillion
preceded me. You know a great many things; do you happen to know the
posting regulations? Besides, I was in a great hurry because I had
promised a pretty woman to breakfast with her, and such engagements, as
you are well aware, cannot be broken."

Master de la Haye looked angry at the rather caustic irony with which I
had sprinkled the dialogue; but he was still more vexed when, taking some
gold out of my pocket, I returned to him the sum he had lent me in
Vienna. A man never argues well except when his purse is well filled;
then his spirits are pitched in a high key, unless he should happen to be
stupefied by some passion raging in his soul.

M. de Bragadin thought I was quite right to shew myself at the opera
without a mask.

The moment I made my appearance in the pit everybody seemed quite
astonished, and I was overwhelmed with compliments, sincere or not. After
the first ballet I went to the card-room, and in four deals I won five
hundred sequins. Starving, and almost dead for want of sleep, I returned
to my friends to boast of my victory. My friend Bavois was there, and he
seized the opportunity to borrow from me fifty sequins, which he never
returned; true, I never asked him for them.

My thoughts being constantly absorbed in my dear C---- C----, I spent the
whole of the next day in having my likeness painted in miniature by a
skilful Piedmontese, who had come for the Fair of Padua, and who in after
times made a great deal of money in Venice. When he had completed my
portrait he painted for me a beautiful St. Catherine of the same size,
and a clever Venetian jeweller made the ring, the bezel of which shewed
only the sainted virgin; but a blue spot, hardly visible on the white
enamel which surrounded it, corresponded with the secret spring which
brought out my portrait, and the change was obtained by pressing on the
blue spot with the point of a pin.

On the following Friday, as we were rising from the dinner-table, a
letter was handed to me. It was with great surprise that I recognized the
writing of P---- C----. He asked me to pay him a visit at the "Star
Hotel," where he would give me some interesting information. Thinking
that he