y respectable and, like my own, allied
to several of the first consequence. Madame de Bray recalled our old
TENDRESSE to my mind, and conjured me so movingly by it--and by the
regard which her family had always entertained for me--that I could not
dismiss the application with the hundred others of like tenor that at
that time came to me with each year. That I might do nothing in the
dark, however, I invited the young fellow to walk with me in the
garden, and divined, even before he spoke, from the absence of timidity
in his manner, that he was something out of the common. "So you have
come to Paris to make your fortune?" I said.

"Yes, sir," he answered.

"And what are the tools with which you propose to do it?" I continued,
between jest and earnest.

"That letter, sir," he answered simply; "and, failing that, two horses,
two suits of clothes, and two hundred crowns."

"You think that those will suffice?" I said, laughing.

"With this, sir," he answered, touching his sword; "and a good courage."

I could not but stand amazed at his coolness; for he spoke to me as
simply as to a brother, and looked about him with as much or as little
curiosity as Guise or Montpensier. It was evident that he thought a
St. Mesmin equal to any man under the King; and that of all the St.
Mesmins he did not value himself least.

"Well," I said, after considering him, "I do not think that I can help
you much immediately. I should be glad to know, however, what plans
you have formed for yourself."

"Frankly, sir," he said, "I thought of this as I travelled; and I
decided that fortune can be won by three things--by gold, by steel, and
by love. The first I have not, and for the last I have a better use.
Only the second is left. I shall be Crillon."

I looked at him in astonishment; for the assurance of his manner
exceeded that of his words. But I did not betray the feeling. "Crillon
was one in a million," I said drily.

"So am I," he answered.

I confess that the audacity of this reply silenced me. I reflected
that the young man who--brought up in the depths of the country, and
without experience, training or fashion--could so speak in the face of
Paris was so far out of the common that I hesitated to dash his hopes
in the contemptuous way which seemed most natural. I was content to
remind him that Crillon had lived in times of continual war, whereas
now we were at peace; and, bidding him come to me in a week, I hinted
th