We had heard of him as a duellist, as a bully, an
employer of bravos. At Jarnac he had been the last to turn from
the shambles. Men called him cruel and vengeful even for those
days--gone by now, thank God!--and whispered his name when they
spoke of assassinations; saying commonly of him that he would not
blench before a Guise, nor blush before the Virgin.
Such was our visitor and neighbour, Raoul de Mar, Vidame de
Bezers. As he sat on the terrace, now eyeing us askance, and now
paying Catherine a compliment, I likened him to a great cat
before which a butterfly has all unwittingly flirted her
prettiness. Poor Catherine! No doubt she had her own reasons
for uneasiness; more reasons I fancy than I then guessed. For
she seemed to have lost her voice. She stammered and made but
poor replies; and Madame Claude being deaf and stupid, and we
boys too timid after the rebuff we had experienced to fill the
gap, the conversation languished. The Vidame was not for his
part the man to put himself out on a hot day.
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