He had been standing upon the steps, looking out, like me, upon the
moonlight effects that transformed, as it were, the objects and
buildings in the little street. He accosted me, I say, with the
politeness, at once easy and lofty, of a French nobleman of the old
school. He asked me if I were not Mr. Beckett? I assented; and he
immediately introduced himself as the Marquis d'Harmonville (this
information he gave me in a low tone), and asked leave to present me
with a letter from Lord R----, who knew my father slightly, and had
once done me, also, a trifling kindness.
This English peer, I may mention, stood very high in the political
world, and was named as the most probable successor to the distinguished
post of English Minister at Paris. I received it with a low bow, and
read:
My Dear Beckett,
I beg to introduce my very dear friend, the Marquis d'Harmonville, who
will explain to you the nature of the services it may be in your power
to render him and us.
He went on to speak of the Marquis as a man whose great wealth, whose
intimate relations with the old families, and whose legitimate influence
with the court rendered him the fittest possible person for those
friendly offices which, at the desire of his own sovereign, and of our
government, he has so obligingly undertaken.
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