"
The door had just opened to give ingress to a gentleman who stepped
forward and whose face Newman remembered. He had been the author of our
hero's discomfiture the first time he tried to present himself to Madame
de Cintre. Valentin de Bellegarde went to meet his brother, looked at
him a moment, and then, taking him by the arm, led him up to Newman.
"This is my excellent friend Mr. Newman," he said very blandly. "You
must know him."
"I am delighted to know Mr. Newman," said the marquis with a low bow,
but without offering his hand.
"He is the old woman at second-hand," Newman said to himself, as he
returned M. de Bellegarde's greeting. And this was the starting-point of
a speculative theory, in his mind, that the late marquis had been a very
amiable foreigner, with an inclination to take life easily and a sense
that it was difficult for the husband of the stilted little lady by the
fire to do so. But if he had taken little comfort in his wife he had
taken much in his two younger children, who were after his own heart,
while Madame de Bellegarde had paired with her eldest-born.
"My brother has spoken to me of you," said M. de Bellegarde; "and as
you are also acquainted with my sister, it was time we should meet." He
turned to his mother and gallantly bent over her hand, touching it with
his lips, and then he assumed an attitude before the chimney-piece.
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