Powder and Patch by Georgette Heyer Page B

Trembles in Her Ear’. I would you could have seen it.”
    “Which? The rondeau?”
    “The pearl, man! The rondeau you shall most assuredly see.”
    “Merciful heaven!” gasped Tom. “A rondeau! Philip—poet! Sacré mille petits cochons!”
    “Monsieur dines at home this evening?” asked Francois.
    Philip sat at his dressing-table, busy with many pots and his face. He nodded. “The uncle of Monsieur receives, without doubt?”
    “A card party,” said Philip, tracing his eyebrows with a careful hand.
    François skipped to the wardrobe and flung it open. With a finger to his nose he meditated aloud.
    “The blue and silver ... un peu trop soigné. The orange ... peu convenable. The purple ... the purple ... essayons!”
    Philip opened the rouge jar.
    “The grey I wore at De Flaubert’s last month.” François clapped a hand to his head.
    “Ah, sot!” he apostrophised himself. “Voilà qui est très bien.” He dived into the wardrobe emerging presently with the required dress. He laid it on the bed, stroking it lovingly, and darted away to a large chest. From it he brought forth the pink and silver waistcoat that De Bergeret had admired, and the silver lace. Then he paused. “Les bas ...? Les bas aux oiseaux-mouches ..,
    où sont-ils?” He peered into a drawer, turning over neat piles of stockings. A convulsion of fury seemed to seize him, and he sped to the door. “Ah, sapristi! Coquin! Jacques!” In answer to his frenzied call came the cadaverous one, shivering. François seized him by the arm and shook him.
    “Thou misbegotten son of a toad!” he raved. “Where is the small box I bade you guard with your life? Where is it, I say. Thou—”

“I gave it into your hands,” said Jacques sadly. “Into your hands, your very hands, in this room here by the door! I swear it.”
    “Swear it? What is it to me, your swear? I say I have not seen the box! At Dover, what did I do? Nom d’un nom, did I not say to you, lose thy head sooner than that box?” His voice rose higher and higher. “And now, where is it?”
    “I tell you I gave it you! It is this bleak country that has warped your brain. Never did the box leave my hands until I gave it into yours!”
    “And I say you did not! Saperlipopette, am I a fool that I should forget. Now listen to what you have done! You have lost the stockings of Monsieur! By your incalculable stupidity, the stupidity of a pig, an ass—”
    “Sacré nom de Dieu! Am I to be disturbed by your shrieking?” Philip had flung down the haresfoot. He slewed round in his chair. “Shut the door! Is it that you wish to annoy my uncle that you shout and scream in his house?” His voice was thunderous.
    François spread out his hands.
    “M’sieur, I ask pardon! It is this âne, this careless gaillard—” “Mais, m’sieur!” protested Jacques. “It is unjust; it is false!”
    “Ecoutez donc, m’sieur!” begged François, as the stern grey eyes went from his face to that of the unhappy Jacques. “It is the bandbox that contains your stockings—the stockings aux oiseaux-mouches! Ah, would that I had carried it myself! Would that—” “Would that you would be quiet!” said Philip severely. “If either of you have lost those stockings ...” He paused, and once more his eyes travelled from one to the other. “I shall seek another valet.”
    François became tearful.
    “Ah, no no, m’sieur! It is this imbecile, this crapaud— “M’sieu’, je vous implore—
    Philip pointed dramatically across the room. Both men looked fearfully in the direction of that
    accusing finger.
    “Ah!” François darted forward. “La voilà! What did I say?” He clasped the box to his breast. “What did I say?”
    “But it is not so!” cried Jacques. “What did you say? You said you had not seen the box! What did I say? I said—”
    “Enough!” commanded Philip. “I will not endure this bickering! Be quiet François! Little monkey that you are!”
    “M’sieur!”