Talking thus the two had reached the Quai de l’Ecole, and there a carriage just missed running over de Sigognac, though he did his best to get out of its way.  As it was, only his extremely slender figure saved him from being crushed between it and the wall, so close did it come to him—­notwithstanding the fact that there was plenty of room on the other side, and that the coachman could easily have avoided the foot passenger he actually seemed to pursue.  The windows of the carriage were all closed, and the curtains drawn down, so that it was impossible to tell whether it had any inmates or not—­but if de Sigognac could have peeped within he would have seen, reclining languidly upon the luxurious cushions, a handsome young nobleman, richly dressed, whose right arm was supported by a black silk scarf, arranged as a sling.  In spite of the warm red glow from the crimson silk curtains, he was very pale, and, though so remarkably handsome, his face wore such an expression of hatred and cruelty, that he would have inspired dislike, rather than admiration—­as he sat there with a fierce frown contracting his brow, and savagely gnawing his under lip with his gleaming white teeth.  In fine, the occupant of the carriage that had so nearly run over the Baron de Sigognac was no other than the young Duke of Vallombreuse.

“Another failure!” said he to himself, with an oath, as he rolled along up the broad quay past the Tuileries.  “And yet I promised that stupid rascal of a coachman of mine twenty-five louis if he could be adroit enough to run afoul of that confounded de Sigognac—­who is the bane of my life—­and drive over him, as if by accident.  Decidedly the star of my destiny is not in the ascendant—­this miserable little rustic lordling gets the better of me in everything.  Isabelle, sweet Isabelle, adores him, and detests me—­he has beaten my lackeys, and dared to wound me.  But there shall be an end of this sort of thing, and that speedily—­even though he be invulnerable, and bear a charmed life, he must and shall be put out of my way—­I swear it! though I should be forced to risk my name and my title to compass it.”

“Humph!” said Herode, drawing a long breath; “why those brutes must be of the same breed as the famous horses of that Diomedes, King of Thrace, we read of, that pursued men to tear them asunder, and fed upon their flesh.  But at least you are not hurt, my lord, I trust!  That coachman saw you perfectly well, and I would be willing to wager all I possess in the world that he purposely tried to run over you—­he deliberately turned his horses towards you—­I am sure of it, for I saw the whole thing.  Did you observe whether there was a coat of arms on the panel?  As you are a nobleman yourself I suppose you must be familiar with the devices of the leading families in France.”

“Yes, I am of course,” answered de Sigognac, “but I was too much occupied in getting out of the way of the swift rolling carriage to notice whether there was anything of that kind on it or not.”