a nose as red and fiery as a live coal; the idea of how many casks of wine and bottles of brandy must have been imbibed to bring it to such an intensity of erubescence would be enough to terrify the ordinary drinker.  This singular countenance was like a cheese, with a bright, red cherry stuck in the middle of it; and to finish the portrait it would only be necessary to add two apple seeds, placed a little obliquely, for the eyes, and a wide gash for a mouth.  Such was Malartic—­the intimate friend, the Pylades, the Euryalus, the “fidus Achates” of Jacquemin Lampourde; who certainly was not handsome—­but his mental and moral qualities made up for his little physical disadvantages.  Next to Lampourde—­for whom he professed the most exalted admiration and respect—­he was accounted the most skillful swordsman in Paris; he was always lucky at cards, and could drink to any extent without becoming intoxicated.  For the rest, he was a man of great delicacy and honour, in his way—­ready to run any risk to help or support a friend, and capable of enduring any amount of torture rather than betray his comrades—­so that he enjoyed the universal and unbounded esteem of his circle.

Malartic went straight to Lampourde’s table, sat down opposite to him, silently seized the glass the other had promptly filled, and drained it at a single draught; evidently his method differed from his friend’s, but that it was equally efficacious his nose bore indisputable witness.  The two men drank steadily and in silence until they had emptied their third bottle, and then called for pipes.  When they had puffed away for a while, and enveloped themselves in a dense cloud of smoke, they fell into conversation, deploring the bad times since the king, his court and followers, had all gone to Saint Germain, and comparing notes as to their own individual doings since their last meeting.  Thus far they had paid no attention whatever to the company round them, but now such a loud discussion arose over the conditions of a bet between two men about some feat that one of them declared he could perform and the other pronounced impossible, that they both looked round to see what it was all about.  A man of lithe, vigorous frame, with a complexion dark as a Moor’s, jet-black hair and flashing eyes, was drawing out of his red girdle a large, dangerous looking knife, which, when opened, was nearly as long as a sword, and called in Valencia, where it was made, a navaja.  He carefully examined and tested the edge and point of this formidable weapon, with which he seemed satisfied, said to the man he had been disputing with, “I am ready!” then turned and called, “Chiquita!  Chiquita!”

At the sound of her name a little girl, who had been sleeping, rolled up in a cloak, on the floor in a dark corner, rose and came towards Agostino—­for it was he of course—­and, fixing her large dark eyes upon his face earnestly, said, “Master, what do you want me to do?  I am ready to obey you here as everywhere else, because you are so brave, and have so many red marks on your navaja.”