The door opened, and the fellow whom I had seen the night before with Madame de Cocheforet entered and took a stool by the fire.

I felt sure that he was one of the servants at the Chateau; and in a flash his presence inspired me with the most feasible plan for obtaining admission which I had yet hit upon.

I felt myself grow hot at the thought--it seemed so full of promise, yet so doubtful--and, on the instant, without giving myself time to think too much, I began to carry it into effect.
I called for two or three bottles of better wine, and, assuming a jovial air, passed it round the table.

When we had drunk a few glasses I fell to talking, and, choosing politics, took the side of the Languedoc party and the malcontents in so reckless a fashion that the innkeeper was beside himself at my imprudence.

The merchants, who belonged to the class with whom the Cardinal was always most popular, looked first astonished and then enraged.