The Seneschal cleared his throat with noisy nervousness.

Madame stood hand on hip, the flush fading slowly, her glance resuming its habitual lazy insolence.

By the fire Marius paused and kicked the logs into a blaze, regardless of the delicate fabric of his rosetted shoes.
"Monsieur le Seneschal," said madame calmly, "came to see us in the matter of the courier." "Ah!" said Marius, with an insolent lifting of his brows and a sidelong look at Tressan; and Tressan registered in his heart a vow that when he should have come to wed the mother, he would not forget to take payment for that glance from her pert son.
"Monsieur le Comte will remain and sup with us before riding back to Grenoble," she added.
"Ah!" said he again, in the same tone.

And that for the moment was all he said.

He remained by the fire, standing between them where he had planted himself in the flesh, as if to symbolize the attitude he intended in the spirit.
But one chance he had, before supper was laid, of a word alone with his mother, in her own closet.
"Madame," he said, his sternness mingling with alarm, "are you mad that you encourage the suit of this hedgehog Tressan ?" She looked him up and down with a deliberate eye, her lip curling a little.
"Surely, Marius, it is my own concern." "Not so," he answered her, and his grasp fastened almost viciously on her wrist.