The hands of the clock verging upon the hour of closing the Bank, there was a general set of the current of talkers past Mr. Lorry’s desk. He held the letter out inquiringly; and Monseigneur looked at it, in the person of this plotting and indignant refugee; and Monseigneur looked at it in the person of that plotting and indignant refugee; and This, That, and The Other, all had something disparaging to say, in French or in English, concerning the Marquis who was not to be found.

“Nephew, I believe⁠—but in any case degenerate successor⁠—of the polished Marquis who was murdered,” said one. “Happy to say, I never knew him.”

“A craven who abandoned his post,” said another⁠—this Monseigneur had been got out of Paris, legs uppermost and half suffocated, in a load of hay⁠—“some years ago.”