Part 6

"Another day you shall hear how my father carried the dead officers into the catacombs and left them there, and of two dangerous quests he made in those caves in search of us, and of a strange adventure which befell him. On Sunday week come and dine, and hear it all."

"It is most interesting," I said.

"And this is the house, and we were in the cave," said Pierce.

"And," said I, "that was your mother's glove we saw moldering on the cask, where she left it?"

"Yes. A few years ago we found in a corner the baby's rattle. The little fellow died last June, an old man, and the mother and the good, brave Duke are gone. And now you will sup with his son and grandson."

"Ah," exclaimed young St. Maur. "Here is Francois and supper." Upon this the long, lean man who had admitted us said, "Monsieur is served. I shall carry in the wine." And he added, to me, "Monsieur may have let fall his handkerchief," and, so saying, he returned it, lying on a salver. Upon this the Duke and the rest of them laughed outright, but made haste to explain at once.

"Francois," said Des Illes, "will you never be old enough to acquire a little virtue? My dear M. Michel, we have had our good thief Francois with us all these days, ever since that adventure in the cave. He has money in bank, but to steal a handkerchief now and then he cannot resist. I must say, he always returns it."

"Monsieur will have his little jest," said Francois. "The supper waits." With this he left us.

"What a delightful character!" said Pierce. "And did he really pick my friend's pocket?"

"Assuredly," said the Duke. "For many years he used now and then to ask a holiday. He commonly came back rather forlorn, and apt for a while to keep the house and be shy of gendarmes. It was our belief that he went off to get a little amusement in his old fashion. I suspect that he got into serious trouble once, but Des Illes is secretive."

"And how old is he?" said I.

"That no man knows," returned our host, rising. "To be asked his age is the one thing on earth known to annoy him. He says time is the only thief without honor among other thieves."

"Queer, that," said I, as our host rose. "The old have commonly a strange pride in their age."

"I have none," laughed the Duke.

"This way," said Des Illes, and we followed him into a pretty dining-room, and sat down below a half-dozen canvases of men and women of the days of the Regency.

It was a delightful little supper, with clarets of amazing age and in perfect condition. Toward the close, Des Illes retired for a few minutes to add the last charm to what the younger St. Maur called the toilette of the salad. When we had praised it and disposed of it, Des Illes said to me: "Monsieur, our good fortune has brought you here to-night, on the evening when once in each year we sup together in the mourning costume which may have excited your curiosity."

To this we both confessed, and Des Illes added: "On this day we, who are among the few who remember the Terror, meet because it is January the twenty-first. On this day died Louis Sixteenth. You will join us, I trust, in a glass of older wine in remembrance of our dead King." Thus speaking, he rose and himself took from the mantel-shelf a bottle. "It is of the vintage of 1793, an old Burgundy. Its name I do not know, but, as you see, each bottle was marked by my father with a black ribbon."

Standing beside me, he filled our glasses, the Duke's, that of St. Maur, and last his own. Pierce and I rose with the rest. The Duke said, "The King, to his memory." and threw the glass over his shoulder, that no meaner toast might be drunk from it. I glanced at Pierce, and we did as they had done.

"It shows its age." said Des Illes, "but still holds its bouquet. Fading--fading!"

"One would scarce know it for the wine we knew when it and we were young," said the Duke.

"Know it?" said Des Illes. "Ah me, dear Duke, if you yourself, aged twenty-five, were to walk in just now and say, '_Bon jour_, Duke, how is myself,' would you know him, think you?"

"_Pardie_, my friend; you have ghostly fancies. Give us some younger wine and a gayer jest."

"With all my heart," said Des Illes.

"Let it be the Clos Vougeot of '20," said the younger St. Maur. "It was with that wonderful vintage that I made my first entry into the highest society of the great wines."

"A fine seigneur is that," said Des Illes.

"It reminds me rather of some grande dame," returned St. Maur. "There is something haughty about the refinement of a high-caste Burgundy: a combination of decisive individual quality with good manners."

"How pretty that is!" said Pierce. "The good manners of a wine!"

"And is n't champagne just a bit like a grisette?" laughed the Duke. "But a Margaux like this, or the Romance I see yonder, are grandees, as my friend has said; and there might be more to say of them, but I leave the rest to your fancy. A little more Burgundy, Monsieur?"

As is, alas, true concerning most of the pleasant meals I remember, I can recall but faint reminiscences of the bright talk of that memorable supper.

The younger St. Maur told us a pretty story of a vineyard wooing; a thing so delicate and idyllic that I shall not dare to take it out of its social frame for you. Later, Des Illes stood up and in a queer, creaky tenor sang (and by no means ill) the song the girls sing when they trample out the juice of the grapes in the great vats. Upon this Pierce quoted:

Pink feet that bruise The gold-green grapes of Andalouse.

I rashly tried to put it into French, and was much complimented upon what I knew to be a sorry failure.

I have a misty recollection of what came after, of old-time jests, of levities as to the Corsican, and, too, a pretty story the Duke told us of the fairy vineyards near to Dijon, which only a woman who loves has ever seen. I seem now, as I write of this delightful night, to see it all again: the little old gentleman; the clear-cut face of the Duke; his son, cynical and handsome; the sheen of jet; the somber, picturesque dresses; thief Francois behind Des Illes's chair, ruddy, gaunt, not less than ninety, with a smile of the same age. As I try to recall it, I remember--do I remember?--the flavor of that Clos Vougeot, and hear again the courteous voice of the Duke: "A little more Burgundy, Monsieur?"