But mademoiselle de Coigney had no sooner been informed by her brother of the discovery he had made, than she doubted not that it was on the score of Horatio that he had met with such ill success in his courtship; and also imagined, that it had been owing to some ill impressions mademoiselle Charlotta had given the baron de Palfoy, that her father had been treated by him in the manner already recited.  She complained of it to the baron de la Valiere, and told him, her whole family had been affronted, and her brother rendered miserable, for the sake of a young man, who, said she, can neither have birth or fortune to boast of, since he has been so long a prisoner without any ransom paid, or interposition offered to redeem him.

The baron was too generous not to vindicate the merits of Horatio, as much as was consistent with his love and complaisance for his mistress:  he was notwithstanding very much picqued in his mind that a person, to whom he had given the greatest proofs of a sincere and disinterested friendship, should have concealed a secret of this nature from him, and the more so, as he had seemed to expect and desire his confidence.  From this time forward he behaved to him with a coldness which was sufficient to convince the other of the motive, especially as he found mademoiselle de Coigney took all opportunities of throwing the most picquant reflections on him.  It is certain that lady was so full of spight at the indignity she thought her family had received, that she could not help whispering the attachment of Horatio and Charlotta, not only at St. Germains, but at Paris also, with inunendo’s little less cruel than those her brother had made use of to his companions; so that between them, the amour was talked of among all who were acquainted with either of them.

At length the report reached the ears of the baron de Palfoy, who, tho’ he did not immediately give an entire credit to it, thought it became him to do every thing in his power to silence it.

Accordingly he called his daughter to him one day, and having told her the liberty which the world took in censuring her conduct on Horatio’s account, commanded her to avoid all occasions of it for the future, by seeing him no more.

The confusion she was in, and which she had not artifice wholly to conceal from the penetrating baron, more convinced him, than all he had been told, that there was in reality some tender intercourse between them; but resolving to be fully ascertained, he said no more to her at that time, but dispatched a messenger immediately to St. Germains, desiring Horatio to come to him the same day.

The lover readily obeyed this summons, but not without some apprehensions of the motive:  the hints daily given him, joined to the alteration, not only in the behaviour of mademoiselle de Coigney, but likewise of the baron de la Valiere, gave him but too just room to fear his passion was no longer a secret.