then these finds served as so many springs which, turned on by a question, played off an essay on Jean Goujon, Michel Columb, Germain Pilon, Boulle, Van Huysum, and Boucher, the great native painter of Le Berry; on Clodion, the carver of wood, on Venetian mirrors, on Brustolone, an Italian tenor who was the Michael-Angelo of boxwood and holm oak; on the thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, on the glazes of Bernard de Palissy, the enamels of Petitot, the engravings of Albrecht Durer—­whom she called Dur; on illuminations on vellum, on Gothic architecture, early decorated, flamboyant and pure—­enough to turn an old man’s brain and fire a young man with enthusiasm.

Madame de la Baudraye, possessed with the idea of waking up Sancerre, tried to form a so-called literary circle.  The Presiding Judge, Monsieur Boirouge, who happened to have a house and garden on his hands, part of the Popinot-Chandier property, favored the notion of this coterie.  The wily Judge talked over the rules of the society with Madame de la Baudraye; he proposed to figure as one of the founders, and to let the house for fifteen years to the literary club.  By the time it had existed a year the members were playing dominoes, billiards, and bouillotte, and drinking mulled wine, punch, and liqueurs.  A few elegant little suppers were then given, and some masked balls during the Carnival.  As to literature—­there were the newspapers.  Politics and business were discussed.  Monsieur de la Baudraye was constantly there—­on his wife’s account, as she said jestingly.

This result deeply grieved the Superior Woman, who despaired of Sancerre, and collected the wit of the neighborhood in her own drawing-room.  Nevertheless, and in spite of the efforts of Messieurs de Chargeboeuf, Gravier, and de Clagny, of the Abbe Duret and the two chief magistrates, of a young doctor, and a young Assistant Judge—­all blind admirers of Dinah’s—­there were occasions when, weary of discussion, they allowed themselves an excursion into the domain of agreeable frivolity which constitutes the common basis of worldly conversation.  Monsieur Gravier called this “from grave to gay.”  The Abbe Duret’s rubber made another pleasing variety on the monologues of the oracle.  The three rivals, tired of keeping their minds up to the level of the “high range of discussion”—­as they called their conversation—­but not daring to confess it, would sometimes turn with ingratiating hints to the old priest.

“Monsieur le Cure is dying for his game,” they would say.

The wily priest lent himself very readily to the little trick.  He protested.

“We should lose too much by ceasing to listen to our inspired hostess!” and so he would incite Dinah’s magnanimity to take pity at last on her dear Abbe.

This bold manoeuvre, a device of the Sous-prefet’s, was repeated with so much skill that Dinah never suspected her slaves of escaping to the prison yard, so to speak, of the cardtable; and they would leave her one of the younger functionaries to harry.