She vanished, a little fluttered, lovelier than ever in her mixture
of confusion and timidity. Scaramouche closed the door and faced the
enraged M. Binet, who had flung himself into an armchair at the head
of the short table, faced him with the avowed purpose of asking for
Climene's hand in proper form. And this was how he did it:

"Father-in-law," said he, "I congratulate you. This will certainly mean
the Comedie Francaise for Climene, and that before long, and you shall
shine in the glory she will reflect. As the father of Madame Scaramouche
you may yet be famous."

Binet, his face slowly empurpling, glared at him in speechless
stupefaction. His rage was the more utter from his humiliating
conviction that whatever he might say or do, this irresistible fellow
would bend him to his will. At last speech came to him.

"You're a damned corsair," he cried, thickly, banging his ham-like fist
upon the table. "A corsair! First you sail in and plunder me of half my
legitimate gains; and now you want to carry off my daughter. But I'll be
damned if I'll give her to a graceless, nameless scoundrel like you, for
whom the gallows are waiting already."

Scaramouche pulled the bell-rope, not at all discomposed. He smiled.
There was a flush on his cheeks and a gleam in his eyes. He was very
pleased with the world that night. He really owed a great debt to M. de
Lesdiguieres.

"Binet," said he, "forget for once that you are Pantaloon, and behave
as a nice, amiable father-in-law should behave when he has secured a
son-in-law of exceptionable merits. We are going to have a bottle of
Burgundy at my expense, and it shall be the best bottle of Burgundy
to be found in Redon. Compose yourself to do fitting honour to it.
Excitations of the bile invariably impair the fine sensitiveness of the
palate."

CHAPTER VII. THE CONQUEST OF NANTES

The Binet Troupe opened in Nantes--as you may discover in surviving
copies of the "Courrier Nantais"--on the Feast of the Purification with
"Les Fourberies de Scaramouche." But they did not come to Nantes
as hitherto they had gone to little country villages and townships,
unheralded and depending entirely upon the parade of their entrance
to attract attention to themselves. Andre-Louis had borrowed from the
business methods of the Comedie Francaise. Carrying matters with a high
hand entirely in his own fashion, he had ordered at Redon the printing
of playbills, and four days before the compan