espoisse pleased the
ladies, and won at cards; these were the only ways of gaining a living
known to him.

Their mother, Dame de Lespoisse, was making a splash at Motte-Giron only
in order to catch gulls. As a matter of fact, she had not a penny, and
owed for everything, even to her false teeth. Her clothes and furniture,
her coach, her horses, and her servants had all been lent by Parisian
moneylenders, who threatened to withdraw them all if she did not
presently marry one of her daughters to some rich nobleman, and the
respectable Sidonie was expecting to find herself at any moment naked
in an empty house. In a hurry to find a son-in-law, she had at once
cast her eye upon Monsieur de Montragoux, whom she summed up as being
simple-minded, easy to deceive, extremely mild, and quick to fall in
love under his rude and bashful exterior. Her two daughters entered
into her plans, and every time they met him, riddled poor Bluebeard with
glances which pierced him to the depths of his heart. He soon fell
a victim to the potent charms of the two Demoiselles de Lespoisse.
Forgetting his oath, he thought of nothing but marrying one of them,
finding them equally beautiful. After some delay, caused less by
hesitation than timidity, he went to Motte-Giron in great state, and
made his petition to the Dame de Lespoisse, leaving to her the choice
of which daughter she would give him. Madame Sidonie obligingly replied
that she held him in high esteem, and that she authorized him to pay his
court to whichever of the ladies he should prefer.

"Learn to please, monsieur," she said. "I shall be the first to applaud
your success."

In order to make their better acquaintance, Bluebeard invited Anne and
Jeanne de Lespoisse, with their mother, brothers, and a multitude of
ladies and gentlemen to pass a fortnight at the castle of Guillettes.
There was a succession of walking, hunting, and fishing parties, dances
and festivities, dinners and entertainments of every sort. A young
_seigneur_, the Chevalier de Merlus, whom the ladies Lespoisse had
brought with them, organized the beats. Bluebeard had the best packs of
hounds and the largest turnout in the countryside. The ladies rivalled
the ardour of the gentlemen in hunting the deer. They did not always
hunt the animal down, but the hunters and their ladies wandered away in
couples, found one another, and again wandered off into the woods. For
choice, the Chevalier de la Merlus would lose himsel