I have tried to make what use I could of this fallow time, as I did on the chaland .During the days I have tried to make conversation with Eloise, the girl who received the letter. This has been difficult because she is not very intelligent and we have few interests in common. I let it be known that I have been at Versailles and St. Cloud recently. In time, word reached her of this, and she began to sit near me at meals, and to ask if I knew this or that person there, and what had become of so-and-so. So at last I have learned who she is, and who her well-dressed cousin is: the Chevalier d'Adour, who has devoted his last several years to currying favor with Maréchal Louvois, the King's commander-in-chief. He distinguished himself in the recent massacres of Protestants in the Piedmont and, in sum, is the sort who might be entrusted with a mission of some importance.