He had a good and mild countenance, without expression--a mathematician minus the pride.

A certain fire sparkled in the eyes of this personage, a rather sly smile played round his lips; but the observer might soon have remarked that this fire and this smile applied to nothing, enlightened nothing.

Vatel laughed like an absent man, and amused himself like a child.

At the sound of his master's voice he turned round, exclaiming: "Oh! monseigneur!" "Yes, it is I.What the devil are you doing here, Vatel?
Wine! You are buying wine at a _cabaret_ in the Place de Greve!" "But, monseigneur," said Vatel, quietly after having darted a hostile glance at Gourville, "why am I interfered with here?
Is my cellar kept in bad order ?" "No, certes, Vatel, no; but--" "But what ?" replied Vatel.

Gourville touched Fouquet's elbow.
"Don't be angry, Vatel; I thought my cellar--your cellar--sufficiently well stocked for us to be able to dispense with recourse to the cellar of L'Image-de-Notre-Dame." "Eh, monsieur," said Vatel, shrinking from monseigneur to monsieur with a degree of disdain: "your cellar is so well stocked that when certain of your guests dine with you they have nothing to drink." Fouquet, in great surprise, looked at Gourville.