And taking the remaining two he held one in the hollow of each hand.
For a couple or three minutes we held them thus while he chatted about the various vintages. Then we placed them in a row.
"Now," he said, "take up each one separately and smell it."
I did so, and found a most pleasant perfume--each, however, quite separate and distinct, as different as eau-de-Cologne is from lavender water.
"This," he said, after sniffing at one glass, "is 1815--Waterloo year--a magnificent vintage. And this," he went on, handing me the second glass, "is 1829--very excellent, but quite a distinct perfume, you notice. The third is 1864--also good. Of the 1815 I very fortunately have two bottles. Bellamy, in Pall Mall, has three bottles, and there are perhaps four bottles in all Paris. That is all that's left of it. The fourth--smell it--is the ordinary brandy of commerce."
I did so, but the odour was nauseating after the sweet and distinct perfume of the other three.
"Just try the 1815," he urged, carefully pouring out about a third of a glass of the precious pale gold liquid and handing it to me.
I sipped it, finding it exceedingly pleasant to the palate. So old was it that it seemed to have lost all its strength. It was a really delicious liqueur--the liqueur of a gourmet, and assuredly a fitting conclusion to that excellent repast.
"I think I'll have the '64," he said, pouring out a glass and swallowing it with all the gusto of a man whose chief delight was the satisfaction of his stomach.
I took a cigarette from the big silver box he handed me, and I stretched out my hand for the matches.... Beyond that, curiously enough, I recollect nothing else.
I remember seeing, as though rising from out a hazy grey mist, a woman's face--the countenance of a very pretty girl, about eighteen, with big blue wide-open eyes and very fair silky hair--a girl, whose eyes bore in them a hideous look of inexpressible horror.
Next instant the blackness of unconsciousness fell upon me.
When I recovered I was amazed to find myself in bed, with the yellow wintry sunlight streaming into the low, old-fashioned room. For some time--how long I know not--I lay there staring at the diamond-paned window straight before me, vaguely wondering what had occurred.